The Most Christian, himself hardly adverse to war or to messing up the infrastructure, does of course buy his way when it's cheaper or more convenient. Why, every serious power does this. Our friend Venetian ambassador Piero Mocenigo, who keeps a close eye on these machinations in general and on Ambassador Colbert in particular, wrote on the 12th current in his weekly report to the Doge and Senate (at https://www.british-history.ac.uk…) of how Spain is currently paying Sweden to stay in the Triple Alliance. He threw in, however, a comment on the French method, which suggests that not everyone in London is impressed:
"[Sweden] cannot disown the pledge involved in the acceptance of the money paid by the Spaniards (...) Such is the opinion of the Secretary Arlington, who enlarged on the subject with me. He pointed out that Sweden alone, as distinguished from the other allies enjoyed the advantage of being paid by the Spaniards for what, in the event of a rupture [by Spain] with France, she would contribute for guaranteeing the states of the Catholic [Spain]. He said that she would arrive at having an army on foot at the expense of Spain, whereas from France she [Sweden] could expect nothing but liberal promises of pensions which would be a long time in taking shape."
As Williamson finishes reading Appendix III to Sam's dense and detailed letter, James bends toward the King and whispers: "You should say something".
"Hmm? Yeah, thanks Williamson. Gentlemen, we'll discuss this in private now, if you would be so kinde as to wait outside..."
Sam and the rest bow and file out. Williamson has a stretch and a large glass of wine. James to Charles: "You should have said more".
"More about what? Whatever are you after?"
"You know how the gossips are. A 30-minute presentation, and then you say nothing. They'll say you didn't understand or care or don't have the mental capacity. You should have asked two questions and contradicted a little and offered on-the-spot advice. All Great Leaders do this. I had questions ready for you on this card here. You could have asked for another report, Pepys loves doing them".
"For God's sake, Jimbo, we asked him to do a report on how that office is set up, he did it, he says in perfectly clear language that all's fine and should be kept as is, and that's it! It's if I had launched into a detailed debate that people would wonder if I understood. Arlington, send that report to the Lords, and then we'll see what a fountain of clever ideas they are. And I'd like to see my Privy Council meetings being gossiped openly..."
"They all keep Diaries, bro, you know that, nothing's really private anymore".
"So if in a hundred years people read of King Charles' wise pronouncement on how many types of specialist officers the Navy Office should have, my place in history will be assured?" The king harrumphs. "Let's discuss the budget, instead, shall we, my lord High Admiral? If I'm gonna fight the French this summer, I'd rather not spend my time opining on org charts. OK, bring' em back in".
La Gazette de France (available, in high French only, at https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148…) publishes today an "Extraordinary", a supplement on "the Affaires of England, in a Letter from London". The French gazette is rarely where you find your red-hot newes, so imagine our surprize on reading this:
"Mais, preſques en meſme temps qu'on a ici, reçeu cette bonne Nouvelle [a letter to Charles from the king of Denmark, which had come sometime in March] il en eſt arrivé une trés faſcheuse de Tanger, que les Tempeſtes en ont entiérement rüiné le Mole, auquel on avoit dépenſé des Sommes immenſes (...) Cette diſgrace a beaucoup faſché le Roy de la Grand' Bretagne: lequel, ayant appris le bon eſtat de la Place (...) ne penſoit plus qu'à donner les ordres nécéſſaires pour (...) en rendre la Garnison la plus forte qu'il lui auroit été poſſible (...) en cas que le Roy de Taffiléta (...) se fut réſolu d'en entreprendre le Siége".
[But, nearly at the ſame time as we had here received this good Newes, came a most vexing one from Tangiers, that the Stormes have entirely wrecked its Mole, to which we had devoted immenſe Amounts (...) This diſgrace has much angered the King of Great Britain: who, having learned of the good state of the Place (...) only thought to give the necesſary orders to (...) make its Garrison as strong as possible (...) in case the King of Taffilet (...) would resolve to undertake its Siege".]
At this we almost choked on our cardamome coffee, for when had Mr Pepys, emerging from all these Committees for Tangiers, ever mentioned this Apocalypse? Never - his only discourse of Tangiers was of routine budget matters and, indeed, on the reorg of the troops there. (Or could the quicksilver in our daily Purgative indeed have confused our Braines? Some say it can do that). We perused the State Papers - keeping in minde that the French gazette is usually a month behind, even with this newfangled calendar the Continentals are using - and found no mention either!
This would indeed make it wise to send Taffilet gifts of jewels and ego-boosting Ambassies. If 'tis true. If 'tis not, we now wonder what Advantage could accrue to Versailles, in disseminating this canard...
By some strange magic the State Papers open themselves today on a document of April 8, a "warrant, to pay to the earl of Sandwich, Master of the Great Wardrobe" - oh yes, he's that too - "4000 L., to furnish a present to be sent to the Emperor of Morocco, by Henry, Lord Howard, Ambassador Extraordinary to him".
Because while Thomas Allen has indeed sailed home, we're not forgetting Taffilet, the pirate-king of Barbary, whose wish to try diplomacy (especially acute since Allen threatened to burn down his fleet) and to receive a glamorous British ambassador, will presently be fulfilled. Of late there had been a lot of to- and fro on the budget for that indispensable gift, and yea, £4,000 should buy something not too shabby. In fact it must make Sandwich's head spin just to think about it, given his own perspective on ambassadorial budgets.
'Tis probably for the better if the merchants, whose ships have been England's gifts to Taffilet so far, don't know about this. But they shouldn't miss the greater picture. We find in Gazette No. 353 newes, from a ship now come to Yarmouth, that a French merchant was detained "by an Algiers man of War of 36 guns", and his captain most civilly entertained while its cargo was closely inspected. The Turks, whose patronage Taffilet seems to have accepted, "excusing the strictness of the search upon several abuses put upon them by such of their Enemies [e.g., currently, the French] as had pretended their ships and goods to have been English".
And so, between Allin's treaty of last September with Taffilet and Charles' care to stay out of Venice's fight for Candia with the Turks, 'tis a good thing in the Med to be English right now, and perhaps worth a carbuncle or two.
Sam's appearance with Dennis Gauden before the Treasury Commissioners is duly listed among their minutes for today. The session, the last before a two-week recess, must have been quite intense, as Sam's turn is item No. 54 out of 57, not bad for a morning's business, especially as only two Treasurers are recorded to have been there: "When the Navy privy seal is passed the Treasurers of the Navy are to have the 30,000L. on the Wine Act; also a warrant for 6,000L. out of the ready money of the Customs in the Exchequer" [https://www.british-history.ac.uk…]
Makes sense. Surely that didn't take "most of the morning", which must have been spent waiting to be called. Sam then may have attended this earlier discussion: "A letter to be written to all the nobility that are in arrear with their Poll money" - well, almost by definition that should be all the nobility, period - "and their warrants are to be stopped till they have paid". The warrants include the "creation money" their lordships receive from the crown just for being who they are (or were made, rather), and sundry other subsidies such as "stable money". A few deadbeats are specifically named, including no less than "the Lord Chamberlain" and, gasp but of course, "the Earl of Sandwich", whose "last warrant" (unspecified) hangs in the balance. Either Sam wasn't in the room at that time, or his Sandwich account is so written off that the above that he just shrugged and thought comfy thoughts of the coming pea porridge instead. All the better, if Sam was in this rare mood for "buffoonery" (Sam Pepys the buffoon not being so often in evidence).
