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LORD NORTH'S MINISTRY

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of the Treasury in January 1770, and was succeeded by Lord North, who was already Chancellor of the Exchequer, and now combined the two offices. His Cabinet included certain other members of the former Administration, but it was different in tone. On the change of Ministry, Sir Francis Bernard once more urged the wrong which had been committed in his case. His application,' says his son, 'was not in this instance a request, but a claim.' Lord North recognised its justice, and increased his pension to 1,000l.; but only to afford fresh proof that there was some powerful obstacle at work, since this grant was almost immediately changed into an appointment as one of the Commissioners of a new Board of Revenue in Ireland, which, even if the income was of equal amount, was a very different affair to a man requiring ease and rest above all things, and having to consider the possibilities of starting three sons in professions. Moreover, the salary was probably dependent on his health and ability to perform the duties of his post.

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As Thomas Bernard has left in total obscurity the nature of the influences which worked against his father, it is useless to attempt a solution of the question now, when much that was known or suspected at the time is forgotten. The wheels within wheels' of such transactions form a complex system of machinery, only to be mastered by careful study under favourable circumstances. But the Governor's son does state that the King had promised Sir Francis Bernard a pension of 1,000l. a year; and it is impossible not to wonder how a monarch, reputed to be so conscientious, could allow any influences whatsoever to bring about a breach of his plighted word. George III. had succeeded in becoming 'his own Minister,' to an extent which disposes of the possible suggestion that he was ignorant of any portion of the arrangements.

Intimately conversant with official routine, and thoroughly master of the details of every department of the Government, he acquired a familiar knowledge of all the appointments in the gift of the Ministry, and reserved to himself the right of controlling them. Nor was this monopoly of patronage confined to offices of

importance or considerable emolument; it descended even to commissions in the Army, and the disposal of small places, which custom as well as expediency had delegated to the heads of those branches of the service to which they belonged.1

If this statement, which is supported by other testimony, be anywhere near the truth, it is evident that George III. must have been cognisant of Sir Francis Bernard's treatment at the hands of his successive Governments. There is, indeed, some probability that it originated with him. The years 1770 and 1771, during which Sir Francis was, in familiar parlance, 'driven from pillar to post,' were years of great political agitation in England. Wilkes and Beckford were leaders of a 'patriotic' or popular party, and the King was repeatedly addressed by deputations in terms of positive insult. His nervous irritability had already given cause for anxiety 3 in the earlier portion of his reign, and, if it is considered that American affairs were becoming daily more critical, there is no improbability in supposing that one mode in which the King's vexation showed itself may have been in leaving an American Governor as a scapegoat in the hands of his enemies, since he afterwards virtually left the whole body of American loyalists to their fate.

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While Sir Francis Bernard was resigning himself to the check he had received, he continued in frequent communication with Lord Hillsborough on the subject of American affairs. This was well known in America, and commented on by the Boston Gazette,' which in September 1770 gives the following items of London news published in July:

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Yesterday morning the Right Hon. the Earl of Hillsborough

1 Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, from Original Family Documents, by the Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, K.G. (1853), vol. i. p. 3. These volumes are known to have been compiled chiefly by Mr. Smith, the librarian at Stowe, and editor of the Grenville Papers, who doubtless wrote the passage.

2 See Lecky, History of England in the Eighteenth Century, vol. iii. ch. ix., and several passages in other chapters; also other works relating to George III. and his reign.

In 1765. See Lecky and others.

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN

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had a numerous levée of the principal American merchants and colony agents, previous to his Lordship's departure for Ireland.

The common business of America, in the absence of Lord Hillsborough, will devolve on a gentleman belonging to the Plantation Office, who is to have the advice and assistance of Governor B-rd.

This was probably Mr. John Pownall, the UnderSecretary.

Benjamin Franklin had recently been appointed by the House of Representatives agent for Massachusetts. He was already agent for Pennsylvania, Georgia, and New Jersey, and by these offices made up an income of 1,2007. a year, far more than the Governor of Massachusetts had received during certain years of his administration. There was no cordiality between Franklin and Lord Hillsborough, at whose house he one day met Sir Francis Bernard, an event recorded in his Journal :

Wednesday, 16 January, 1771.-I went this morning to wait on Lord Hillsborough. The porter at first denied his Lordship, on which I left my name and drove off. But before the coach got out of the square the coachman came and said, 'His Lordship will see you, sir.' I was shown into the levée room, where I found Governor Bernard, who, I understand, attends there constantly. Several other gentlemen were there attending, with whom I sat down a few minutes, when Secretary Pownall came out to us and said his Lordship desired I would come in.2

Lord Hillsborough received Franklin with much politeness, excusing himself for his first refusal by stating that he was dressing to attend Court; but the interview soon became stormy, because the Minister would not admit Franklin's right to call himself agent for Massachusetts, in which province he had been appointed by the House of Representa

'The Boston Gazette and Country Journal, containing the freshest Advises, Foreign and Domestic, Monday, September 17, 1770.' The paragraph quoted is dated London, July 26.'

