The American Revolution Revisited: A War Between History and Memory

The 250th anniversary of the American Revolution and War for Independence is nearly upon us. It is destined to reach new heights of commercialism, with beer companies no doubt leading the pack. Corny commemorations and tall tales will all be a part of the celebration. Will there be room for calm reflection on the events of 1775-1783? Not much, I fear, especially in the Age of Trump and MAGA. In the best of times, dispassionate analysis of great events tends to be in short supply, overwhelmed and marginalized by the popular taste for hoopla. On this occasion calm analysis is likely to be obliterated by the Trumpets of MAGA. 

The revolution will be celebrated as a great victory for liberty and equality. It was, though more in the rhetoric of the Declaration of Independence than anything in reality. Awkwardly, it was also a war to preserve slavery. 

In 1773, British judge Lord Mansfield declared in the Somerset Case that slavery had no basis in English law. The Somerset ruling aroused panic among some slaveholders, mostly in the southern colonies. It helped unite them with the northern colonies, where the rallying cry was the more historically palatable "no taxation without representation." Traditional narratives of the revolution have tended to emphasize Britain's attacks on colonial liberty while ignoring the colonist's denial of liberty to the enslaved. 

Alarmed slaveholders denied the right of Parliament to pass laws affecting the internal or domestic affairs of the colonies. Slavery, they argued, was a domestic American issue. In 1775, on the verge of war, they accused the British of plotting slave revolts and Indian attacks as a means of subduing the rebellious colonies. In 1776, they decided that independence was necessary to prevent emancipation and loss of control over enslaved Blacks. 

In that sense the War for Independence had more in common with the Civil War than is generally acknowledged. Looked at from the perspective of the enslaved population, both were wars for liberty. Many Blacks absorbed the rhetoric of their white masters and saw the Revolutionary War as an opportunity to secure their freedom, by joining the British. Historians estimate that around 100,000 enslaved persons ran off to British lines between 1775 and 1783, 25,000 in South Carolina alone. They were not complacent bystanders, but active participants in the struggles that gave birth to a nation. 

History is often unpleasant, messy, and chaotic. It is seldom as simple as we would like it to be. Historical myth is the opposite: neat, generally pleasing -- at least to our prejudices -- and comfortably black and white. The myths are "alternative facts" or "fake history." Not surprisingly, myths tend to dominate if not smother actual history in the popular consciousness, the "public memory." By "actual history" I do not mean the "truth" but the result of painstaking historical research, writing, and interpretation. If well done, the result is our best current approximation of the truth. In that sense, history resembles science. Science is a more exact business, of course. Scientists can use repeated experiments to confirm their hypotheses. Historians do not have that luxury. They cannot repeat history. In most cases, they would not wish to. 

Historian Lewis Namier wrote that the writing of history "is not a visit of condolence." He might have added that the same is true of reading it. Learning our history is often difficult, troubling and confusing. If it never is, we are reading the wrong stuff. Some people avoid the problem by ignoring history, just as others avoid ethical problems by ignoring philosophy. Henry Ford is alleged to have said that "history is bunk." Apparently, he didn't say exactly that, but he did reject the past as dead and meaningless, not worth bothering about. 

Abraham Lincoln disagreed with Ford. In his Second Inaugural Address he declared, "My Fellow Americans, we cannot escape history." He understood that the terrible war nearing its end was the result of the country's failure to abolish slavery early in its history. Novelist William Faulkner held a similar view: "The past isn't dead. It is not even past." His characters are prisoners of their history, in this case the history of the Deep South. 

Karl Marx wrote in much the same vein in The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte (1852): "The tradition of all dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brains of the living." Marx prefaced that statement with "Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please; they do not make it under self-selected circumstances, but under circumstances existing already, given and transmitted from the past." One does not have to be a Marxist to agree with that statement. Our history, like our biology, constrains us, for good or ill.

