CHAPTER I.

FROM 1660 TO 1678.

State of the country previous to the birth of Sarah Jennings:—Her parentage—Account of her sister, La Belle Jennings—James the Second—Characters of Anne Duchess of York, and of her successor Maria d’Esté—The Princesses Mary and Anne—Origin and character of John Churchill—His family and circumstances.

The period which preceded the birth of the distinguished individual whose singular course is traced out in these Memoirs, was one of apparent luxury and security, but of actual and imminent peril to the national welfare. Charles the Second, in the decline of what could scarcely be deemed his days of prosperity, had not, indeed, experienced the bitterness of grief, which, in the fatal events that succeeded the rebellion of Monmouth, reduced the afflicted monarch to a state of depression which hurried him to an unhonoured grave. That painful scene, which in its effects upon the health and happiness of Charles recalled to remembrance the anguish of the royal mourner for Absalom, had not been as yet enacted: Monmouth was to appearance still loyal, at least, still trusted; and the ascendancy of the Roman Catholic persuasion over our Established worship was, at that time, problematical.

The opinions of reflective men, hushed by the wise determination not to anticipate the effect of probable events, which might accomplish all that they secretly desired, were resolving, nevertheless, into those famous schools of politics, which it were wrong to denominate factions, and which were afterwards divided into the three parties interwoven with all modern history, denominated Jacobites, Tories, and Whigs.

It is true it was not until some years afterwards that these celebrated appellations affixed to each combination certain characters, which have ever since, with little variation, retained the stamp which each originally bore; but the names only were wanting. Public opinion, in those worthy to assert its importance, had actually arranged itself under three different banners; although it required some signal manifestations on the part of government, to draw forth the forces marshalled under these, from the state of inaction in which for the present they remained.

Amongst the middle, or moderate party,—who, not contending, like the Jacobites, for the indefeasible and divine right inherent in one family under every circumstance, asserted generally the principles of arbitrary government,—a great portion of the gentry, landed proprietors, numbers of whom had fought and bled for the Royal cause, and yet, who were, from the same high spirit and loyal dispositions, equally ready to defend their country from oppression should occasion require, might at this period be enumerated. This respectable portion of the community were, for the greater part, of the Protestant faith; and, therefore, whilst dreading the notion of republicanism, they were attached to the reigning monarchs, and averse to the succession of James, or to the Yorkist Party, as it was called—a name which, by a singular coincidence, had already proved fatal to the peace of England.

Upon the virtue and strength of the Tories, as they might then be called,—though eventually they merged, as the abettors of the Revolution, into the bolder faction, with whom from necessity they were joined,—much of what has since been preserved to us, depended. Notwithstanding the practice which obtained among those who had sufficient influence, of sending their sons into the army, and their daughters to court, it is from the royalist families that many of those who promoted the Revolution, and who even suffered for their premature exertions in the cause of liberty, have sprung. Individuals who would have shuddered at the name of Revolution, whilst yet their restored monarch ruled the country,—with a facility which, when we consider his character and example, is incomprehensible,—became, in after times, impatient to distinguish themselves in a resistance to the unsettled mandates of a court, and in their eagerness to promote the dominion of just and fixed laws. Amongst this class was the family of Churchill; and, if we consider the Duchess as its chief representative, that of Jennings. The origin, principles, and circumstances of the latter family we are now about to discuss.

Sarah Duchess of Marlborough, the subject of this Memoir, a gentlewoman by birth, and a favourite of fortune, affords, in the narrative of her chequered life, an instance that integrity, unless accompanied by moderation, cannot protect from the assaults of slander, nor personal and hereditary advantages insure happiness.

This celebrated woman, the beautiful and intellectual offspring of wealthy and well-descended parents; the wife of the most distinguished, and also of the most domestic and affectionate of men; blessed as a parent beyond the lot of most mothers; the favourite of her sovereign, and endowed with superabundant temporal means; lived, nevertheless, in turbulence and discontent, and died, unloved, unregretted, and calumniated.

