Year of Darkness - Part 6 - 1786 by Annabel Howarth

Diary of Georgiana Newton

16 June 1786, Weymouth 

So, we came here, to Weymouth, anyway.  Mother insisted.  She has such high ambitions.  She had heard that, despite the tragedy that had beset this coastline earlier in the year, and the lack of sunlight, the Duke of Gloucester would be in residence in Gloucester Lodge for the summer.  Mother is keen that I should make the acquaintance of his daughter, Princess Sophia, as a friendship with her could be the key to helping us rise in society.  And so, we have spent some dismal days promenading beside the sea, in hopes of making the acquaintance of the Duke’s wife, Maria, the Princess Sophia and her younger brother.  We should usually see the white cliffs to the left of the bay, and at this time of year, at least, some days of golden sun and blue sky, but this year has been like no other I have ever known.  The muddy haze in the sky has never lifted, like a constant storm is brewing. 

Molly was full of it on our second evening here, regaling stories from servants who stay here throughout the year.  I know I should not permit her to speak so freely to me, but I should die of boredom if it was not for her tales, which she recalls with such liveliness, whilst combing my hair through before bed.  I look forward to it.  She told me of a huge commotion, about a week after the dreadful incident of the wreck of the Halsewell, when a dishevelled man came knocking at the front door, saying he had come for “his rights” as Newton’s heir.  He demanded to see him, having been told that this was his house.  His clothes were torn and bloodied.  Nobody could understand what he was saying.  They told him the master, John Newton, and his family, were in their family home in Yorkshire.  The stranger then collapsed to the floor in such a despondent heap.  Saying he had searched for so long, for his mother, who he had been told was called Agnes, wife of Robert Newton.  Nobody could make sense of it, but they took pity on him, as they thought he must be quite maddened by the horrifying events of the shipwreck.  He said he had come from there.  We needed help in the stables, and so he is now employed here, although I am unlikely to come across him, intrigued as I am.

 

25 June 1786, Weymouth

Another dark day.  At the start of the year, we were all waiting for spring to arrive, and it never did, but it is strange how soon a dramatic alteration in our lives becomes the new normal.  Mother is as happy as if the sun had appeared again, as she has managed to ingratiate herself on Lady Anne, who has invited her to have tea with her and Lady Maria.  She wishes me to join them and hopes that Lady Maria will think me a suitable companion for Princess Sophia.  I cannot imagine what I will have in common with a 13 year old girl, or how anyone cannot see through my mother.  I hope I do not appear as awkward as I feel.  Mother has me balancing books on my head, as if that will help.

I am usually bored when retiring to the Drawing Room after dinner.  I have developed a knack of smiling and nodding, in such a way that nobody appears to notice that my mind has wandered elsewhere.  But last night the conversation held me raptured for once, as it suddenly turned from the latest wig fashion to tales of the Halsewell.  I had been gazing into space, when our “eccentric” guest (as mother calls her) Mrs Hurst, an elderly and distant relation of ours, announced, “I find all of this is so trivial in the light of the plight of the poor souls lost in the Halsewell.”  My ears immediately pricked up and I listened intently as she spoke of the fear that the Captain and his daughters must have felt, huddled in the round house.  Not least because I had overheard father mention at dinner, that he had heard rumours that the government were considering whether to set up a penal colony in Botany Bay, Australia, and he joked of changing our fortunes by taking us all there as one of the first colonists.  Mother looked at him rather reproachfully and said, with a laughter that her eyes did not convey, that he wouldn’t spoil my “chances of a good marriage by dragging us to the other side of the world”.  And I certainly hoped he was not at all serious, as I did not wish to lose my life dashed against the rocks. 

Mrs Hurst said it had been widely reported that plunderers had stripped the bodies thrown to the shore, “but what the newspapers will not tell you, is of the fearsome sight of many of the bodies torn apart, as though their limbs had been ripped from their sockets, and some even reported seeing chunks taken out of the flesh, as though some great monster had bitten through with its mighty jaws.”  She said that she had heard stories, that fear in the eyes of the haunted looking souls who had escaped the wreckage and made their way back towards London on foot, was not only because of the ravages of the sea.  Some were reported to have gone mad, murmuring about “the beast”. 

Mother laughed it off, as “nonsense”, and there were “no such things as monsters”.  “The sea is monster enough.” 

But Mrs Hurst nodded and tapped the side of her nose, in such a way as to suggest that she knew better.  “Nevertheless, we should help those poor souls.  I believe that there is a charity set up to help the 74 survivors – out of 240, can you imagine it!”

“You can call it 73,” Mother then said, “as we have taken in one of those survivors ourselves.” 