Peter McCandless, REMARKABLE CHARLESTONIANS IN THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION (Arcadia, The History Press, 2025)

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Masters of Caricature: Thomas Rowlandson

Thomas Rowlandson (1757-1827) was a prolific English caricaturist of the Georgian Age. His cartoons and prints encompassed politics, personality, social life, medicine, death, and other topics both contemporary and timeless. He produced large numbers of illustrations for books, both fiction and non-fiction. 

Many of Rowlandson's published works are bawdy and erotic, certainly by later Victorian standards. His unpublished works included more explicit erotica, which he created for private individuals. 

"The Courtesan" is an example of the milder erotica. An elderly "customer" leers lustily at the young woman, the Georgian equivalent of the modern escort.

A more explicit drawing is "Ladies Trading on their Own Bottom" (1810). Here, an elderly Jewish man seated between two prostitutes is giving them bags marked 100, clearly payment for services rendered.  

In the 1780s Rowlandson became friends with another master caricaturist, James Gillray. Gillray's success producing satirical prints encouraged Rowlandson to try his hand at it. Together, he and Gillray helped to make the pugnacious John Bull a personification of Britain and British resistance to the French and Napoleon. 

One of Rowlandson's forays into political caricature was a series he did on the electoral campaigning of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire. The story is related in the 2008 film The Duchess, starring Keira Knightley, and by yours truly elsewhere. 

The Duchess' political activities aroused a scandal. Rowlandson took full advantage of the situation, portraying her mingling with and even kissing men from the lower orders. The cartoons implied that she was acting much like a common woman of the streets. [See Scandal: Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, and the British Election of 1784] 

Rowlandson seems to have been a bit obsessed with the Duchess. Despite the implied criticism in his electoral cartoons, I think he may have had a secret crush on her. His depictions of her were not always political. An example is a watercolor, "A Gaming Table at Devonshire House" (1787).

Devonshire House was the London residence of Georgiana and her husband the duke, where they (or she) threw many lavish parties. Here, Rowlandson pictures the Duchess in a hat throwing the dice during a game of faro. Her sister, also hatted, is reaching into her purse for more money. One of the young men at the table is the Prince of Wales, the future George IV, who famously gambled away a fortune. 

The painting is dripping with sensuality. Rowlandson may have been criticizing Georgiana's fondness for gambling but he was an avid and often successful gambler himself. He certainly captures her famous beauty here. 

Rowlandson was equally fascinated with the more grisly business of anatomy and one of its offshoots, body snatching. He produced a number of prints showing anatomists and their pupils dissecting corpses. on the right, the man in the brown coat is looking at a price list for bodies. [Image: "The Dissecting Room"]

In "The Persevering Surgeon" Rowlandson adds a touch of eroticism. The surgeon is about to dissect the body of a young woman, and seems to be leering lustily at her breasts. 

Rowlandson also portrayed the business of securing the "subjects" of dissection. Body snatching, as it was known, involved stealing freshly dead bodies. It was an illegal, but highly profitable trade. 

Obtaining enough bodies legally, even for teaching purposes, was difficult. The growth of anatomy schools in the late 18th century increased the demand for them far beyond the legal supply. 

Anatomists and their pupils often hunted for subjects. Starting in the late 18th century, professional gangs of "Sack Em Up Men," also known as "Resurrection Men," helped to supply the deficiency. They obtained the goods from cemeteries, dead houses, and hospital morgues. In some infamous cases they murdered people to sell their bodies. 

Rowlandson portrayed their nocturnal work in prints such as "The Resurrection Men." 

You may have noticed the presence of skeletons in the previous images. They obviously represent Death, the nemesis of us all, and the great equalizer. They appear in many of Rowlandson's prints. an example is "Death in the Dissecting Room." Here, Avenging Death makes a sudden appearance, terrorizing the anatomists and the body snatcher hauling in a fresh subject. 

Rowlandson's interest in the grisly and macabre is also seen in his drawing of men hanging from a gibbet along the Thames. 

 

In 1814, a friend of Rowlandson's, George Henry Harlow, produced this portrait of him. He was then in his late 50s and at the peak of his career. He died in 1827. 