Her original condition in life was fixed by Providence in a station, neither too high to enjoy the quiet privileges of domestic comfort, nor too low to aspire to distinction; and it was rather her misfortune than her privilege, that she was singled out, in early life, to receive the favours of the great. She was the daughter of a country gentleman in good circumstances. Her family had, for many generations, possessed an estate at Sandridge in Hertfordshire, near St. Albans, at which place, it has been stated, the father of the Duchess could muster a tenantry sufficient to influence considerably the election of members for the adjacent borough of St. Albans.[2]

The family of Jennings had been held in high estimation by the House of Stuart, and were distinguished among the adherents to the Royal cause. The Duchess, whatever might be her subsequent opinions of rulers and princes, sprang from a race devoted to the hereditary monarchy. Her grandfather, Sir John Jennings, received the order of the Bath, in company with his unfortunate young patron, Charles the First, then Prince of Wales; and the partiality of the Stuart family, when restored, was successively manifested by proofs of favour to the owners of Sandridge.[3]

These details refute the reports which prevailed, during the sunshine of prosperity which the Duchess enjoyed, that her parents were of mean origin. It was also stated, by the scandalous writers of the day, that her mother was a woman of abandoned character, rejected from society, and of the lowest extraction. Among the various proofs which might be adduced in contradiction of this aspersion, the most convincing is the correspondence which Mrs. Jennings maintained, with families of respectability in her own neighbourhood. A letter is still extant, between Sarah Duchess of Marlborough and the daughter-in-law of Sir John Wittewronge of Rothamsted Park, near St. Albans, in which this calumniated lady is referred to by Mrs. Wittewronge, addressing the Duchess, as “your noble mother.”[4] This, and the still stronger testimony which will be presently adduced, disprove the insinuations of party writers, who required but a slender foundation of surmise upon which to ground their injurious attacks.

Those who thus wrote were perhaps aware, that they could scarcely wound a person of the Duchess’s disposition more deeply than by an aspersion of this description. Yet, in her celebrated Vindication, written in old age, the Duchess, with calmness, refutes in these terms those who sought to defame her origin: “Though I am very little concerned about pedigree or families, I know not why I should not tell you, that his (her father’s) was reckoned a good one; and that he had in Somersetshire, Kent, and St. Albans, about four thousand pounds a year.”[5]

The mother of the Duchess belonged, in fact, to a family in some degree superior to that of her husband. She was Frances Thornhurst, daughter of Sir Giffard Thornhurst of Agnes Court in Kent, and heiress to her father’s property. Thus, on both sides, the Duchess might regard her origin with complacency; and the expression of the antiquary Collins, when he describes her relatives “as a considerable family,” is justified.[6]

This point, of little importance had it not been obscured by malignity, is readily ascertained: but of the dispositions, principles, and attainments of the parents who nurtured one who played so conspicuous a part, we have no authentic record. It is a singular fact, that until a diligent inquiry was made, with a view to the compilation of these Memoirs, a degree of obscurity existed, even with regard to the birthplace of the Duchess. Archdeacon Coxe explicitly declares that she was born at Sandridge; but, on examining the parish registers of that place, no mention of that fact, nor indeed of the birth of any of the Jennings family, is to be found in them; nor are there in the church, as it now stands, any monuments inscribed with that name. Neither does there appear to have been any house on the estate at Sandridge, of nearly sufficient importance to have been the residence of the Jennings family.[7] It appears, however, from indisputable testimony, that Sarah Jennings was born on the twenty-ninth day of May,[8] in the year 1660, at Holywell, a suburb of St. Albans, and in a small house, very near the site of the spacious mansion afterwards erected there by her husband, John Duke of Marlborough.

It is to be regretted that a reference to the registers of the Abbey of St. Albans will not assist in establishing this point: in the fire which broke out in that noble building in 1743, a portion of those valuable memorials was burnt. But tradition, corroborated by probability, has satisfied the minds of those most qualified to judge, that at Holywell, the future “viceroy,” as she was sarcastically denominated, first saw the light.[9]

This celebrated woman was one of five children, all of whom, excepting Frances Duchess of Tyrconnel, she survived. Her brothers Ralph and John died young; and one of her sisters, Barbara, who married a gentleman of St. Albans, named Griffiths, died in London in 1678, in the twenty-seventh year of her age.[10]

By the early demise of these relatives, the Duchess acquired that hereditary property which became afterwards her home. At a very early age, however, she must have left Holywell, to enter upon the duties of a courtier. She was preceded in the service of Anne Hyde, Duchess of York, by her eldest sister Frances, the celebrated _La Belle_ Jennings, who graced the halls in which the dissolute Charles and James held carousal, and who followed the destinies of the exiled James to a foreign land.