Although I continued to smile dimly, in my usual way, I felt my pulse rate rise, as the intrigue took over, and I strained to make sure I could hear what they were saying, over the wittering of Elizabeth, who was sat beside me, whispering some nonsense about beauty patches.  

“We have a new stable boy,” mother smiled grandly, as though she was some great philanthropist.  “He is quite mad of course.  He walked this way from the shipwreck, rather than return with the other sailors to London.  Says he is the heir to Agnes Newton.  Whoever, he thinks she is.”

Mrs Hurst looked very startled at this point.  She started, as though to speak, and then looked around as if checking the room.  I watched her, as she sat back a while, not speaking, while the conversation reverted back to wigs and make-up.  And then, she sat up, with a determined look, and said, “there is an old story, you may not have heard, Carolina,” and she said it in such a slow, sombre, mysterious way that my mother was stopped in her tracks.  Staring ahead of her, she spoke of the story she had been told as a child, a frightening tale of a Lady Agnes and the moon beast.  She was the first wife of one of the Newton lords, going back generations, who was attacked one night when she entered the kitchens. 

“Oh, I remember that tale, I forgot the name, but it was just a story, to scare children into staying in their beds at night.  Nothing more.  The strange boy has probably heard the same tale.”  And my mother just laughed and continued to hold audience for the remainder of the evening, talking excitedly of her appointment for tea with Lady Anne and Lady Maria.  But I watched Mrs Hurst, whose strange and sombre look remained on her face all evening.

 

1 July 1786 – Weymouth

 

I feel I should be in awe of the afternoon, mother and I spent in the company of Lady Anne and Lady Maria.   Lady Anne has the most delightful morning room, over-looking the sea front.  Even with the dullness of the days, the room appeared to shine with its opulence, and the number of candles lighting the room, and we could see the waves crashing on the shore, although the cliffs beyond still allude us from this distance.

All of that, and mother’s obvious delight at the way our afternoon passed, has been eclipsed for me, by the chance meeting of the dark eyed boy.  For that is what I will now call him.  The mad sailor who is now our stable hand.  One of the footmen has been taken ill, and he was asked to step in.  I wondered who he was, as he helped me up to the carriage on our return from Lady Anne’s.  Even though we could have walked from here, mother insisted we take the carriage, to create the right impression.  It was the way he looked directly at me, as the servants rarely do, that caught my attention, and I found myself catching my breathe, as I had never felt such a sensation, as I was drawn in by his eyes.  And now I am almost ashamed to write, but I must share these feelings somewhere.  I cannot rid him from my thoughts.

 

2 July 1786 – Weymouth

I dropped my shawl, before entering the carriage today.  The dark eyed boy is still there, covering for the sick footman.  He had the impertinence to speak to me, as he picked up my shawl and handed it to me.  “I am here to see the wrongs are righted, Madam,” he said.  And hearing his velvet voice, and so close to my ear, like a warm breeze, almost made me swoon.  He does not smile.  Not with his mouth, nor with his eyes.  His eyes that should not look at me, but at once repel and draw me in.  I have never felt such a sensation before.

 

3 July 1786 – Weymouth

I was disappointed this afternoon, to find our usual footman has returned.  His eyes cast down as he helps me into the carriage, as it should be and ever was.  I felt relief, but then as the carriage pulled away, I felt a despondency, and emptiness, that my life will return to sheer, opulent, nothingness. 

 

4 July

Late tonight, although I had eaten well, I felt an unusual hunger. I started to descend the stairs to the kitchen.  And even as I did so, in my nightgown, I heard the words of Mrs Hurst in my head, and felt it unwise to do so.  I reached the middle landing, with the large arched window that overlooks the courtyard at the back of the house, towards the mews, and I saw a figure stood in the moonlight.  Even in the dark haze, the brightness of the full moon casts a glow, and I know it is him standing there.  I can feel his eyes upon me, drawing me to him.  I know it is wrong.  I came back up here, to the sanctuary of my room, with the idea to write it all out of me, in the candle-light, but something inside is drawing me like a spell.  I am very afraid, but I will go to him.

[Historical notes:

The Halsewell (East Indiaman) was wrecked on 6 January 1786, driven onto the rocks below a cliff on the Isle of Purbeck in Dorset.

Prince William Henry, Duke of Gloucester and Edinburgh, younger brother of George III, married to Maria Walpole, two surviving children, Sophia and William Frederick, built a grand residence, Gloucester Lodge, which later became the holiday home of George III.  Weymouth’s Esplanade was constructed between 1770 and 1855.

In August 1786 Parliament passed a law to set up a colony at Botany Bay, the first group set sail the following year.]