Surely none of their lordships saw fit to attend so base and absurd a phant'sy as their actually paying taxes, like vulgar merchants. Every day new complications are thought up! This makes what should be the simple exercise of living on credit far beyond your means and without working, sooo outlandishly and needlessly complex! Why can't we just be given money by his Majestie, without having to give it back the next day to his clerkes, and in exchange, I dunno, ride to the crusades or somethin'?
That a lot of luv there between Sam and the gentlemen-captain was not, could be expected. This flat-foot quill-pusher from the central admin, this vile commoner, disguised as one of them, the horror. But it also seems clear which way this court-martial would go if left to the officers' corps. In this case we wonder how widely the case may have been followed, through the grapevine, by the restless multitude of the ordinary seamen. Pray recall, from the case summary we had thought usefull to post (at https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…) that Roger Baker's plight migtht've been fairly widely known, as his ship's crew had rallied and he had apparently agitated and written around quite a bit, including to Sam. A fact which, if known to the gentlemen-captain, they might've used to plead for his recusal as a judge.
This Society has phant'sied on occasion that seamen would throw bricks through Sam's beautiful windows, as payment for all the rotten biscuits, pressing and whatnot. Sam now comes across as the lower ranks' go-to friend in London - at least for the pursers, who are perhaps not to be confused with the lumpen who furl sails. How the case will go we know not, but 'tis likely the brass knew exactly what it was doing in appointing him to the bench. It suggests the system isn't as well stacked against the tars as one may doubt, or maybe that the system was prudent, given how the fleet's full attention will be needed this summer.
Meanwhile, Sam who yesterday said "how soon I know not" when the Treasurers would deliver the cash they promised him for Tangiers, was satisfied today: The machine, which on occasion can crank fast, has spit out a "Treasury order for 1,449L. 8s. 10d. and 2,000L. to Samuel Pepys for Tangier" (at https://www.british-history.ac.uk…)
The State Papers' end-of-the-month bundle of miscellany (at https://play.google.com/books/rea…) provides a welcome glimpse of the faceless crowd of MyPeople drudges, of the sort that Sam used to have lunch with (though not so often anymore, meseems) without ever naming them. This in the form of a blank warrant from "Whitehall" to the Treasurer of the Chamber, "for a payment to John Birtby, Ant[hony] Ryder, and John Gauntlett, clerks of the Privy Council, for their pains in writing above 1,000 circular letters, and other letters and orders, as directed by the Navy Commissioners during the late war, and by the committees for the sickness, fire of London, &c." With an enclosed list of letters written since September 1663, some in as many as 68 copies.
Hang in there John Anthony & John, it's only a wait of 237 years until Chester Floyd Carlson, inventor of the photocopier, is born in what is now the barely imagined wilderness of the Pacific northwest. Let's assume an average of 10 copies, 2 pages per document and six-day weeks, and it's only about four pages per day for each of you, but those have to be blot-free, and there will have been rush-orders and monster documents. "68 copies" may well correspond to orders that had to be routed to every deployed ship, and so perhaps not so infrequent. Evidently the bureaucracy has also churned out well above 1,000 documents in 5.5 years.
But wait a minute; so the Navy sends its stuff to the Privy Council for copying? "Aye", Sam whispers from the netherworlds; "in those gilded halls they have the nimblest, marble-whitest harpsichord-player hands. The Office only gets former seamen with calluses and rope-mangled fingers. Some have been known to eat the quills and drink the ink".
The memo left by Sam and Middleton in the State Papers is actually even more incriminating than L&M's summary suggests. It mentions, more specifically, examining "Pett (...) as to lending boats from the stores at Chatham to Mr. Kent". This Mr. Kent will also be interrogated by a "Francis Toney", apparently a junior investigator based at Chatham who reappears in further letters and is sent on April 2 chasing after a stolen piece of rope.
A separate affidavit, attached to Sam's memo but dated March 27, after Sam had already left for Dartford, relates that "Francis Toney demanded of Mr. Kent whose boat it was that he had in his ground; he replied that it was his own, and he bought it of Mr. Pett; did not hear anything said about its being borrowed".
'Tis enough to make the knave-o-meter's needle jump, but indeed the file also contains "affidavits (...) relative to boats, old piles, and spurshores, supposed to be taken by Pett, and converted to his own use". Which sound like junk lying around the yard, but wood is expensive and spurshores, "a timber or spar designed to hold a boat away from a pier" according to Merriam-Webster's dictionary, are safety equipment, best not appropriated for firewood.
Allow us, however, an exculpatory note on Mr. Pett's liberal spending on his "pretty house": if the same rules apply as at the Portsmouth yard, we recall from last September that Capt. Tinker's house there was the King's house, and as such had to be kept in royal state, and at great expense, in case H.M. or H.R.H. decided to drop by.
A side note: interestingly, the March 27 memo mentions that one of the witnesses, Daniel Eldridge, "showed the Board the absolution of his late excommunication under the seal of the Archbishop of Canterbury". This presumably removes an obstacle to hearing the witness, but we confess that we didn't even know an excommunication was reversible. Sounds popish to us, but still reassuring (note to self: make sure to include the Archbishop on the guest list for all future dinners).
A quick search for records on Daniel Eldridge finds a shipwright of that name working on Woolwich from 1724 [https://books.google.fr/books?id=…, page 80]. Perhaps the one at Chatham was his dad.
On the Lord Mayor just "betaking himself" to a sulk, rather than being "forced to go": Venetian ambassador Piero Mocenigo begs to differ with our more benign assessment, and relates the incident in his weekly intelligence as a very big deal, big enough that the Doge and Senate should know:
================================================== Serious trouble was narrowly averted here these last evenings owing to the readiness of the people to revolt. This was because when the lord mayor, who has the office and charge of governing the city, entered the college of the Templars who are all gentlemen students, these last claimed as a privilege of that place, that they should lower the sword carried before him by the justiciar. When he objected to do this, they took away the sword and detained the mayor ignominiously for some hours in the College as a prisoner. As the people were gathering their forces on his behalf the king found it necessary to send the guards to put down the tumult. By their efforts the young gentlemen were persuaded to let the lord mayor go, and peace was restored; and so with great ease a fire was extinguished that might very easily have renewed the fire of London with the worst consequences.