Resembling in some respects her sister, Frances Jennings was equally celebrated for her talents and for her beauty. Her personal charms were, however, of a softer and more alluring character than those of the imperious Sarah. Her bright yet delicate complexion, her luxuriant flaxen hair, and her attractive but not elevated features, might have been liable to the charge of insipidity, but that a vivacity of manner and play of countenance were combined with youthful loveliness, in riveting the attention on a face not to be forgotten. Like her sister, Frances possessed shrewdness, decision, penetration, and, their frequent attendant in woman, a love of interfering. Proud rather than principled, and a coquette, this lovely, aspiring woman had no sooner entered upon her duties of a maid of honour, than her youth and innocence were assailed by every art which could be devised, among men whose professed occupation was what they termed gallantry. Frances united to her other attractions remarkable powers of conversation; her raillery was admirable, her imagination vivid. It was not long before her fascinations attracted the notice of that devotee and reprobate, James Duke of York, whose Duchess she served. But James, in directing his attention to a Jennings, encountered all the secret contempt that a woman could feel, and received all the avowed disdain which she dared to show. To his compliments, the indignant and persecuted maid of honour turned a deaf ear; and the written expressions of the Duke’s regard were torn to pieces, and scattered to the winds. Nor was it long before Frances Jennings found, in a sincere and honest attachment, an additional safeguard against temptation.

Sarah, at twelve years of age, was introduced into the same dangerous atmosphere. Fortunately for both sisters, in Anne Duchess of York they found a mistress whom they could respect, and in whose protection they felt security; for she possessed—the one great error in her career set apart—a sensible and well-conditioned mind.

Her court was then the chief resort of the gay and the great. It was the Duchess’s foible (in such circumstances one of injurious effect) to pride herself upon the superior beauty of her court, and on its consequent distinction in the world of fashion, in comparison with that of the Queen, the homely Katharine of Braganza. But she had virtue and delicacy sufficient to appreciate the prudence and good conduct of those around her, and to set an example of propriety and dignity, in her own demeanour, becoming her high station. United to a husband who, in the midst of depravity, “had,” says Burnet, “a real sense of sin, and was ashamed of it.”[11] Anne, had she lived, might have possessed, as a Protestant, and as a woman of understanding, a salutary influence over the mind of her husband;—an influence which prudent women are found to retain, even when the affections of the heart are alienated on both sides. But her death, which happened in 1671, deprived England of a queen-consort who professed the national faith; and, in her, James lost a faithful and sensible wife, and the court a guide and pattern which might have checked the awful demoralization that prevailed.

Anne was succeeded by the unfortunate Maria Beatrix d’Esté, Princess of Modena, called, from her early calamities, “the Queen of Tears.”[12] Into the service of this lovely child, for such she then was, Sarah Jennings, in consequence of the partiality entertained by the Stuarts for her family, who had been always Royalists, was, shortly after the death of her first patroness, preferred.

In the young Duchess of York Sarah found a kind mistress, an affectionate and a liberal friend. Her subsequent desertion of this unhappy Princess is, we are of opinion, one of the worst features of a character abounding in faults; and proves that ambition, like the fabled Upas tree, blights all the verdure of kindly affections which spring up within the human heart.