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Imagining John Bull: Part 1: The Georgian Age

Not so long ago people in much of the world would have easily recognized the image below as John Bull, a symbol of the British nation, much like the USA's Uncle Sam or France's Marianne. But he did not always look like this guy. He evolved for more than two centuries before he was allowed to go to his rest.

John Bull began life as a literary creation rather than an image. He was "born" in 1712 as a character in two of Dr John Arbuthnot's political satires, Law is a Bottomless Pit and The History of John Bull. Ironically, Arbuthnot was a Scot whose character evolved into a personification of Englishness. 

The name "Bull" from the beginning invited comparisons with the animal of that name, especially its virility, strength and stubbornness. Bull also alluded to English fondness for roast beef. The French often called the English les rosbifs.

During the Georgian period, caricaturists provided John Bull with a visual image, or rather a variety of images. He was sometimes portrayed as a bull rather than a man, as in James Gillray's, "John Bull Triumphant" (1780). 

The figure the bull is tossing into the air represents Spain, which had recently joined France and the fledgling United States in war against Britain. The frightened looking figures at the right are France (in blue and pink) and the USA (the Native American!). A farmer in red and buff looks on in satisfaction at the bottom left. Or is he John Bull the man? 

In the cartoon from 1814 below, Bull is pictured as a man with a bull's head. "Johnny Bull and the Alexandrians," however, is by an American. It is commenting on the British attack on Alexandria, Virginia during the War of 1812. The anthropomorphic Bull did not catch on. He was destined to be a man.

The Georgian era John Bull was English, but not necessarily British, in outlook. He was insular in his views. He distrusted "foreigners." That distrust extended to Scots (or North Britons), despite the fact that England and Scotland had been united into Great Britain since 1707.

The cartoon below, Sawney Scot and John Bull (1792) illustrates but seems to condemn the age-old animosity between the Scots and the English. With Britain heading to war with revolutionary France,  the artist was perhaps saying, "let's bury the prejudices that divide us." It would take some time, but John Bull would come to be a British as well as an English symbol. 

During the French Revolution and Napoleonic periods (1789-1815), John Bull emerged into the national limelight as a patriotic, no-nonsense opponent of revolution and then of authoritarianism. 

Two great Georgian caricaturists, James Gillray and Thomas Rowlandson, played significant roles in shaping the image of Bull around the turn of the 19th century. 

An example is Gillray's "French Liberty/English Slavery" (1792). Although Gillray does not name the English figure here, he parallels the image of John Bull he and other artists were developing. 

The "liberated" Frenchman wearing a tricolor cockade is emaciated and attired in rags. He is dining on raw scallions and snails. In contrast, the English "slave" is stout, comfortable, and well dressed He is tucking into a meal of roast beef and ale, his wig at his side. 

The skinny Frenchman is praising the new French republic as a paradise. The portly Englishman is complaining that high taxes are starving him to death. The irony could hardly be missed.  

British caricaturists of the revolutionary period generally drew Bull as a yeoman farmer. He is a man of the earth -- honest, hale, hearty, and rough in manner. Neither rich nor poor, he is a man of simple tastes and strong principles, pugnacious and ever ready to fight Britain's enemies. 

He was also a man of voracious appetites. Gillray's 1798 print, "John Bull Taking a Luncheon, or British Cooks Cramming Old Grumble Gizzard with Bonne Chere" shows Bull gorging on French naval ships. The cooks are British admirals. The one on the right is Admiral Nelson, who had just won a major sea battle against the French fleet in the Battle of the Nile. 

Artists of the time often drew Bull in a long coat and buff trousers (as above), or in a farmer's smock, as in this 1791 Gillray print, "Alecto." 

"Alecto" is a satirical jab at Whig leader Charles James Fox, who had expressed sympathy for the French Revolution. Fox, on the right is pictured as a recruiting sergeant, trying to enlist John Bull into support for the revolution. No hope for that. 