Sam would have put a laugh-out-loud emoji in his diary next to this report of his captaincy, if he could. Indeed the Jersey is a bit of a comic-opera set right now. Its record at https://threedecks.org/index.php?… indicates it's fairly old (launched in 1654), and sadly does not mention Capt. Pepys as in-filling between Capts. Francis Digby (which ended in January) and William Poole (whose command will start on April 1 and fittingly enough take the ship to Tangiers).
At this time the Jersey is in dock at Woolwich to have its mainmast replaced (says a letter of 28 January), providing a stable enough deck for its interim captain to pace while brandishing his saber, but in late November it came to notice in the State Papers (https://play.google.com/books/rea…) for its botswain, its gunner, its purser and its cook all being AWOL.
It seems there are different views on whether the Lord Mayor was, as Sam puts it, "forc[ed] to go" into that closett, and sequestered there by the proud students. John Bulstrode, in his diary (at https://archive.org/details/bulst…, page 102) says upon the mayor's entry with his sword, "the gentlemen of the house (...) begun soe great a disturbance that they would not suffer his Lordship to proceed, soe as betaking himselfe to a gentleman's chamber in the house where he was obliged to stay all the day". So the mayor "betook himselfe" and went to sulk, leaving at 7 "with his sword up, without any dinner". He wasn't necessarily frog-marched and thrown into that room.
And serjeant Beck with his watchmen, if they were trotting as we phant'sied, may have been headed to the Temple but not to grab Coventry, because Bulstrode also informs us that the latter won't be arrested until tomorrow morning, March 4. The warrants against Coventry, dated this day, must have been signed after a Council meeting held tonight, perhaps more or less at the same time as the mayor, his mood foul and his stomach rumbling, was slinking out of his hideaway. Why, we say, can't everyone just relax?
On the Mall, Sam's coach encounters that of Sir William Coventry, in which servants are busy stuffing bags and travel-cases.
"I say, Sir William, good-morrow! What a happy surprise", Sam exclaims, still high from last night's revels.
Coventry, in his coach, starts almost to the ceiling and drops a booklet, "100 usefull French sentences for All Situations". "Why, yes, Mr. Pepys. I'm afraid..."
"Have you seen those papers the East India Company wants to introduce at the Treasurers' this day fortnight, my lord? I have a rebuttal with me already, if you have but a minute" - Coventry twitches, gestures to the servants to hurry it, scans the Mall in all directions - "it's only twelve pages. To begin with..."
"Yes, yes, very good Pepys. We'll discuss". Grabs Sam's proferred papers, stuffs them in Sir Duncomb's lap, who almost spills the bag of coins he was tying up. "Now if you will excuse us..."
"I was hoping, Sir William, that you would honor my humble house when leisure allows you. I have now but the most admirable collection... No? Some coffee or chocolate at yonder house at least".
"Mr. Pepys, I have an even grander idea. A masque! As in Venice".
"Why, Sir William, I never suspected... Shall we say, next week?"
"Nay, why delay our pleasure? Right now! Know you, I always fant'sied being a coachman". Coventry starts shrugging off his coat. "Your coachman's green livery is the talk of London, you know? Let me trade clothes with your man and drive your beautiful coach in his stead".
Sam is about to give his enthusiastic support to the project - this must be some new Italian fad at Court, a show of support for Candia! But Hewer cuts in, "Alas, my lord, we're late to the theater already. Mr. Pepys' wife is unstinting, as you may know! Farewell now, my lords" Knocks the ceiling, "Billy! Let's move!"
Billy cracks his whip smartly and bewildered Sam sees Coventry's coach recede in the distance. Why, is that searjant Beck, with a detachment of the Watch, whom they just passed trotting in the other direction?
Aye, Sir William Coventry would be well advis'd to get busy:
-------------------------------- March 3. Warrant to James Beck, serjeant-at-arms, to apprehend Sir William Coventry, and convey him to the Tower for having sent a challenge to the Duke of Buckingham. March 3. Warrant to Sir John Robinson, Lieutenant of the Tower, to receive Sir William Coventry. --------------------------------
State Papers, https://play.google.com/books/rea…. C'mon, Sam, you told us on Monday that all of London knew about it, how can you not be connecting ye dots presently. How can Sir William himself be so blinde as not to be half-way to France already.
So, between a routine morning at the office and the theater, Mr. Pepys "put a mouthfull of victuals in [his] mouth" - unusual language - then took the "upper part of [Queen Katherine's mummified] body in [his] hands". An interesting day indeed, though given the mummy's fragile condition images of Sam "manhandling" it and waltzing with it through the abbey seem unlikely. We phant'sy that Captain John Tinker of Portsmouth, who on Sunday last had asked Sam for leave to come up to London, mayhap brought from a ship come from Tangiers certain remarkable Herbs grown there, whose vapors when smok'd are renown'd to soothe the eyes, with minor side effects on the Minde.
This is not Sam's first encounter with the Leathery Ones. Last spring, on his way back from a merry party at Sir G. Whitmore’s, "by moonshine (...) I having there seen a mummy in a merchant’s warehouse there [sic], all the middle of the man or woman’s body, black and hard" (...) it pleased me much, though an ill sight", so much so that the merchant offered "a little bit, and a bone of an arme". This had been Sam's first - "I never saw any before" (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…) But not the last, then, and only the vanguard of the flood of mummies that are soon to come to London and end ground up in paintpots and medicine jars, walking about in Victorian phantasms and (with luck) stored away between clay pots in museums, a 200-year British love-story with mummies that will be reconsidered with the advent of synthetic pigments but also because the Egyptians tired of it and clamped down.
With less of a magickal pretext, we also note that this hadn't been the first time that Sam, who's always got to touch everything, makes contact with a cadaver out of curiosity, see https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…. And yes, many cultures do refuse to consider their dead as necessarily best served by being locked away and out of sight - why, we ourselves confess to have once been honor'd to share a bedchamber with our hosts' ancestral mummy, who was very decent and quiet company. But of course there are mummies, whose worship may well be idolatrous, and then there are Royal Mummies. Hundreds still come to King Charles to be touched for the King's Evil. In an antique, mummified Queen this virtue must have been distillated & concentrated by the dessication process!
Oh, and by the way, 'tis Carnaval season, halfway 'tween the winter solstice and spring, and a time when mummies are so potent, they almost glow in the dark.
John Bullstrode reports in his Diary for February 13 (at https://archive.org/details/bulst…) that the Spanish Ambassador, doing his job, has, with optimism or grim resignation we do not know, complain'd about all the piracy. "They say a meeting has been had with that ambassador by certain Lords thereto appointed, in order to give him all satisfaction on that point, which they say is like to end in making a more plaine and evident declaration of the peace in the West Indyes, &c." &c indeed. The story doesn't say if the meeting was held at the Spanish Embassy and was a chance to pocket some silverware.