Maria Beatrix, the beloved, adopted daughter of Louis XIV., encountered, in her marriage with James, a fate still more calamitous than that which the ungainly Katharine of Braganza, or the lofty but neglected Anne Hyde, bore in unappreciated submission. Beautiful beyond the common standard, and joyous as youth and innocence usually are, this unhappy woman came, in all the unconsciousness of childhood, to incur the miseries of suspicion and obloquy, and to experience subsequent reverse, even poverty. She was hurried over to England, when little more than fourteen years of age, to become the bride of James, then no longer young, in whom bigotry was strangely united to looseness of morals, which habitual and prompt repentance could not restrain. In his phlegmatic deportment, in spite of the natural grace of all the Stuarts, vice failed to attract, yet ceased not to disgust; nor can we be surprised that repeated and fruitless negociations were necessary to procure him a wife, after remaining a widower for more than two years.[13]

In November, 1673, the ill-fated Princess of Modena landed at Dover. The match, which had been accelerated by the promise of a portion to Maria, his adopted daughter, from the King of France, was universally unpopular in England. It had been, however, already concluded, the Earl of Peterborough having, in September, married the Princess by proxy, in Italy. He had conducted the bride to Paris, when Parliament met, and the Commons voted an address to the King, to prevent the marriage of his brother and the Princess, on the plea of her religion. The hopes of a dowry prevailed, at a time when Charles was so impoverished as to entertain an idea of recalling the ambassadors from foreign courts, from the want of means to support them; and the Princess was married to the Duke, at Dover, on the same evening that she landed, to prevent further obstacles, the ceremony being performed according to the rites of the Church of England.[14]

The Duke and the Duchess proceeded to Whitehall, where no very cordial welcome awaited their arrival. The Duchess was refused the use of the private chapel, which had been stipulated by the marriage articles, and the Duke was advised by his friends to withdraw from the country.[15]

Such was the reception of Maria D’Esté, the mother of the Pretender, and, as such, the innocent cause of many national disasters. In her service, and favoured by her kindness, Sarah Jennings passed many years; nor can the subsequent desertion of this lovely and unfortunate Princess, which the then influential Countess of Marlborough justified to herself, be viewed in any other light than as an act of the coldest ingratitude. During the twelve years that Mary enjoyed a comparatively private station as Duchess of York, she passed her time, and engaged those around her, in innocent amusements and revels, which have been always peculiarly agreeable in their rulers to the English people. Young and light-hearted as she then was, Mary was herself the fairest flower of the court, over which she presided with the gay grace of her country. “She was,” says Macpherson, “of exquisite beauty. Her complexion was very fair, her hair black, her eyes full of sweetness and fire. She was tall in her person, and admirably shaped; dignified in her manner, and graceful in her deportment.”[16]

By the sweetness and propriety of her conduct, she, in her hours of sunshine, made herself universally beloved, notwithstanding her religion; and amid the storms of her subsequent career she showed a spirit and heroism which deserved a better cause, and a clinging attachment to James which merited a worthier object.

There is no reason to conclude that at first Sarah Jennings lived constantly in the household of the Duchess. “I was often at court,” is an expression which occurs in a passage of her Vindication. She seems, indeed, to have remained in the proximity of the Duchess, chiefly for the purpose of being a sort of playmate, rather than attendant, of the Princess Anne, the step-daughter of her royal mistress, whose favour she ultimately succeeded in obtaining, and for whose dawning greatness she relinquished her adherence to the falling fortunes of the Duchess. It is probably to this intimacy with the juvenile branches of the court that Sarah, in part, owed that correctness of conduct, which not even the malice of her enemies could successfully impugn; and soon a sincere and well-founded attachment, the great safeguard to wandering affections, ended in an engagement which gave to the beautiful Miss Jennings an efficient and devoted protector.

In the year 1673, John Churchill, afterwards Duke of Marlborough, was appointed to be a gentleman of the bedchamber to the Duke of York,—probably on occasion of the Duke’s marriage. Churchill was at this time a colonel in the army, and already his fame stood high as an officer of enterprise; whilst, at the court, there were few of the young gallants of the day who could cope with this gifted man, in the dignity and symmetry of his person, in the graces of his manner, or in the charm which good-breeding, and a species of benevolence in small and every-day matters, confer upon the deportment.

The illustrious name of Churchill requires, however, some comment, before the disturbed course of his love-suit to his future wife, the solace and torment of his later days, can be unfolded.

