The “Battle of Cornhill,” otherwise the fight for the signatures to the servile loyal address as already described, was followed by another stage in the contest, an attempt to carry the address in state through the city, the procession being stopped by a conflict in Fleet Street, of which turbulent episode a caricature appeared, March 22, 1769, under the title of the “Battle of Temple Bar.” The engraving offers a vista of Fleet Street; the Devil Tavern, the arched entrance to the Temple, and Nando’s Coffee-house are shown to the right; the gates of the bar are closed, and around is a scene of confused conflict. The decapitated heads of Fletcher and Townley, stuck on poles over Temple Bar, are represented in conversation. The Jacobites executed for their share in the Scottish raid of 1745 are inquiring whether the Addressers are not “friends to the cause which we all love so dear,” and which had planted their heads on the bar over twenty years before. A carriage, drawn by two horses, is the centre of the struggle; the coachman is observing “They all seem in a fair way;” the rabble are pelting the vehicle, from which the person charged with the care of the loyal address is making his escape. Another member of the party bound for St. James’s is seeking shelter from the shower of missiles at the entrance to Nando’s. Other coaches have been subjected to similar indignities; the servants are declaring, “Our masters are finely bedaubed!” The city marshal and his charger are under fire from the mob; grasping his baton and holding his hat to protect his face, the marshal declares, “I find I must go to ye Devil!” The Devil, perched on the sign of the famous tavern christened after his name, is crying, with a Scotch twang, “in compliment to my Lord Bute,” “Fly to me, my Bairns!” This plate is given in the London Magazine, with an account of the pelting and flight of those who were engaged in carrying the address to the king.
SEQUEL TO THE BATTLE OF TEMPLE BAR—PRESENTATION OF THE LOYAL ADDRESS AT ST. JAMES’S PALACE. 1769.
[Page 201.
The concluding stage in the progress of the address and the cavalcade of carriages which attended it, was marked by the appearance of the satirical engraving entitled the “Sequel to the Battle of Temple Bar,” 1769, of which a reduced fac-simile is given. The spot represented is the front of St. James’s Palace, facing St. James’s Street. The remnants of the procession of merchants charged with the address in support of the ministry in power are escaping down Pall Mall, the carriages, with broken windows, being followed by galling volleys of stones and dirt on the part of the mob, while a hearse exhibiting inflammatory placards is accorded an enthusiastic reception. The spectators gathered at the St. James’s Coffee House and around the palace are encouraging the hostile demonstration; the courtiers are surveying the tumult from the gateway and windows of St. James’s Palace. A person mounted on the tower, and assumed to be intended for Lord Bute, is pointing to the weathercock, exclaiming, “High north wind,” i.e. a Scotch wind. The Guards are making attacks upon individuals; a gentleman is being surrounded; the violence of the soldiers is watched by a clergyman, evidently intended for Parson Horne, whose eye was upon those who infringed the rights of the subjects or unlawfully maltreated any of the people. A burlesque funeral procession diversified the proceedings, headed by a mounted mute, wearing a crape weeper, with mourning staff, the hearse drawn by two wretched screws, one black and one white; the coachman is equally odd—the person who drove was declared to have been a frolicsome lordling, it is said young Earl Mountmorres. The body of this vehicle displays a flaring placard—the presentment of an Irish chairman striking with a bludgeon a person who is knocked down and defenceless; this moving picture, inscribed “Brentford,” represents the fate of Mr. Clarke, whose fractured skull, caused by the brutal attack of Proctor’s hired ruffians, ended in his death. Similar placards, “St. George’s Fields” and “Scot Victory,” are posted on the hearse to remind the ministers that the odium of the massacre of the people at St. George’s Fields, and the deliberate assassination of William Allen (May 10, 1768), by a grenadier of the Scottish Regiment, were not forgotten; a coloured picture of this episode was displayed on the other side of the hearse. A diversion is attempted at the entrance to the palace gates, where the figure of a short nobleman is distinguishable by the star on his coat; he is using his broken official staff like a sword. This personage, who actually seized one of the rioters, and who is intended for Earl Talbot, lord steward of the household, is bareheaded, his wig having been displaced in the scuffle with the people, and, finally, a knock on the head cooled his courage; the Guards are coming to his support. Further details of the ending of this vexed question of the address are given in the political intelligence of the time. From all accounts, Mr. Boehm, in whose charge was the fateful roll, was too occupied in securing his own safety to trouble about the fate of the address. It appears that the scattered procession went on to St. James’s without the presenter of the document which had entailed so many embarrassments. According to the Political Register, a messenger was despatched back to the coffee-house for the address; where “Mr. Boehm, having missed it, remained in great suspense.” After many inquiries and great alarm, the roll was found under the seat of the coach, where, by a miracle, it had escaped the search of the mob; the address was immediately forwarded to St. James’s, where it was expectantly awaited.
The history of this incident is taken up by the Political Register for 1769:—
“The merchants and traders who retired with the address mentioned in the account of the proceedings at the ‘King’s Arms,’ having by means of repeated advertisements and private letters obtained a considerable number of persons to sign the said address at the Merchant Seamen’s Office over the Royal Exchange; ... Wednesday, the 22nd March, at two in the afternoon, being appointed, on that day at noon, a great number of the merchants, etc., of this city, set out from the Royal Exchange in their carriages, in order to present an address to His Majesty, attended by the City Marshal and constables; before they got to Cheapside, the mob showed them many marks of their resentment, by hissing, groaning, throwing dirt, etc., but when they arrived at Fleet Street, the multitude grew quite outrageous, broke the windows of the coaches, threw stones and glass bottles, and dispatched a party to shut up the gates at Temple Bar, on which the cavalcade was obliged to stop. Mr. Cook, the City Marshal, going to open the gates with his attendants, was very severely treated; his clothes were torn off his back and his head cut in two places. The populace then attacked the gentlemen in their carriages; Mr. Boehm (who carried the roll) and several of his friends being covered with dirt, were obliged to take refuge in Nando’s Coffee-house. Some of the coaches then drove up Chancery Lane, Fetter Lane, and Shoe Lane; but the greater part of the gentlemen, finding it impossible to proceed, returned home. The Addressers, however, did at length reach St. James’s, but the mob threw dirt at the gentlemen as they got out of their carriages at St. James’s Gate.”
The few that reached the palace were so covered with dirt as to be unpresentable, and those of the courtiers who came within reach of the mob were also bespattered. The document which was the main cause of this disturbance was within an ace of never reaching its destination.
“When Mr. Boehm was obliged to get out of his coach at Nando’s Coffee-house to avoid the mob, in his hurry he left the address under the cushion on one of the seats, and immediately ordered the coachman to go home; some of the mob opened the coach door, and began to search for the address, but the coachman declaring ‘it was sent before’ (though he knew not where it was), they were the less diligent in their search, and missed laying hold of it, by not feeling six inches farther on the seat.”
On the road thither, by the Strand, the additions already mentioned were made to the cavalcade, to the consternation of those who formed part of it:—