During the 19th century, the farmer's smock disappeared. The long coat and buff trousers became standard in colored prints, often with a red waistcoat. The coat was often blue, perhaps because blue and buff symbolized the two major political parties of the time, the Tories and the Whigs. 

After 1800, the cartoons tend to portray Bull as a sporting countryman who loves dogs, horses, hunting, and English ale. He has little use for intellectualism and European high culture. 

An example is Rowlandson's 1811 print "John Bull at the Italian Opera." While others are enjoying or pretending to enjoy the music, Bull, up in the box, cannot disguise his irritation, or boredom. Away with that foreign stuff! 

John Bull appeared frequently as the nemesis of Napoleon Bonaparte. A common theme was "Come on Boney, we dare you to attack us!" Gillray drew an especially grisly Bull holding the head of Napoleon in "Buonaparte 48 Hours after Landing" (1803)

In "John Bull Making Observations on the Comet" (1807) Rowlandson tells the comet (Napoleon) that he will never reach the level of the sun (King George III). British naval ships on the horizon explain why. 

In "Conversation Across the Water" (artist unknown), 1803, Napoleon declares he will invade Britain. John Bull, looking a bit like Bilbo Baggins, dares him to try. He also points to Royal Navy ships on the horizon. In many of the prints of this time, Napoleon appears as a pint-sized dictator dwarfed by his hat and boots: "Little Boney."

In "John Bull Arming the Spaniards," (1808) Rowlandson portrays Bull as the British emissary bringing aid, arms, and ammunition to Spain in its struggle against Napoleonic conquest. 

In the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars, Bull was enlisted in other causes, some of them repugnant today. In "John Bull Taking a Clear View of the Negro Slavery Question" (1826), Robert Cruikshank uses Bull to undermine the arguments of the growing antislavery movement. 

The abolitionists (in black) are raving about the terrible conditions of the enslaved in the West Indies. Bull, in blue and buff, peers through the telescope and "clearly" sees them enjoying feasting and dancing. A few years later (1833) the abolitionists succeeded. Parliament abolished slavery in the British Empire. 

By the 1820s, John Bull was maturing as a personification of the British nation. Victorian caricaturists would give him a fashion makeover, and employ him to represent a variety of opinions.

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British Monarchs Who Ended Badly, Part 11: The German Georges and Robert Walpole

In 1714, the death of the last Stuart monarch, Queen Anne, brought the first of the Hanoverian line to the throne of the new Kingdom of Great Britain. 

The name "Hanoverian" name derives from the German principality of they ruled, Hanover. The first four Hanoverian kings were named George, and the period 1714 to 1830 is often called the Georgian Age. 

Hanover was one of some three hundred states that made up the Holy Roman Empire. As Voltaire correctly quipped, it was neither Holy, nor Roman, nor an Empire. It had developed in the Middle Ages into a confederation of mainly German states presided over loosely by emperors from the Austrian Hapsburg dynasty. 

The prince of Hanover was an Elector, one of seven in the "empire." Their title came from their right to select the emperors. Since the 15th century they had always elected the emperors from the Habsburgs. 

In 1714, George, Elector of Hanover, became king of Great Britain, in accordance with the Act of Settlement of 1701. That act of Parliament barred Roman Catholics from inheriting the throne and provided that upon Queen Anne's death, the throne would pass to her closest Protestant heir. In 1701 that was George's mother Sophia, but she died just weeks before Anne. [Image: George I, by Sir Godfrey Kneller]

Most Britons grudgingly accepted their new foreign king. he might be German but at least he was not French or Catholic. The first two Georges were never exactly popular. 

A few months after George I's coronation, Scottish Jacobites rose on behalf of the exiled Catholic Stuart claimant, James "III," son of James II & VII. Their rebellion was quickly crushed, as were other risings and plots, but the threat of a successful Jacobite coup was not ended until the 1750s.  

George I was not the kind of person to inspire devotion or enthusiasm, even in his own family. He and his wife detested one another. Before inheriting the British crown, he had possibly murdered her lover. He also imprisoned her for life. 