Roger de Courselle, or Courcil, one of the Barons of Poitou, who followed William the Conqueror to England, and settled first in Somersetshire, and afterwards in Devonshire, under the anglicised name of Churchill, was the direct progenitor of Colonel Churchill. It is worthy of remark, that at different periods the ancestors of our great warrior have been noted for valour. In the reign of Stephen, Sir Bartholomew Churchill lost his life defending Bristol Castle, in the cause of the king; and in the disturbed times of Edward the Fourth, William, a lineal descendant of Sir Bartholomew, fought under the banners of the Courtenays in Devonshire, for his sovereign. Successive proofs of loyalty were given by the Churchill family; and Sir Winston, the father of the hero of Blenheim, left the University of Oxford, whilst a youth, to enlist in the army of Charles the First, in which he served with distinction, as a captain of horse, in several battles.[17]

It was the inevitable consequence of the political turmoils in which the family of Colonel Churchill bore a part, that his patrimony should have suffered. His youth was passed in privacy and restraint; and perhaps to that circumstance may be traced that love of order in his affairs, and that close regulation of his expenditure, which in his prosperous days procured for him the opprobrium of penuriousness. During the civil wars, his father had married a daughter of Sir John Drake, of Ashe in Dorsetshire, where Sir Winston was thankful, after the execution of Charles the First, to retire, his estates being sequestrated by Parliament, and a fine of upwards of four thousand pounds imposed upon him for his adherence to the Royal cause.

In the safe seclusion of Ashe, John Churchill was nurtured; and, although upon the restoration of Charles the Second the family estate was recovered, his father was honoured with knighthood, and employed by government, his valiant son never derived any pecuniary advantage from the paternal property.[18] Sir Winston ultimately was reduced to circumstances of difficulty, in which he died, bequeathing his estate to his widow, with a request that she would leave it to his third son, Charles. To his family connexion, not solely to fortune or to his own merits, was John indebted for his elevation to distinction. His condition therefore, in some respects, resembled that of his early and late affection, as far as worldly and external circumstances are concerned.

The family of Churchill, like that of Jennings, was ancient; and young Churchill possessed, in the power of referring to a long line of ancestry, an incentive, to an ardent mind peculiarly attractive, to aim at distinction, not only for self-gratification, but with the hope of restoring to former honour those whose fortunes and fame had been crushed, but not obliterated. Colonel Churchill, even from his childhood, had been connected with a court, and destined to share a courtier’s duties and rewards. From his boyhood he was honoured with the notice of Royalty, the Duke of York being his first patron.

To the influence of James he owed his rapid promotion in the army; and, as in all similar cases, several causes, such as were incidental to the Stuart family, and probably from their known looseness of principle, were assigned for his success. But to the good-nature and discernment of James the Second, the first opportunity afforded to Marlborough of becoming great must be attributed. Observing the enthusiasm of the high-minded boy, then his page, during the reviews of the regiments of Foot Guards, James inquired of the youth “what profession he would prefer?” Churchill, neither overpowered nor abashed by this trait of condescension, fell upon his knees, and owned a predilection for that of arms, venturing to beg “for a pair of colours in one of those fine regiments.” His petition was granted, and at sixteen years of age Churchill entered the army.

This commencement of his fortune has been stated, but erroneously, to have been the result of James’s passion for Arabella Churchill, the sister of the young officer, and afterwards the acknowledged mistress of the prince. But Arabella, who was younger than her brother, had not at that time attracted the notice of her brother’s patron. In all probability her transient influence over the Duke—that influence which excited the sole pang of jealousy ever evinced by Anne Hyde—accelerated the rise to eminence which Churchill gained with unusual rapidity, and in consideration of which he appears, in compliance with the custom of the day, to have witnessed, without the burning blushes of shame, his sister’s disgrace. Arabella, indolent, easy, not beautiful,[19] and unambitious, soon lost her royal lover’s regard. She bore him, however, two sons, one, the celebrated James Fitz-James, Duke of Berwick; the other, Henry, Grand Prior of France; and two daughters, Lady Waldegrave and Mrs. Godfrey.