May we point out, in hope of perswadding this Assembly to suspend the customary One Hundred Lashes, that the weather last night was most inclement, and the Lady whose hand Mr. Pepys did hold, may have indeed welcomed this help from a local resident in navigating, in the dark, a construction area likely less familiar than her distant home in Charing Cross. Mr. Gadbury reports "Wind, rain, snow, hail" in London. From the Channel ports, the Letters (at https://play.google.com/books/rea…) contain nothing but Newes of Aeolian disasters and woe, viz. six shipwrecks with casualties and ships dragging their anchors for as much as 2 miles in Yarmouth, and three shipwrecks (one "to pieces") in Deal. We pray that the Lady herself was not broken to pieces in her long journey.
'nother thing. Mr. Bullstrode in his Journall (at https://archive.org/details/bulst…) notes already (though he seems to write with up to a week's delay, and so benefits from the gossip) that "his Majesty was much offended" by my Lord Rochester's conduct, so the King having "pardoned it to Rochester already" seems a hasty Interpolation. We surmise that Sam saw, from a distance, the King nod at the rake's embarrassed salute this morning. Perhaps at Versailles, the dismissal would have been harsher.
But on this matter, Terry's note "L&M note Lord Sandwich's Journal" led us to chase my Lord's journal, post the one ending in 1665 that is most readily found and oftentimes quoted. Las! The chase ends at https://discovery.nationalarchive…, with a catalog reference to a journal indeed ending in 1671, but "held privately (...) not available". We still rejoice that my Lord's not so deeply buried in the Audit of his Ambassadorial accounts (which aren't going so well for him, actually) as to miss Court dinners.
"Gov. Modyford lent Morgan's fleet a massive English Man-o-War named the HMS Oxford (...) The night that the raid was going to commence, there was a huge celebration aboard the ships. A few drunk soldiers during this accidentally destroyed the HMS Oxford". That's what we call a successful pyrate's party. Phant'sy they drank the captain's wine and stole his clothes, too.
A reminder of the Unpredictability of Kings, or maybe of the Blindeness of Great Men: Wasn't my lord Ormond writing to his pal Ossory just four days ago, on the 9th instant, of being "confident that the King neither is, nor will be, prevailed to remove him from the government of Ireland..."? And this, after months of presence at Court precisely to find out. (Carte calendar, https://web.archive.org/web/20191…)
In the Treasury Commission's minutes for this day (at www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-tre…) we find not a Word of this 50,000L. tussle with the Navy. We phant'sy that mayhap it took place before or after the official meeting, or the commission's Remembrancer had dropped his quill, or he got a Significant Look from my Lord Ashly, to go and water ye flowers for a minute.
The only Naval business pertains to the Commission's consideration on the 27th instant of my Lord Anglesey having "diverted" supply funds (we evok'd it at https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…) "The King to be moved in the 4,000L. paid by the Earl of Anglesey to other uses but which should have been for buying stores: that another fund may be appointed for it". This looks like a careful climb-down from accusations against one of the Big Men.
Incidentally we also find in today's State Papers (https://play.google.com/books/rea…) an annoyed request from White Hall, "referenc[ing] (...) the petition of John Chase, his Majesty's apothecary, to find a way for payment of his arrears of 7,000L. and provide for his future payment, the King being wishful to relieve his extremity. With a repetition of the recommendation thereof, the King being displeased that it has not been attended to". The-king-being-displeased, aye gentlemen, let's get moving now, for all we know this Chase may be withholding deliveries of quicksilver for the royal elaboratory next door...
Let the Treasurers chafe and wiggle. Our Sam is walking on water; eating the Duke's sauce right out of his Grace's spoon, and today, seeing them getting dressed down right after a matter-of-fact popping by the State Council. Oh, and the minutes for last Wednesday said "Process against Mr. Pepys to be stopped till sealing day".
Sam is invited today into a sordid little affair that is likely to become the Navy's scandal du jour before long, the State Papers (https://play.google.com/books/rea…) indicate.
On 22 January Roger Baker, purser of the Dartmouth - a busy 5th class workabee frigate which often shows up in reports on convoy and supply missions - wrote to the Commissioners a long and pretty graphic complaint against his captain, Richard Trevanion. Following some unclear muddle (at least as summarized in the Papers) about beer bought on credit, wine issued to the crew for Christmas and an altercation between the two of them, Baker says Trevanion suddenly "gave me 200 blows with his cane, and took me by the hair of my head, intending to dash my brains out (...) he so mangled my face that I fear I shall lose an eye". The 200 blows alone (if we take them literally) must have taken a good 15 minutes at least, but it's not finished: "While I was under the doctor's hands he commanded the boatswain to clap me into the bilboes [leg shackles] atop of the forecastle [the upper deck] where I continued 10 hours, being nailed down with a staple to the davit [a crane often used to suspend the lifeboat]" - sounds dangerous, and wickedly inventive. It gets better: The boatswain gets trashed too for looking like he would help, Trevanion threatens other officers with a council of war or "to have them hanged". So, bad captain; a captain Bligh before the hour. Baker apparently has the letter smuggled out while the madman is on shore.
Letters on 31 January and 2 February then suggest that the Dartmouth, which was to sail to Cadiz and Tangiers on resupply duty, has not; it was wrongly sighted on its way home, and it's unclear where it's been, if anywhere. On 3 February it's in Holehaven, in Essex, so unless it has supernaturall engines we doubt if it went to Tangiers and back. On that day Baker reappears, still locked up in his cabin and reporting that Trevanion has gone rogue, "has not yet rated his men, and God knows when he will" - we're a bit unsure if this is a bureaucratic offense or something worse that could lead to a Bounty situation. The ship, https://threedecks.org informs us, has 110 men on board, who are likely not shrinking lilies themselves but must be more than a bit uneasy about the cap'n by now.
And finally today Baker is writing to Sam, god of the pursers. Apparently some action has been taken, and he offers to "justify on oath the business impeached against my commander", however he "durst[s; dares] not go near the commander, for fear of being murdered". You betcha.
Sam will want the Trevanion file. There's one at https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…, which shows him to be on his second command only, and to have lasted less than a year on the first, a 4th class ship called the Marmaduke that was quite a bit larger - so the Dartmouth could have been a demotion already. Hmm.