George I arrived in England with two mistresses. He promptly conferred titles on them. One was tall and thin, the other large and heavy. The English dubbed them the Maypole and the Elephant. 

George I's heir, also called George, hated him, and the feeling was mutual. This family dynamic became a feature of the reigns of the first three Hanoverian kings. Father and heir never got on. 

The reigns of the first two Georges were marked by significant political developments. Parliament continued its march towards supremacy. The office of Prime Minister emerged for the first time. The job had -- and still has -- no existence in law. Like so much of the British political system, it is the product of traditional usage.

Historians generally accord the title of the first Prime Minister to Sir Robert Walpole. He rejected the title, which began as a term of scorn. An MP from Norfolk, he rose to power due to his administrative ability and skill in maintaining a working majority in Parliament. He also benefited from being a Whig. 

The Whigs were firm supporters of the Hanoverian dynasty. The Tories were much less enthusiastic. George I suspected that some Tories were closet Jacobites, and he was not entirely wrong. He favored Whig politicians and chose his ministers from their ranks. 

George I's reign ushered in what British historians have called the Whig Supremacy. It lasted until the 1760s. Walpole's tenure as prime minister lasted from 1721 to 1742, making him the longest serving as well as the first prime minister. His ascendancy was sometimes called the "Robinocracy" from Walpole's nickname, Robin.

An event we can relate to these days helped bring Walpole to power. It was The South Sea Bubble, a financial crash involving the South Sea Company. It was a monopoly company established in 1714 to trade with the Spanish empire in America, a trade in slaves and manufactured goods. 

The Company promised huge profits. It attracted many investors, including Walpole himself, who did well from it. A buying mania ensued and shares skyrocketed in price. But the great profits never materialized. The South Sea Company was essentially a Ponzi scheme. 

The company's crash exposed corruption on the part of its directors, who included leading government ministers. Their disgrace and Walpole's adroit management of the fallout left him in command of the cabinet. He also earned the admiration of the king for protecting his mistresses, who had been involved in the scheme, from prosecution. George I relied on Walpole to lead the government for the rest of his reign.  

George II, who inherited the throne in 1727, intended to replace Walpole, who he disliked for siding with his father. His politically astute queen, Caroline of Anspach, urged him to retain Sir Robert. 

Although George also took mistresses, he was devoted to Caroline and listened to her. He helped keep Walpole in power for another fifteen years. In 1735 he gifted the house at 10 Downing Street to Walpole. It has been the residence of British prime ministers ever since.

Unfortunately for Walpole, Queen Caroline died in 1737. George II was devastated. As she lay dying, he promised that he would never take another wife, only mistresses. He kept his promise.

[Image: George II and Queen Caroline]

Walpole's position was secure as long as he maintained the support of a majority in Parliament and the support of the monarch. Getting and keeping the majority was a difficult and unedifying business. It required lots of promises, threats, and above all, bribes. 

The bribes included titles, lucrative government jobs, and pensions. It was a constant balancing act, because the number of  bribes available was always insufficient for the number of those seeking them. 

I don't mean to claim that Walpole's political system was uniquely corrupt. It is how even "democratic" governments function to some extent even now, although the bribes may be different. 

[Image: Speaker Onslow, center, calling upon Walpole, left, to speak in the House of Commons, by William Hogarth, 1730]

Walpole was able to keep things running fairly smoothly into the early 1730s. After that, he faced increasing opposition from disgruntled Whigs who called themselves the "Patriots." As an opposition, they were more effective and dangerous than the Tories. They also had the support of Frederick Prince of Wales, who true to Hanoverian form, despised his father.

The Patriots claimed that under Walpole the executive had become too powerful, the government too centralized for the good of the country. Their trump card was their attacks on Walpole's foreign policy. 

Walpole favored a peaceful foreign policy, emphasizing negotiation and the promotion of trade. He was able to keep Britain out of war for most of his premiership. The Patriots denounced what they claimed was his failure to take a firm stand against the machinations of England's traditional enemies, France and Spain.