At the period of his appointment in the household of the Duke of York, Colonel Churchill was in his twenty-fourth year. Already had he distinguished himself at the siege of Tangier during his first campaign, and had served afterwards under the Duke of Monmouth, and nominally under Louis the Fourteenth; but, to the especial advantage of his military character, he had fought under the banners of Marshal Turenne. Already had he signalised himself in the attacks on Nimeguen, where his courage attracted the discerning eye of Turenne, who gave him the name of the “handsome Englishman;” and a station of importance having been abandoned by one of Turenne’s officers, Captain Churchill was appointed to maintain it, which he effected, expelling the enemy.[20]

At the siege of Maestricht Churchill still further advanced his fame, and received the thanks of Louis the Fourteenth, and his fortunes seemed to his youthful mind advancing to their climax, when he was presented to Charles the Second by the Duke of Monmouth, with this warm-hearted asseveration, characteristic of that gallant nobleman. “To the bravery of this gallant officer,” said the Duke, addressing his royal father, “I owe my life.” The last reward of Churchill’s valiant exertions had been an appointment to the command of the English troops auxiliary to France; a post which the Earl of Peterborough had resigned.[21] The fame of these various services had been extolled by friends at court, and by connexions, influential in various degrees, and for various reasons.

Recalled, at sundry times, to the duties of a court life, the hero who surpassed the generals under whom he served, surpassed also the courtiers with whom he came into frequent collision. He was endowed with personal beauty, height of stature, (being above the middle size,) activity, and sweetness of expression: in short, the perfection of the species, high intellect combined with perfect grace, was exhibited in this great, and, when chastened by the course of events, subsequently good man. His countenance was mild, thoughtful, commanding; his brow lofty, his features regular but flexible. His deportment was dignified, and, at the same time, winning. “No one,” said one who knew him personally, “ever said a pert thing to the Duke of Marlborough.”[22]

The same consummate judge even attributed the great success of the Duke “to the Graces, who protected and promoted him.” “His manner,” Lord Chesterfield declares, “was irresistible, either by man or woman.”

Like most young men destined to the profession of arms, the education of Churchill was limited. Lord Chesterfield, indeed, declares that the great Marlborough was “eminently illiterate, wrote bad English, and spelt it worse;” and he goes so far as to assert, that “he had no share of what is commonly called parts; he had no brightness, nothing shining in his genius.”

But with this opinion, however backed by high authority, it is impossible for those who trace the career of Marlborough to agree. That he was not a man of extensive intellectual cultivation, as far as the learning to be acquired from books was concerned—that he was not calculated to harangue in the senate with peculiar distinction, nor addicted deeply to the study of the closet—may readily be admitted. It may even be allowed that he was deficient in the science of orthography—in those days less carefully instilled in youth than in the present time.[23] But that he was absolutely illiterate, or even of mediocre parts moderately cultivated, his private letters sufficiently disprove. They are all admirably expressed; clear, emphatic, and in well-constructed sentences. His father was a man of letters, the author of an historical work,[24] and by Sir Winston was the education of Churchill superintended, until he was placed at St. Paul’s school, London.[25]

To the “cool head and warm heart” of Marlborough, as King William the Third expressed it, he owed his early and progressive success. He was at once the object of affection and of confidence. His calmness, the suavity of his temper, until disease, most cruel in its effects on _that_, broke down his self-command; his forbearance—his consideration for others—the gentleness with which he refused what he could not grant—the grace with which he conferred favours—these qualities, combined with indefatigable industry, hardihood, and a judgment never prejudiced by passion, were the true sources of Churchill’s greatness, the benignant spirits which made the gifts of fortune sweeter when they came.