2 The Life of Benjamin Franklin, written by Himself, vol. ii. ch. ii., edited by John Bigelow. An extract from Franklin's Journal, entitled 'Minutes of the conference mentioned above, sent in a letter to Samuel Cooper,' dated 'London, 5 February, 1771.'

tives alone, the Governor and Council having selected another person. This conference ended somewhat abruptly, the parties not being able to find any common standpoint from which to discuss matters.

Before proceeding to relate the troubles of Lady Bernard and her family in America, it becomes necessary to notice a scurrilous report which appeared in the 'Boston Gazette,' Samuel Adams's paper, on September 3, 1770, possibly one of many; this particular libel has, however, survived the contest which gave it being. It was copied by Wirt in a note to his 'Life of Patrick Henry,' a Virginian 'patriot' much resembling Samuel Adams, whence it has been transcribed by Jesse into his 'Memoirs of George III.' without further inquiry.1 Therefore it cannot here be passed over in silence, and is given at full length. The original paragraph in the Boston Gazette' is as follows:

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New York, August 27. Extract of a Letter dated London,

5th of June, 1770.

The people of England now curse Governor Bernard as bitterly as those of America. Bernard was drove out of the Smyrna Coffee-house not many days since by General Oglethorpe, who told him he was a dirty, factious scoundrel, who smelt cursed strong of the hangman, that he had better leave the room as unworthy to mix with gentlemen of character, but that he would give him the satisfaction of following him to the door had he anything to reply. The Governor left the house like a guilty coward.

I know not whether any formal contradiction of this story was published at the time, but the best refutation consists in the record of Sir Francis Bernard's remaining years, which were cheered by marks of attention and friendship from persons of undoubted honour and character. Subsequent to the date of this supposed expulsion, he is found in frequent consultation with Lord Hillsborough on matters requiring sound judgment and high integrity, both of which, it may be assumed, the Secretary of State believed

Note to page 81 of Wirt's Life of Patrick Henry, 3rd edition. The statement is quoted from that work by Jesse: Memoirs of the Life and Reign of George III.

GENERAL OGLETHORPE

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him to possess. Indeed, Lord Hillsborough, as before stated, bore generous testimony to Sir Francis Bernard's merits after his death.

General Oglethorpe was a man of considerable celebrity, active in many public movements; he is perhaps especially deserving of remembrance as the reformer of the horrible debtors' prisons-the Fleet and Marshalsea-and as the founder of the Colony of Georgia. His career was chequered, since he was twice tried by court-martial, but on both occasions acquitted. Reared a Jacobite, but afterwards an officer under the new dynasty, a contemner of Parliaments, and to some extent a sympathiser with the revolted Americans, his opinions formed a curious medley; but there appears to be no evidence, beyond the letter in the Boston Gazette,' that the General, who was then eighty-one, and noted for his courtesy, ever behaved as represented in that letter. If any controversy with the ex-Governor ever took place in more gentlemanly style, even this `Oglethorpe's friends apparently did not care to remember. In his biography by Wright, there is no mention of the Smyrna Coffee-house encounter, nor, indeed, any mention of Sir Francis Bernard at all.1

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I now return to the subject of Lady Bernard and her children, such particulars as I have been able to gather of their fortunes, during the separation-of about a year and a half-from Sir Francis, having been postponed, in order not to interrupt the narrative of his exertions and disappointments in England.

Julia Bernard, after noting her father's departure, continues:

All state and form were now broke up; his country-house was taken possession of, and my mother, with four children, took a pretty residence called the Cherry House, a few miles from Boston,

1 Wright (Robert), A Memoir of General James Oglethorpe, &c., &c. Mr. Wright mentions an American book, Memorials of James Oglethorpe, by T. W. Harris, D.D., but gives no hint of having met with the libel or anything relating to it in that work.

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