Comments
Second Reading
About Wednesday 21 April 1669
Stephane Chenard • Link
The Most Christian, himself hardly adverse to war or to messing up the infrastructure, does of course buy his way when it's cheaper or more convenient. Why, every serious power does this. Our friend Venetian ambassador Piero Mocenigo, who keeps a close eye on these machinations in general and on Ambassador Colbert in particular, wrote on the 12th current in his weekly report to the Doge and Senate (at https://www.british-history.ac.uk…) of how Spain is currently paying Sweden to stay in the Triple Alliance. He threw in, however, a comment on the French method, which suggests that not everyone in London is impressed:
"[Sweden] cannot disown the pledge involved in the acceptance of the money paid by the Spaniards (...) Such is the opinion of the Secretary Arlington, who enlarged on the subject with me. He pointed out that Sweden alone, as distinguished from the other allies enjoyed the advantage of being paid by the Spaniards for what, in the event of a rupture [by Spain] with France, she would contribute for guaranteeing the states of the Catholic [Spain]. He said that she would arrive at having an army on foot at the expense of Spain, whereas from France she [Sweden] could expect nothing but liberal promises of pensions which would be a long time in taking shape."
About Sunday 18 April 1669
Stephane Chenard • Link
As Williamson finishes reading Appendix III to Sam's dense and detailed letter, James bends toward the King and whispers: "You should say something".
"Hmm? Yeah, thanks Williamson. Gentlemen, we'll discuss this in private now, if you would be so kinde as to wait outside..."
Sam and the rest bow and file out. Williamson has a stretch and a large glass of wine. James to Charles: "You should have said more".
"More about what? Whatever are you after?"
"You know how the gossips are. A 30-minute presentation, and then you say nothing. They'll say you didn't understand or care or don't have the mental capacity. You should have asked two questions and contradicted a little and offered on-the-spot advice. All Great Leaders do this. I had questions ready for you on this card here. You could have asked for another report, Pepys loves doing them".
"For God's sake, Jimbo, we asked him to do a report on how that office is set up, he did it, he says in perfectly clear language that all's fine and should be kept as is, and that's it! It's if I had launched into a detailed debate that people would wonder if I understood. Arlington, send that report to the Lords, and then we'll see what a fountain of clever ideas they are. And I'd like to see my Privy Council meetings being gossiped openly..."
"They all keep Diaries, bro, you know that, nothing's really private anymore".
"So if in a hundred years people read of King Charles' wise pronouncement on how many types of specialist officers the Navy Office should have, my place in history will be assured?" The king harrumphs. "Let's discuss the budget, instead, shall we, my lord High Admiral? If I'm gonna fight the French this summer, I'd rather not spend my time opining on org charts. OK, bring' em back in".
About Sunday 18 April 1669
Stephane Chenard • Link
La Gazette de France (available, in high French only, at https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148…) publishes today an "Extraordinary", a supplement on "the Affaires of England, in a Letter from London". The French gazette is rarely where you find your red-hot newes, so imagine our surprize on reading this:
"Mais, preſques en meſme temps qu'on a ici, reçeu cette bonne Nouvelle [a letter to Charles from the king of Denmark, which had come sometime in March] il en eſt arrivé une trés faſcheuse de Tanger, que les Tempeſtes en ont entiérement rüiné le Mole, auquel on avoit dépenſé des Sommes immenſes (...) Cette diſgrace a beaucoup faſché le Roy de la Grand' Bretagne: lequel, ayant appris le bon eſtat de la Place (...) ne penſoit plus qu'à donner les ordres nécéſſaires pour (...) en rendre la Garnison la plus forte qu'il lui auroit été poſſible (...) en cas que le Roy de Taffiléta (...) se fut réſolu d'en entreprendre le Siége".
[But, nearly at the ſame time as we had here received this good Newes, came a most vexing one from Tangiers, that the Stormes have entirely wrecked its Mole, to which we had devoted immenſe Amounts (...) This diſgrace has much angered the King of Great Britain: who, having learned of the good state of the Place (...) only thought to give the necesſary orders to (...) make its Garrison as strong as possible (...) in case the King of Taffilet (...) would resolve to undertake its Siege".]
At this we almost choked on our cardamome coffee, for when had Mr Pepys, emerging from all these Committees for Tangiers, ever mentioned this Apocalypse? Never - his only discourse of Tangiers was of routine budget matters and, indeed, on the reorg of the troops there. (Or could the quicksilver in our daily Purgative indeed have confused our Braines? Some say it can do that). We perused the State Papers - keeping in minde that the French gazette is usually a month behind, even with this newfangled calendar the Continentals are using - and found no mention either!
This would indeed make it wise to send Taffilet gifts of jewels and ego-boosting Ambassies. If 'tis true. If 'tis not, we now wonder what Advantage could accrue to Versailles, in disseminating this canard...
About Friday 9 April 1669
Stephane Chenard • Link
By some strange magic the State Papers open themselves today on a document of April 8, a "warrant, to pay to the earl of Sandwich, Master of the Great Wardrobe" - oh yes, he's that too - "4000 L., to furnish a present to be sent to the Emperor of Morocco, by Henry, Lord Howard, Ambassador Extraordinary to him".
Because while Thomas Allen has indeed sailed home, we're not forgetting Taffilet, the pirate-king of Barbary, whose wish to try diplomacy (especially acute since Allen threatened to burn down his fleet) and to receive a glamorous British ambassador, will presently be fulfilled. Of late there had been a lot of to- and fro on the budget for that indispensable gift, and yea, £4,000 should buy something not too shabby. In fact it must make Sandwich's head spin just to think about it, given his own perspective on ambassadorial budgets.
'Tis probably for the better if the merchants, whose ships have been England's gifts to Taffilet so far, don't know about this. But they shouldn't miss the greater picture. We find in Gazette No. 353 newes, from a ship now come to Yarmouth, that a French merchant was detained "by an Algiers man of War of 36 guns", and his captain most civilly entertained while its cargo was closely inspected. The Turks, whose patronage Taffilet seems to have accepted, "excusing the strictness of the search upon several abuses put upon them by such of their Enemies [e.g., currently, the French] as had pretended their ships and goods to have been English".
And so, between Allin's treaty of last September with Taffilet and Charles' care to stay out of Venice's fight for Candia with the Turks, 'tis a good thing in the Med to be English right now, and perhaps worth a carbuncle or two.
About Wednesday 7 April 1669
Stephane Chenard • Link
Sam's appearance with Dennis Gauden before the Treasury Commissioners is duly listed among their minutes for today. The session, the last before a two-week recess, must have been quite intense, as Sam's turn is item No. 54 out of 57, not bad for a morning's business, especially as only two Treasurers are recorded to have been there: "When the Navy privy seal is passed the Treasurers of the Navy are to have the 30,000L. on the Wine Act; also a warrant for 6,000L. out of the ready money of the Customs in the Exchequer" [https://www.british-history.ac.uk…]
Makes sense. Surely that didn't take "most of the morning", which must have been spent waiting to be called. Sam then may have attended this earlier discussion: "A letter to be written to all the nobility that are in arrear with their Poll money" - well, almost by definition that should be all the nobility, period - "and their warrants are to be stopped till they have paid". The warrants include the "creation money" their lordships receive from the crown just for being who they are (or were made, rather), and sundry other subsidies such as "stable money". A few deadbeats are specifically named, including no less than "the Lord Chamberlain" and, gasp but of course, "the Earl of Sandwich", whose "last warrant" (unspecified) hangs in the balance. Either Sam wasn't in the room at that time, or his Sandwich account is so written off that the above that he just shrugged and thought comfy thoughts of the coming pea porridge instead. All the better, if Sam was in this rare mood for "buffoonery" (Sam Pepys the buffoon not being so often in evidence).