It is uncertain at what time or in what manner the first tokens of ardent affection between Colonel Churchill and the youthful Sarah were exchanged. The authoress of the “Life of Zarah” has given a romantic description of their first meeting, in which, as in other ephemeral works, we may suppose there may be some foundation of truth, but no accuracy of detail. According to this account, the youthful fancy of Sarah was first attracted by the grace of her valiant lover in the dance—a recreation in which he particularly excelled. “Every step he took carried death in it,”[26] and the applause and admiration which Colonel Churchill obtained, sank deep into the heart of one whose ambition was perhaps as easily stimulated as her love. Yet that her affections were interested in the addresses of the brave Churchill, is manifest from her rejection of another suitor of higher rank, the Earl of Lindsay, afterwards Marquis of Ancaster, and of others, by whom she was considered as “the star and ornament of the court.”[27]

The correspondence between these celebrated lovers during the anxious days of courtship was preserved by the survivor, with a care that marked the honour which she felt she had received in being beloved by such a man as Marlborough. They are said, by Archdeacon Coxe, to have displayed the most ardent tenderness on the part of Churchill, with alternations of regard and petulance on that of the lady. Her haughtiness, and the sensibility of her future husband, fully appear in these letters. Yet, notwithstanding the defects of character which they betrayed in the one party, the attachment on the side of the other increased in ardour, and continued sufficiently strong to overcome all obstacles. Amongst these, the scanty portion of Sarah, no less than the still greater deficiency of means on the part of her lover, formed the principal impediment. In order to show the different circumstances of each of the families with which they were connected, it is necessary to give some account of their various members, and of the fortunes which they had at this time begun to share.

The adherence of the Churchill family to the royal House of Stuart, and the adverse effect of that adherence upon the fortunes of Sir Winston Churchill, have been already mentioned. Sir Winston, a man of considerable learning and of approved bravery, had indeed so far retrieved his circumstances, and relieved his estate of its heavy burdens, as to be able, in 1661, to stand for the borough of Weymouth, and to sit in the first parliament called by Charles the Second. He was afterwards appointed a commissioner of the Court of Claims in Ireland, and constituted, on his return from that country, one of the comptrollers of the Board of Green Cloth,—an office from which he was removed, but to which he was restored. But these appointments appear to have been the sole compensation which he received for his active services; and he seems to have devoted the latter portion of his days to pursuits of literature rather than of ambition, being one of the first fellows of the Royal Society, and the author of an able and elegant historical work on the Kings of England, which composition he dedicated to Charles the Second.[28]

Sir Winston’s means were encumbered, however, with seven sons and four daughters; and although seven of this numerous family died in infancy, yet still a sufficient number remained to entail anxiety upon the owner of an impoverished estate. George Churchill, the third surviving son, like his brother John, owed the first gleams of royal favour to family interest, but insured its continuance by his merit. He distinguished himself both by sea and land; was a faithful servant, for twenty years, as a gentleman of the bedchamber to George of Denmark, and attained, under King William, the post of one of the commissioners of the Admiralty.

Charles, the fourth son, was also bred to arms, and, at an early age, signalised himself at the time of the Revolution. To him the landed property of Sir Winston descended, on account of some pecuniary obligations which his father owed him, and which prove how circumscribed were still the means of the brave and estimable Sir Winston. Like his brothers, Charles held offices under the crown, and was appointed governor of the Tower of London by Queen Anne.[29] Thus, whilst, by merit and interest conjoined, the sons of Sir Winston Churchill attained independence, and perhaps wealth, it was natural for him to desire that his eldest surviving son should farther advance his fortunes by an advantageous marriage; nor was it inconsistent with the notions of the day, to look upon marriage solely as a negociation in which the affections were not even consulted, or were at least regarded as of secondary import.

That such were the sentiments of Sir Winston and Lady Churchill, appears from the strenuous opposition which they made to their son’s union with Miss Jennings: for at present her portion was inconsiderable, and her family interest not to be compared with that of the Churchills. It is true that the estate at Sandridge, to which the Duchess afterwards became co-heiress, was more productive than those lands which Sir Winston Churchill had saved from the grasp of the parliament; but still it was encumbered by a provision for her grandfather’s numerous issue; nor was it until the death of her brothers, without children, that Sarah and her sister Frances shared the patrimonial property. Thus circumstanced, and precluded on both sides from the expectation of parental aid, the young soldier was obliged to depend upon his own powers of exertion, to find means to form an establishment for the lady to whom he made his ardent suit.

The young Duchess of York was, at this juncture, the counsellor and confidante of Sarah, and she appears to have offered her and Colonel Churchill some pecuniary assistance in this emergency.[30] Nor was her bounty the only source from which a future provision for the lovers was derived.