Their constant criticism gradually ate away like acid at Walpole's support in the country and Parliament. In the late 1730s the Patriots helped to whip up public demands for war against Spain. The pretext was Spanish mistreatment of British merchants trading to the Caribbean. The goal was to seize wealth and land from Spain's American colonies. 

In 1739, Walpole gave way to the public clamor, and declared war.  The "War of Jenkin's Ear" followed, named for an English ship captain who alleged that a Spanish coast guard officer inspecting his vessel had cut off his ear. Jenkins brought to Parliament, sparking widespread outrage. 

The war did not go well. The opposition blamed Walpole's policies and forced him from office in 1742. George II was nearly as devastated as when Caroline died. He wept on hearing that Walpole resigned, and awarded the former prime minister a seat in the House of Lords, as Earl of Orford. 

[Image: Walpole painted as a ranger at Richmond Park by John Wooten]

The War of Jenkins Ear merged with a broader European war in the early 1740s, the War of the Austrian Succession. Britain was now at war with France as well as Spain. The war ended in stalemate in 1748. 

The War of the Austrian Succession is notable in the history of the monarchy for one fun fact: it was the last time a British king led troops in battle, in 1743. The clash at Dettingen in Germany was technically a British/Hanoverian victory but had little effect on the outcome of the war.  [Image: George II at Dettingen by John Wooten]

The same war also saw the last battle fought on British soil, at Culloden near Inverness in Scotland. In April 1746, a Hanoverian army cornered and crushed Jacobite forces under Charles Edward Stuart, AKA Bonnie Prince Charlie. 

Culloden was more a massacre than a battle. Responsibility for the atrocities that followed belonged to William, Duke of Cumberland, a son of George II. Scots named a smelly weed toxic to horses after him: Stinking Billy. 

In retrospect, Culloden marked the end of the Jacobite threat to the Hanoverian dynasty. It also led to the destruction of the clan system in the Scottish Highlands, and eventually, the forced emigration of most Highland people to the Lowlands and other realms: Canada, the USA, Australia, and beyond. 

Today there are fewer people in the Highlands than in the 18th century. Sheep, hunters, and fishermen replaced the people, then tourists seeking the "romance" of the wild mountains, lochs, and glens. 

The peace of 1748 was merely a truce. By the mid 1750s Britain was once again at war with France, and eventually, Spain. It began in America, where it is still called the French and Indian War. It merged again into a broader European War, the Seven Years' War (1756-1763). 

The Seven Years' War started badly for Britain. It ended in triumph. The turnaround derived in large part from the leadership and strategies of William Pitt, who directed the war effort from 1757. Pitt was a leading member of the Patriot group of Whigs. 

[Image: William Pitt the Elder, later first Earl of Chatham by William Hoare]

George II hated Pitt. In addition to his constant attacks on the government and management of the war, Pitt had alleged that British interests were being sacrificed to the interests of Hanover, which he called "that despicable electorate."    

The king tried to keep Pitt out of government. He succeeded for several years. But as defeat followed defeat, he was forced to relent in 1757, and Pitt entered the cabinet to manage the war. 

Whether it was due to Pitt's leadership or not, cictory followed victory from 1758 on. New France (Canada and the land between the Appalachians and the Mississippi) became part of the British Empire, as did Spanish Florida and chunks of India and Africa.

George II did not live to see the outcome. By1760, he was blind in one eye and nearly deaf. On October 25, he died of heart failure (aortic dissection) while in his close stool (toilet) -- a rather undignified death for a king. 

On the plus side, George II lived to be 77, longer than any previous British monarch. He had outlived his eldest son and heir, Frederick, who died in 1754. He was succeeded by his grandson, who became George III, the first Hanoverian monarch born in Britain.  

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Canaletto Does London, 1746-1755

Giovanni Antonio Canal, or Canaletto, the handle he painted under, is renowned for his lavish portrayals of Venice, where he was born and spent most of his life. Even his name evokes the watery avenues of his native city. 

Canaletto is far less known for his "English Period." He spent nine years in London, arriving in 1746, and painted more than 50 London scenes. Many of them, like his Venetian paintings, focus on water, in this case the mighty Thames. 