Surely none of their lordships saw fit to attend so base and absurd a phant'sy as their actually paying taxes, like vulgar merchants. Every day new complications are thought up! This makes what should be the simple exercise of living on credit far beyond your means and without working, sooo outlandishly and needlessly complex! Why can't we just be given money by his Majestie, without having to give it back the next day to his clerkes, and in exchange, I dunno, ride to the crusades or somethin'?
About Thursday 1 April 1669
Stephane Chenard • Link
That a lot of luv there between Sam and the gentlemen-captain was not, could be expected. This flat-foot quill-pusher from the central admin, this vile commoner, disguised as one of them, the horror. But it also seems clear which way this court-martial would go if left to the officers' corps. In this case we wonder how widely the case may have been followed, through the grapevine, by the restless multitude of the ordinary seamen. Pray recall, from the case summary we had thought usefull to post (at https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…) that Roger Baker's plight migtht've been fairly widely known, as his ship's crew had rallied and he had apparently agitated and written around quite a bit, including to Sam. A fact which, if known to the gentlemen-captain, they might've used to plead for his recusal as a judge.
This Society has phant'sied on occasion that seamen would throw bricks through Sam's beautiful windows, as payment for all the rotten biscuits, pressing and whatnot. Sam now comes across as the lower ranks' go-to friend in London - at least for the pursers, who are perhaps not to be confused with the lumpen who furl sails. How the case will go we know not, but 'tis likely the brass knew exactly what it was doing in appointing him to the bench. It suggests the system isn't as well stacked against the tars as one may doubt, or maybe that the system was prudent, given how the fleet's full attention will be needed this summer.
Meanwhile, Sam who yesterday said "how soon I know not" when the Treasurers would deliver the cash they promised him for Tangiers, was satisfied today: The machine, which on occasion can crank fast, has spit out a "Treasury order for 1,449L. 8s. 10d. and 2,000L. to Samuel Pepys for Tangier" (at https://www.british-history.ac.uk…)
About Wednesday 31 March 1669
Stephane Chenard • Link
The State Papers' end-of-the-month bundle of miscellany (at https://play.google.com/books/rea…) provides a welcome glimpse of the faceless crowd of MyPeople drudges, of the sort that Sam used to have lunch with (though not so often anymore, meseems) without ever naming them. This in the form of a blank warrant from "Whitehall" to the Treasurer of the Chamber, "for a payment to John Birtby, Ant[hony] Ryder, and John Gauntlett, clerks of the Privy Council, for their pains in writing above 1,000 circular letters, and other letters and orders, as directed by the Navy Commissioners during the late war, and by the committees for the sickness, fire of London, &c." With an enclosed list of letters written since September 1663, some in as many as 68 copies.
Hang in there John Anthony & John, it's only a wait of 237 years until Chester Floyd Carlson, inventor of the photocopier, is born in what is now the barely imagined wilderness of the Pacific northwest. Let's assume an average of 10 copies, 2 pages per document and six-day weeks, and it's only about four pages per day for each of you, but those have to be blot-free, and there will have been rush-orders and monster documents. "68 copies" may well correspond to orders that had to be routed to every deployed ship, and so perhaps not so infrequent. Evidently the bureaucracy has also churned out well above 1,000 documents in 5.5 years.
But wait a minute; so the Navy sends its stuff to the Privy Council for copying? "Aye", Sam whispers from the netherworlds; "in those gilded halls they have the nimblest, marble-whitest harpsichord-player hands. The Office only gets former seamen with calluses and rope-mangled fingers. Some have been known to eat the quills and drink the ink".
About Friday 26 March 1669
Stephane Chenard • Link
The memo left by Sam and Middleton in the State Papers is actually even more incriminating than L&M's summary suggests. It mentions, more specifically, examining "Pett (...) as to lending boats from the stores at Chatham to Mr. Kent". This Mr. Kent will also be interrogated by a "Francis Toney", apparently a junior investigator based at Chatham who reappears in further letters and is sent on April 2 chasing after a stolen piece of rope.
A separate affidavit, attached to Sam's memo but dated March 27, after Sam had already left for Dartford, relates that "Francis Toney demanded of Mr. Kent whose boat it was that he had in his ground; he replied that it was his own, and he bought it of Mr. Pett; did not hear anything said about its being borrowed".
'Tis enough to make the knave-o-meter's needle jump, but indeed the file also contains "affidavits (...) relative to boats, old piles, and spurshores, supposed to be taken by Pett, and converted to his own use". Which sound like junk lying around the yard, but wood is expensive and spurshores, "a timber or spar designed to hold a boat away from a pier" according to Merriam-Webster's dictionary, are safety equipment, best not appropriated for firewood.
Allow us, however, an exculpatory note on Mr. Pett's liberal spending on his "pretty house": if the same rules apply as at the Portsmouth yard, we recall from last September that Capt. Tinker's house there was the King's house, and as such had to be kept in royal state, and at great expense, in case H.M. or H.R.H. decided to drop by.
A side note: interestingly, the March 27 memo mentions that one of the witnesses, Daniel Eldridge, "showed the Board the absolution of his late excommunication under the seal of the Archbishop of Canterbury". This presumably removes an obstacle to hearing the witness, but we confess that we didn't even know an excommunication was reversible. Sounds popish to us, but still reassuring (note to self: make sure to include the Archbishop on the guest list for all future dinners).
A quick search for records on Daniel Eldridge finds a shipwright of that name working on Woolwich from 1724 [https://books.google.fr/books?id=…, page 80]. Perhaps the one at Chatham was his dad.
About Wednesday 3 March 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
On the Lord Mayor just "betaking himself" to a sulk, rather than being "forced to go": Venetian ambassador Piero Mocenigo begs to differ with our more benign assessment, and relates the incident in his weekly intelligence as a very big deal, big enough that the Doge and Senate should know:
==================================================
Serious trouble was narrowly averted here these last evenings owing to the readiness of the people to revolt. This was because when the lord mayor, who has the office and charge of governing the city, entered the college of the Templars who are all gentlemen students, these last claimed as a privilege of that place, that they should lower the sword carried before him by the justiciar. When he objected to do this, they took away the sword and detained the mayor ignominiously for some hours in the College as a prisoner. As the people were gathering their forces on his behalf the king found it necessary to send the guards to put down the tumult. By their efforts the young gentlemen were persuaded to let the lord mayor go, and peace was restored; and so with great ease a fire was extinguished that might very easily have renewed the fire of London with the worst consequences.