It is always an ungracious task to touch upon the errors of those who, by a subsequent career of honour, have left, as the final testament to posterity, an example of domestic virtue. The income which Colonel Churchill possessed,[31] is said to have been derived from a dishonourable source.[32] Amongst the causes of his rapid rise in the army, as well as of his success at court, his relationship to the celebrated Barbara Villiers, afterwards Duchess of Cleveland, has been naturally regarded as one of the most powerful explanations of the favours which he received. This infamous woman, described by Bishop Burnet as “a woman of great beauty, but enormously vicious and ravenous, foolish, but imperious,”[33] governed Charles the Second, as it is well known, by the exhibition of the most tempestuous passions, which she ascribed in his presence to jealousy of him, whilst her intrigues with other men were notorious. She was second cousin to Churchill by his mother’s side, being the daughter of Villiers Lord Grandison, who was killed at the battle of Edge Hill. Whilst Churchill was a youth, she imbibed for him too strong a partiality, in such a mind as hers, to appear even innocent, if it really were so. Her passion for him was as sudden as it was disgusting; and however it may have procured him some temporary assistance, it drew upon him the displeasure of the King, who at one time forbade him the court.[34] The advocates of Churchill have endeavoured to attach little importance to this disgraceful connexion, for which his youth and the temptations of the court alone furnish an apology; yet they cannot, whilst they excuse, entirely deny a fact which undoubtedly sullies the fair fame of Churchill.

Lord Chesterfield, in holding up the Duke of Marlborough as a model of good breeding and irresistible elegance and suavity, thus touches upon the fact of his being under pecuniary obligations to the imperious Duchess of Cleveland. “He had,” says his lordship, “most undoubtedly an excellent, good, plain understanding, with sound judgment. But these alone would probably have raised him but something higher than they found him, which was page to King James the Second’s queen. There the graces protected and promoted him; for while he was an ensign in the Guards, the Duchess of Cleveland, then favourite mistress of the King, struck by those very graces, gave him five thousand pounds; with which he immediately bought an annuity of five hundred pounds a year, of my grandfather Halifax, which was the foundation of his subsequent fortune.”[35]

Upon this slender annuity, thus disreputably obtained, the hopes of Churchill and of the young object of his affections depended. Sarah appears to have been capricious and undecided in her conduct during the progress of their engagement, which lasted three years.[36] The cause of these variations of feeling has been assigned to the opposition made by Sir Winston and Lady Churchill to their son’s forming a union so far below their expectations; but it may be referred to various other sources. The high-minded Sarah must have been often offended and wounded, in the nicest feelings, by the past irregularities of Churchill’s life. Those irregularities were renounced, it is true, upon his engagement with her, and his honourable and well-toned mind was recalled to a sense of that beauty which attends purity of conduct, and its power to dignify characters even of a common stamp. But the effects of his past conduct were found in the bitterness and jealousy of those by whom he had been hitherto flattered,[37] and by whom doubtless the defects of his moral character may have been grossly exaggerated. Sarah may have intended to prove the constancy of her accomplished lover, when, hearing that his parents destined him to become the husband of a young lady of superior fortune to her own, though of less beauty, she petulantly entreated him “to renounce an attachment which militated against his worldly prospects;” and adding many reproaches, pungent as her pen could write,—and in the vituperative style she had few equals,—she declared that she would accompany her sister Frances, then Countess of Hamilton, to Paris, thus finally to end their engagement. Her address to the honour, to the heart of Churchill, was not made in vain; he answered her by an appeal to her affection, and by earnest remonstrances against her cruelty, and a reconciliation was the result.[38]

Whilst these sentiments secretly occupied the heart of Churchill, and of her who loved him, perhaps, less for his excellencies than for the effect which they produced upon others, several events took place at the court of Charles, in which Colonel Churchill, during the intervals of his military service, participated,—his office of master of the robes to the Duke of York, an appointment granted him in 1673, retaining him near the court; whilst Sarah, in the course of her attendance on the Princess Anne, must have taken a considerable interest in the events which immediately concerned the royal family.