The coach-glasses of such as did not huzza for “Wilkes” and “Liberty” were broken, the paint and varnish of chariots and coaches, met and stopped for miles round, were spoiled by the mob—scratching them with the favourite “45.” Lord Bute, generally the object of popular disfavour, was denounced by an attack made on his residence, where the mob broke his windows, as usual, but failed to effect an entrance; the same unwelcome attention was paid to Lord Egremont’s, in Pall Mall, as the chief signatory to the warrant for Wilkes’s committal. The Duke of Northumberland had the honour of appearing, whether he would or no, of being forced to supply the mob with liquor, and to drink with them to Wilkes’s success. The demonstration assumed formidable proportions; all the windows from West to East were illuminated to please the mob, otherwise they were broken by the riotous “true loyal Britons and friends of Liberty,” who performed some curious feats; some of the regimental drummers, not the Scotch regiments it may be premised, beating their drums for Wilkes. This astute diplomatist, finding his election secure, very prudently dismissed his enthusiastic partisans, such as the weavers, back to town, the polling[50] was ended, and by the next morning quietude was resumed in the vicinity of Brentford. Some of the incidents were particularly ludicrous, the mob going out of the way to perpetuate the number of the North Briton so objectionable to the Court. The Austrian Ambassador, the Count de Seilern, described by Horace Walpole in a letter to the Earl of Hertford as the most stately and ceremonious of men, was obliged to get out of his coach, and ignominiously held with his legs in the air while the figures “45” were chalked on the soles of his shoes. This insult formed the grounds of an official complaint. It was as difficult for the minister to help laughing at the gravity of his representations as to redress the slight offered to a friendly power in the person of its representative.
Wilkes was now master of the situation; all his expectations were verified. Elated with success, his audacity enabled him to make the most of his undeserved triumph, and assuming a tone which heaped fresh mortifications upon the Court, he printed an address of acknowledgment to his constituents, in which he invited them to give him their instructions from time to time, and promised that he would always defend their civic and religious rights. Although posing as the champion of liberty, Wilkes’s parliamentary career was a dismal failure; in the House he was of no account whatever.
It is interesting to note contemporaneous opinion on a point which is so strongly distorted by partisanship that independent impressions are rare. Dr. Franklin, whose genuine passion for liberty it must be admitted was as absorbing and unaffected as Wilkes’s assumed patriotism was shallow and self-serving, happened to be in London at the time of the violent ferment occasioned by the Middlesex election in 1768. Although lately returned from Paris, and himself, a citizen of the land which complimented Paine, he thus unreservedly sums up the popular candidate, together with the political agitation associated with his pretensions.
“’Tis really an extraordinary event to see an outlaw and exile of bad personal character, not worth a farthing, come over from France, set himself up as a candidate for the capital of the kingdom, miss his election only by being too late in his application, and immediately carrying it for the principal county. The mob, spirited up by numbers of different ballads, sung or roared in the streets, requiring gentlemen and ladies of all ranks as they passed in their carriages, to shout for ‘Wilkes and Liberty;’ marking the same words on their coaches with chalk, and ‘No. 45’ on every door, which extend a vast way along the roads into the country. I went last week to Winchester, and observed that for fifteen miles out of town there was scarcely a door or window-shutter next the road unmarked, and this continued here and there quite to Winchester, which is sixty-four miles.”
The day of Wilkes’s election appeared the portrait of “John Wilkes, elected Knight of the Shire for Middlesex, March 28, 1768, by the free voice of the people,” with, according to the allegorical taste of the time, Hercules and Minerva as supporters, the latter crowning the elect M.P. with a wreath, while the former tramples upon the serpent of Envy; the genius of Liberty is holding the staff of maintenance, surmounted by the cap of liberty (as invariably associated with Wilkes), and is pointing to the portrait as her champion. Simultaneously appeared an engraving commemorative of other incidents of the return from Brentford, showing the valour of the chief magistrate of the city. The guards on duty at St. James’s Palace had orders to be in readiness to march at beat of drum to suppress any riots which might take place; it has been described how certain drummers took to drumming for Wilkes, while his sympathizers marched through Westminster to the city, upsetting all in their way, chalking doors, breaking window-glass, both in houses and carriages, inscribing vehicles and foot-passengers impartially with “45.” “Wilkes and Liberty” was the cry, and woe to those who did not join in shouting, for they, without further inquiry, were promptly knocked down. In the city, the mob grew more outrageous, the lord mayor being the Hon. Thomas Harley, who had been elected for the city, at the top of the poll, when Wilkes, his name lowest on the list, had been defeated ignominiously; moreover, the lord mayor was a courtier, and was denounced subsequently in the North Briton as “a political gambler,” nor was the charge groundless. The mob accordingly attacked the Mansion House and the lord mayor’s private residence in Aldersgate Street; neither of these places being illuminated in honour of Wilkes was a sufficient offence in the sight of the mob, who proceeded to demolish the windows: every pane of glass was broken, even to those of the lady mayoress’s bed-chamber. Then they erected a gallows, on which was suspended a boot and petticoat to symbolize the Princess of Wales, only too well-known, according to popular clamour, in association with the Earl of Bute, the “Laird of the Boot” thus indicated in close proximity; these suggestive emblems of hated “secret influence” were also marked “45” for the nonce. The pictorial satire evoked on this topic, “The Rape of the Petticoat” (March 28, 1768), exhibits the lord mayor making a sally from the Mansion House, supported by constables armed with long staves; the chief magistrate has himself seized the obnoxious boot and petticoat, amid the ridicule and laughing resistance of the rabble, who are treating his lordship to indignities. Below the design is inscribed, “He valiantly seiz’d the Petticoat and Boot at the portal of his own Mansion.—Daily Advertiser.”
This loyal zeal was rewarded with signal favour. Harley was made a councillor of State, and subsequently, through Lord Suffolk, obtained a lucrative contract. To the impression of this print in the Oxford Magazine the following verses were added:—
“Sing thou, my muse, the dire contested fray,
Where Harley dar’d the dangers of the day;
Propitious Day, that could at once create
A Merchant Tailor[51] Councillor of State!
A numerous multitude contriv’d to meet;
And Halloo Forty-Five thro’ every street;
And (what’s incredible) were heard to cry
Those words seditious, Wilkes and Liberty!
On lofty standards in the air did float
Those hieroglyphics ‘Boot and Petticoat.’
Soon as their dreadful shouts accost the ear
Of grocer knights, and traders in small-beer,
Confounded and amaz’d the Guildhall court
Forget their custard, and forsake their port;
Away, with ghastly looks, lo, Harley ran,
And thus, in doleful plight, their dismal tale began:
‘Most honour’d, most belov’d, thou best of men!’
Then from his mansion rush’d the val’rous chief,
To serve his country, or to—take a thief:
But more resolv’d to crush Rebellion’s root,
And triumph o’er the Petticoat and Boot;
In equal balance hung the fierce dispute
Between the warlike Magistrate and Boot.
The Boot and Petticoat at length gave way,
And now remain the trophies of the day.”
On the 20th of April, Wilkes appeared before the Court of King’s Bench, Westminster, of which event an engraving was published. On his surrendering to his outlawry, the Attorney-General moved for Wilkes’s commitment, but the judges refused to grant an order to that effect, on the ground that he was not legally before the court; Wilkes then left, accompanied by the plaudits of the spectators. “The Scot’s Triumph; or, a Peep behind the Curtain” gives a further illustration of this subject; this print, and another following, are announced in the Public Advertiser:—