(Letter of 15 March 1669, https://www.british-history.ac.uk…)
About Saturday 13 March 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
Sam would have put a laugh-out-loud emoji in his diary next to this report of his captaincy, if he could. Indeed the Jersey is a bit of a comic-opera set right now. Its record at https://threedecks.org/index.php?… indicates it's fairly old (launched in 1654), and sadly does not mention Capt. Pepys as in-filling between Capts. Francis Digby (which ended in January) and William Poole (whose command will start on April 1 and fittingly enough take the ship to Tangiers).
At this time the Jersey is in dock at Woolwich to have its mainmast replaced (says a letter of 28 January), providing a stable enough deck for its interim captain to pace while brandishing his saber, but in late November it came to notice in the State Papers (https://play.google.com/books/rea…) for its botswain, its gunner, its purser and its cook all being AWOL.
About Wednesday 3 March 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
It seems there are different views on whether the Lord Mayor was, as Sam puts it, "forc[ed] to go" into that closett, and sequestered there by the proud students. John Bulstrode, in his diary (at https://archive.org/details/bulst…, page 102) says upon the mayor's entry with his sword, "the gentlemen of the house (...) begun soe great a disturbance that they would not suffer his Lordship to proceed, soe as betaking himselfe to a gentleman's chamber in the house where he was obliged to stay all the day". So the mayor "betook himselfe" and went to sulk, leaving at 7 "with his sword up, without any dinner". He wasn't necessarily frog-marched and thrown into that room.
And serjeant Beck with his watchmen, if they were trotting as we phant'sied, may have been headed to the Temple but not to grab Coventry, because Bulstrode also informs us that the latter won't be arrested until tomorrow morning, March 4. The warrants against Coventry, dated this day, must have been signed after a Council meeting held tonight, perhaps more or less at the same time as the mayor, his mood foul and his stomach rumbling, was slinking out of his hideaway. Why, we say, can't everyone just relax?
About Wednesday 3 March 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
On the Mall, Sam's coach encounters that of Sir William Coventry, in which servants are busy stuffing bags and travel-cases.
"I say, Sir William, good-morrow! What a happy surprise", Sam exclaims, still high from last night's revels.
Coventry, in his coach, starts almost to the ceiling and drops a booklet, "100 usefull French sentences for All Situations". "Why, yes, Mr. Pepys. I'm afraid..."
"Have you seen those papers the East India Company wants to introduce at the Treasurers' this day fortnight, my lord? I have a rebuttal with me already, if you have but a minute" - Coventry twitches, gestures to the servants to hurry it, scans the Mall in all directions - "it's only twelve pages. To begin with..."
"Yes, yes, very good Pepys. We'll discuss". Grabs Sam's proferred papers, stuffs them in Sir Duncomb's lap, who almost spills the bag of coins he was tying up. "Now if you will excuse us..."
"I was hoping, Sir William, that you would honor my humble house when leisure allows you. I have now but the most admirable collection... No? Some coffee or chocolate at yonder house at least".
"Mr. Pepys, I have an even grander idea. A masque! As in Venice".
"Why, Sir William, I never suspected... Shall we say, next week?"
"Nay, why delay our pleasure? Right now! Know you, I always fant'sied being a coachman". Coventry starts shrugging off his coat. "Your coachman's green livery is the talk of London, you know? Let me trade clothes with your man and drive your beautiful coach in his stead".
Sam is about to give his enthusiastic support to the project - this must be some new Italian fad at Court, a show of support for Candia! But Hewer cuts in, "Alas, my lord, we're late to the theater already. Mr. Pepys' wife is unstinting, as you may know! Farewell now, my lords" Knocks the ceiling, "Billy! Let's move!"
Billy cracks his whip smartly and bewildered Sam sees Coventry's coach recede in the distance. Why, is that searjant Beck, with a detachment of the Watch, whom they just passed trotting in the other direction?
About Wednesday 3 March 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
Aye, Sir William Coventry would be well advis'd to get busy:
--------------------------------
March 3. Warrant to James Beck, serjeant-at-arms, to apprehend Sir William Coventry, and convey him to the Tower for having sent a challenge to the Duke of Buckingham.
March 3. Warrant to Sir John Robinson, Lieutenant of the Tower, to receive Sir William Coventry.
--------------------------------
State Papers, https://play.google.com/books/rea…. C'mon, Sam, you told us on Monday that all of London knew about it, how can you not be connecting ye dots presently. How can Sir William himself be so blinde as not to be half-way to France already.
About Tuesday 23 February 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
So, between a routine morning at the office and the theater, Mr. Pepys "put a mouthfull of victuals in [his] mouth" - unusual language - then took the "upper part of [Queen Katherine's mummified] body in [his] hands". An interesting day indeed, though given the mummy's fragile condition images of Sam "manhandling" it and waltzing with it through the abbey seem unlikely. We phant'sy that Captain John Tinker of Portsmouth, who on Sunday last had asked Sam for leave to come up to London, mayhap brought from a ship come from Tangiers certain remarkable Herbs grown there, whose vapors when smok'd are renown'd to soothe the eyes, with minor side effects on the Minde.
This is not Sam's first encounter with the Leathery Ones. Last spring, on his way back from a merry party at Sir G. Whitmore’s, "by moonshine (...) I having there seen a mummy in a merchant’s warehouse there [sic], all the middle of the man or woman’s body, black and hard" (...) it pleased me much, though an ill sight", so much so that the merchant offered "a little bit, and a bone of an arme". This had been Sam's first - "I never saw any before" (https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…) But not the last, then, and only the vanguard of the flood of mummies that are soon to come to London and end ground up in paintpots and medicine jars, walking about in Victorian phantasms and (with luck) stored away between clay pots in museums, a 200-year British love-story with mummies that will be reconsidered with the advent of synthetic pigments but also because the Egyptians tired of it and clamped down.
With less of a magickal pretext, we also note that this hadn't been the first time that Sam, who's always got to touch everything, makes contact with a cadaver out of curiosity, see https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…. And yes, many cultures do refuse to consider their dead as necessarily best served by being locked away and out of sight - why, we ourselves confess to have once been honor'd to share a bedchamber with our hosts' ancestral mummy, who was very decent and quiet company. But of course there are mummies, whose worship may well be idolatrous, and then there are Royal Mummies. Hundreds still come to King Charles to be touched for the King's Evil. In an antique, mummified Queen this virtue must have been distillated & concentrated by the dessication process!
Oh, and by the way, 'tis Carnaval season, halfway 'tween the winter solstice and spring, and a time when mummies are so potent, they almost glow in the dark.