He painted several scenes of the river from the terrace of Old Somerset House, the palace of the Somerset dukes. Here are three views from the house. The first two look east towards the City of London and St. Paul's Cathedral. The third looks west towards the seat of government at Westminster and its famous abbey. 

 

 

Another Thames vantage point Canaletto painted from was the first Westminster Bridge, which was under construction when he arrived in England. The bucket hanging from the arch provides a nice touch.

He also pained the whole bridge when it was completed in 1750. The painting here features the grand opening celebration, with the barges of the dignitaries. 

To the East of London, he did several paintings of Christopher Wren's Royal Naval Hospital at Greenwich, constructed between 1696 and 1712. The buildings later served as the Royal Naval College, and are now part of the University of Greenwich. The Painted Hall has recently been restored and is a must see. James Thornhill's masterpiece, it took nineteen years to complete.  

Canaletto did more than water scenes. Here is his stunning painting of Westminster Abbey, highlighting a procession of the knights of the Order of the Bath.

He left us a fine view of a former great aristocratic residence, Northumberland House, along with the equestrian statue of the ill-fated Charles I to its right. The statue remains where it was, but the house was demolished in the 19th century. The view here is looking up the Strand, the main thoroughfare connecting the City of London and Westminster. 

Another long-gone building he painted was the rotunda at Ranelagh Gardens, a great Georgian pleasure palace. The huge fireplace is at the centre. An orchestra plays at the right, while aristocrats and other wealthy folk promenade.

Canaletto painted several scenes of the famous Horse Guards. The first one here is the Old Horse Guards from St. James's Park, followed by the New Horse Guards that was constructed while he was in London and is still there.  

Below is a view of Whitehall, the seat of government, and the Privy Guards from Richmond House. 

Canaletto returned to Venice in 1755. He left behind a marvellous collection of scenes of Georgian London, then the largest city in the world. Of course, he completely ignored the world of the less fortunate, the crime, slums, and brutality that was the lot of many Londoners. His London is wealthy, even opulent, and the sky is always blue. 

Canaletto died in 1768 in his native city. Below is an engraving of the artist. 

The British Monarchy and the Media in Historical Perspective

Writing in The Independent 16/12/22 Sean O'Grady refers to the revelations of the new Harry/Meghan Netflix series as "a tsunami of princely grievances publicly thrown at the Palace with the sort of acrid bitterness rarely glimpsed from the House of Windsor." 

We can all agree that things have got a bit nasty. But unseemly family feuding in the royal family is hardly unusual, as a brief look at their history reveals. The salacious interest of the mass media in Royal Soap Oprahs is also nothing new. 

The British monarchy and the mass media have long existed in symbiotic relationship. The royals benefit in popular opinion from the sentimental rubbish the tabloids spew forth on an almost daily basis. 

On the downside for them, the media can turn rogue when it promises to boost their profit margins. For the tabloids there is no downside. Stories about the royals sell, toadying or tacky. 

Prince Harry blames the media for Meghan's miscarriage. Accurate or not, it wouldn't be the first time media coverage made royal lives miserable. Rail against it all you like. Nothing is likely to change. 

The Sun and Jeremy Clarkson know that. They can write and print the most obnoxious drivel, knowing it will cause outrage. Once they have aroused the storm, they can say they are sorry and even retract the story. But the damage is done and millions of papers have been sold. It's a good business model. 

   

You may recall that the infamous Oprah interview with Meghan and Harry and its sequels blew almost everything else off the news cycle. Trump was gone (we hoped). We were bored of Covid and Brexit. We never did pay that much attention to the sufferings of the planet and its lesser mortals. 

Before we get our knickers in a twist over Oprahgate and the Netflix series, however, we should put this domestic squabble into perspective. 

Historically, the media has fawned upon or denounced the royals, sometimes at the same time. By historically, I mean primarily since the 18th century, when newspapers and magazines first began to emerge as significant sources of information for the general public. 

