William Pitt and the Great War

by J. Holland Rose

Presumably the national crisis was not yet acute enough to satisfy Pitt that he might conscientiously oppose Addington. But that he was drifting to this conviction appears in the following letter from Rose to the Bishop of Lincoln.

Feb. 11, 1804.[667]

I showed Mr. Pitt your letter because it expressed so entirely my own view of the interesting subject: he appeared at first against anything like hostility, but I think is now disposed to point out pretty strongly the neglect of proper measures of defence in the naval and military departments and to suggest the necessary ones; so [as] to throw on the Government the just responsibility and odium of rejecting them if they shall determine to do so.

Rose then states that the Bishop of St. Asaph calls the new Volunteer Bill "the most wishy-washy thing that ever was produced." He also adds that the King is ill, probably of dropsy. The fact was even worse. A chill caught in drenching rain developed into the former mental malady. Thus the nation was for a time kingless, leaderless, and open to a deadly thrust from Boulogne. For a short time his life was in danger, and all the troubles of a Regency loomed ahead. The Prince of Wales having ventured on the compromising prophecy that the illness "must last several months," Pitt quoted to his informant, Malmesbury, the damning line

Thy wish was father, Harry, to that thought.

In truth, there now began a series of intrigues, in which the Prince, Fox, and the Duke and Duchess of Devonshire played the leading parts, for assuring a Regency and the formation of a Fox Administration. While England needed to keep her gaze on Boulogne, the intriguers thought only of the death or lunacy of the King, the accession of the Prince and the apportionment of the spoils of office. Sheridan on this occasion played his own game and for this was heartily cursed by the expectant Creevey.[668]

In view of these last complications and the prospect of an invasion, Pitt revised his former judgement, and informed Malmesbury that, while declining the offers of the Grenvilles to help to overthrow Addington, he would not refuse to take office if for any reason Ministers resigned. On that day (19th February) Melville wrote to him from Melville Castle that the outlook was full of horror, and everything depended on the formation of a steady and permanent Government with which foreign nations could treat. For this reason he (Melville) urged that the King should be relieved of his executive duties, which it was sheer cruelty to exact from him.[669] Pitt's answer to this daring proposal is not known; but later, on 29th March, in answer to further overtures from Melville, he stated that the King's illness was less serious than was reported by the Earl of Moira, the confidante of the Prince of Wales; and that while it lasted he doubted the propriety of taking any steps to overturn the Ministry.[670] To this scrupulousness Melville was a stranger, and on 4th April again urged him to form a compact opposition for the overthrow of Addington, and promised him the votes of at least twenty-six Scottish members (out of forty-five) for any such effort.[671]

Meanwhile the King recovered but slowly. The nervous, excited, irritable symptoms showed little abatement; and in the third week in March he fell into a fit of anger of such violence that he had to be strapped to his bed. Even more threatening was the military situation. Yorke, early in March, proposed a Volunteer Consolidation Bill, which met with general derision. As the state of the Navy was also unsatisfactory, Pitt freely criticized Ministers, especially St. Vincent; and, on one occasion, when Addington showed boyish petulance, he met with a serene and courteous answer. Tierney, Treasurer of the Navy, attacked Pitt coarsely; Sheridan, with his usual wit and brilliance; but neither coarseness nor eloquence could rehabilitate that Ministry. The urgency of the crisis appears in the following letter written by Pitt at Walmer Castle to some person unknown:

April 11, 1804.

... The experience of the last summer and the discussions of this session confirm me in the opinion that while the Government remains in its present shape and under its present leader, nothing efficient can be expected either to originate with them or to be fairly adopted and effectually executed. With this persuasion, and thinking that a system of more energy and decision is indispensable with a view to the immediate crisis and the many difficulties he may have to encounter in the course of the present contest, I mean to take an early opportunity of avowing and acting on these sentiments more explicitly and decidedly than I have hitherto done; and I shall endeavour to give effect to my opinion by the support of all the friends whom I can collect. My object will be to press to the utmost those points which I think essential to the public defence, and at the same time in doing so to make it, if I can, impossible for the present Government to maintain itself. In this object I have every reason to believe that I shall have the fullest concurrence of all those with whom I have the most differed on former occasions and with whom possibly I may as little agree in future. With their number added to my own more immediate friends, and to the few who have acted with L^d Grenville and Windham, I am persuaded that our division on any favourable question will probably be such as would be sufficient to shake a much stronger Government than the present....[672]