About Sunday 24 January 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
John Bullstrode reports in his Diary for February 13 (at https://archive.org/details/bulst…) that the Spanish Ambassador, doing his job, has, with optimism or grim resignation we do not know, complain'd about all the piracy. "They say a meeting has been had with that ambassador by certain Lords thereto appointed, in order to give him all satisfaction on that point, which they say is like to end in making a more plaine and evident declaration of the peace in the West Indyes, &c." &c indeed. The story doesn't say if the meeting was held at the Spanish Embassy and was a chance to pocket some silverware.
About Wednesday 17 February 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
May we point out, in hope of perswadding this Assembly to suspend the customary One Hundred Lashes, that the weather last night was most inclement, and the Lady whose hand Mr. Pepys did hold, may have indeed welcomed this help from a local resident in navigating, in the dark, a construction area likely less familiar than her distant home in Charing Cross. Mr. Gadbury reports "Wind, rain, snow, hail" in London. From the Channel ports, the Letters (at https://play.google.com/books/rea…) contain nothing but Newes of Aeolian disasters and woe, viz. six shipwrecks with casualties and ships dragging their anchors for as much as 2 miles in Yarmouth, and three shipwrecks (one "to pieces") in Deal. We pray that the Lady herself was not broken to pieces in her long journey.
'nother thing. Mr. Bullstrode in his Journall (at https://archive.org/details/bulst…) notes already (though he seems to write with up to a week's delay, and so benefits from the gossip) that "his Majesty was much offended" by my Lord Rochester's conduct, so the King having "pardoned it to Rochester already" seems a hasty Interpolation. We surmise that Sam saw, from a distance, the King nod at the rake's embarrassed salute this morning. Perhaps at Versailles, the dismissal would have been harsher.
But on this matter, Terry's note "L&M note Lord Sandwich's Journal" led us to chase my Lord's journal, post the one ending in 1665 that is most readily found and oftentimes quoted. Las! The chase ends at https://discovery.nationalarchive…, with a catalog reference to a journal indeed ending in 1671, but "held privately (...) not available". We still rejoice that my Lord's not so deeply buried in the Audit of his Ambassadorial accounts (which aren't going so well for him, actually) as to miss Court dinners.
About Sunday 24 January 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
"Gov. Modyford lent Morgan's fleet a massive English Man-o-War named the HMS Oxford (...) The night that the raid was going to commence, there was a huge celebration aboard the ships. A few drunk soldiers during this accidentally destroyed the HMS Oxford". That's what we call a successful pyrate's party. Phant'sy they drank the captain's wine and stole his clothes, too.
About Friday 12 February 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
A reminder of the Unpredictability of Kings, or maybe of the Blindeness of Great Men: Wasn't my lord Ormond writing to his pal Ossory just four days ago, on the 9th instant, of being "confident that the King neither is, nor will be, prevailed to remove him from the government of Ireland..."? And this, after months of presence at Court precisely to find out. (Carte calendar, https://web.archive.org/web/20191…)
About Friday 12 February 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
In the Treasury Commission's minutes for this day (at www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-tre…) we find not a Word of this 50,000L. tussle with the Navy. We phant'sy that mayhap it took place before or after the official meeting, or the commission's Remembrancer had dropped his quill, or he got a Significant Look from my Lord Ashly, to go and water ye flowers for a minute.
The only Naval business pertains to the Commission's consideration on the 27th instant of my Lord Anglesey having "diverted" supply funds (we evok'd it at https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/…) "The King to be moved in the 4,000L. paid by the Earl of Anglesey to other uses but which should have been for buying stores: that another fund may be appointed for it". This looks like a careful climb-down from accusations against one of the Big Men.
Incidentally we also find in today's State Papers (https://play.google.com/books/rea…) an annoyed request from White Hall, "referenc[ing] (...) the petition of John Chase, his Majesty's apothecary, to find a way for payment of his arrears of 7,000L. and provide for his future payment, the King being wishful to relieve his extremity. With a repetition of the recommendation thereof, the King being displeased that it has not been attended to". The-king-being-displeased, aye gentlemen, let's get moving now, for all we know this Chase may be withholding deliveries of quicksilver for the royal elaboratory next door...
Let the Treasurers chafe and wiggle. Our Sam is walking on water; eating the Duke's sauce right out of his Grace's spoon, and today, seeing them getting dressed down right after a matter-of-fact popping by the State Council. Oh, and the minutes for last Wednesday said "Process against Mr. Pepys to be stopped till sealing day".
About Tuesday 9 February 1668/69
Stephane Chenard • Link
Sam is invited today into a sordid little affair that is likely to become the Navy's scandal du jour before long, the State Papers (https://play.google.com/books/rea…) indicate.
On 22 January Roger Baker, purser of the Dartmouth - a busy 5th class workabee frigate which often shows up in reports on convoy and supply missions - wrote to the Commissioners a long and pretty graphic complaint against his captain, Richard Trevanion. Following some unclear muddle (at least as summarized in the Papers) about beer bought on credit, wine issued to the crew for Christmas and an altercation between the two of them, Baker says Trevanion suddenly "gave me 200 blows with his cane, and took me by the hair of my head, intending to dash my brains out (...) he so mangled my face that I fear I shall lose an eye". The 200 blows alone (if we take them literally) must have taken a good 15 minutes at least, but it's not finished: "While I was under the doctor's hands he commanded the boatswain to clap me into the bilboes [leg shackles] atop of the forecastle [the upper deck] where I continued 10 hours, being nailed down with a staple to the davit [a crane often used to suspend the lifeboat]" - sounds dangerous, and wickedly inventive. It gets better: The boatswain gets trashed too for looking like he would help, Trevanion threatens other officers with a council of war or "to have them hanged". So, bad captain; a captain Bligh before the hour. Baker apparently has the letter smuggled out while the madman is on shore.
Letters on 31 January and 2 February then suggest that the Dartmouth, which was to sail to Cadiz and Tangiers on resupply duty, has not; it was wrongly sighted on its way home, and it's unclear where it's been, if anywhere. On 3 February it's in Holehaven, in Essex, so unless it has supernaturall engines we doubt if it went to Tangiers and back. On that day Baker reappears, still locked up in his cabin and reporting that Trevanion has gone rogue, "has not yet rated his men, and God knows when he will" - we're a bit unsure if this is a bureaucratic offense or something worse that could lead to a Bounty situation. The ship, https://threedecks.org informs us, has 110 men on board, who are likely not shrinking lilies themselves but must be more than a bit uneasy about the cap'n by now.
And finally today Baker is writing to Sam, god of the pursers. Apparently some action has been taken, and he offers to "justify on oath the business impeached against my commander", however he "durst[s; dares] not go near the commander, for fear of being murdered". You betcha.
Sam will want the Trevanion file. There's one at https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…, which shows him to be on his second command only, and to have lasted less than a year on the first, a 4th class ship called the Marmaduke that was quite a bit larger - so the Dartmouth could have been a demotion already. Hmm.