Let's begin with the first two Hanoverian kings, George I and II. That's when the media and the royals first developed a serious symbiotic relationship. The first two Georges were unpopular in Britain, to put it mildly. For one thing, they were foreigners, always a problem in insular England. Ask the EU. (Images: George I and George II)

The press skewered them for spending too much time in Hanover, although they spent more time in England. They never went to Scotland, Wales, or Ireland. Queen Victoria was the first British monarch to spend any quality time in Scotland or travel to Ireland and Wales. 

Critics accused the first two Georges of not speaking English. In fact, they could speak it, but not well, and they generally communicated in German or French.

Opposition politicians, and the press they controlled or influenced, made the most of the monarchs' failings, real or perceived. Some of the criticism was true, some not. 

George I was not a nice man. He was probably responsible for the murder of his wife's Swedish lover. He was definitely responsible for imprisoning his wife for life. Possibly his worst failing was that he was dull and awkward in public. I share a birthday with him but there the resemblance ends, I hope.

The opposition media often heaped ridicule upon him. They made fun of his mistresses, real and alleged. They characterized him as a borderline political idiot, which was far from the truth. Some Tories schemed to replace him and his heir George II with the exiled Catholic Stuart "Pretender" James "III" because they favored the opposition Whigs in Parliament. 

George I survived a couple of attempted and botched "Jacobite"* rebellions and handed the throne to his son, George II. Here it is important to note that father and son hated each other. That would become a royal family tradition.

George II and his eldest son, Frederick, Prince of Wales, also despised one another. They engaged in many nasty domestic battles. Frederick took revenge by supporting the political opposition to his father's ministers. 

A mock epitaph someone wrote for Prince Frederick when he died in 1751 is indicative of the public disdain for the first two Hanoverians:

"Here lies Fred, 

Who was alive and is dead.

Had it been his father,

I had much rather.

Had it been his brother,

Still better than another.

Had it been his sister,

No one would have missed her.

Had it been the whole generation,

Still better for the nation.

But since t'is only Fred,

Who was alive, and is dead,

There is no more to be said." 

Quoted in W. M. Thackeray, The Four Georges.

(Image: Frederick, Prince of Wales)

George II survived the media attacks, and the last and most serious of the Jacobite Rebellions in 1745. He died in 1760 aged 76 and handed the throne to his 23 year old grandson, son of Frederick. 

George III was born in England. He avoided Hanover, and these things immediately made him more popular than the first two Georges. His reign of 60 years, the longest ever until then, saw many ups and downs in his popularity, however. The media treated him and his family with both contempt and veneration. Here is an example of the former, in which John Bull, symbol of England, is farting at the king's portrait:

The family dysfunction continued. George III's relationship with his eldest son resembled that of his predecessors. George, Prince of Wales, like Frederick, supported the political opposition once he obtained adulthood. He tried to get his father declared mentally unfit to rule.  His critics mocked him as the Prince of Whales for his gluttony and rotundity. 

George IV had no problem with his heirs. His only child, Charlotte died in 1817, before he became king. If she had lived, Victoria might never have become Queen. George's family problem was his wife, Caroline. Their relationship became a public scandal. They had been estranged for years when he ascended the throne in 1820. 

George tried to have her excluded from the Queenship, but she was still his wife and most of the British public was on her side. Caroline became Queen. Only her death the following year saved George from that indignity continuing. 

His death in 1830 brought his elderly brother to the throne, William IV. At 65, he was the oldest person to inherit the throne, until today and Charles III. He had no children, and his reign was short. In 1837, 19-year-old Victoria became Queen. She would reign until 1901 and give her name to an era.

Enough! I could go on to Queen Victoria and her mess of trouble-making children and grandchildren (including Kaiser Wilhelm), but I think I have made my points: 

1. To expect good behavior from royals is just as hopeless as to expect it from other mortals. 

2. To expect the media to forego opportunities to sell their "product" to a salivating public is a pipe dream. Unless you enforce strict censorship.... 

*From the Latin for "James" (Jacobus)