SARAH JENNINGS AND JOHN CHURCHILL.

The succession of the Duke d’Anjou to the Spanish crown had, in fact, destroyed the balance of power in Europe; and our William the Third, then recently dead, but even beyond the grave the most resolute enemy of Louis the Fourteenth, had bequeathed to him the new league which bore the name of the Great Alliance, and which had for its aim to place the Spanish crown upon the head of the Archduke Charles, the son of the Emperor of Germany; or in default of dispossessing Philip the Fifth of his kingdom, to trace round the two nations of France and Spain a limit which should never be overpassed by the ambition of either. All hope of success for the Archduke Charles—the legitimate successor to the last four effete kings of Spain—all the means which he might have of preserving in Europe two houses of Austria, and of continuing that grand Austrian duality which the sceptre of Charles the Fifth had produced, but which was then broken in twain, rested chiefly upon the English alliance. There, for the adversaries of Louis the Fourteenth, was the knot of the question. With the treasures of England, with her navy, with her troops also, together with the advantage of her situation, which allowed of her doing so much mischief to France, the Imperialists might effect much; without her they could scarcely do anything. Hence with them the necessity of keeping in power a party favourable to them—the Whigs, a party which preferred that ancient duality to the new duality—in other words, the ambition of Louis the Fourteenth to therewith augment the House of Bourbon, and in effect more dangerous than the other to the English nation. But that necessity created another: it was requisite to have near Queen Anne some one who, at Court, should be, as it were, the advanced sentinel of the Whigs, attached to the interests of Austria, and who would hinder from penetrating, or at any rate prevailing therein any other interest than theirs. This precaution was so much the more indispensable that Queen Anne’s feeling towards the Whigs was purely official, and not a genuine sympathy. To these zealous partizans of Parliament and liberty, to these avowed heirs of those who had made the revolution of 1640, she secretly preferred the Tories. Amongst them she found admirers of the absolute order of government that Louis XIV., lord of France instead of being legislator of it, had for too long a time substituted for the too much contemned troubles of the Fronde. And the rather as they might be termed, under that relation, a veritable French party, did she lean towards them, because they were the defenders of the royal prerogative. The exactions, the delays, the innumerable formalities of constitutional monarchy, wearied her to such an extent, that more than once the rumour ran that she was willing to treat for the recall of her brother, the ex-King James the Third. These reports were not without foundation, as the Duke of Berwick tells us in his “Memoirs”; the desire alone of preventing civil war, to which fresh endeavours on the part of that prince would give rise, was alleged as the generous motive for relinquishing a design which the disgust of a too-limited power had inspired. The Whigs well knew how to conjure that peril. But they had always to dread that whilst continuing to wear the crown, Anne might not so much consider the welfare of England as that of her own pleasure, where such welfare interfered with her peculiar sympathies; and lest in turning to the side of the Tories she might carry away from the Archduke Charles the support of England, in other words his chief reliance. The question was how to guarantee themselves from that untoward eventuality? One means devised—and it was not the less available in this case of royalty exercised by a woman—was to secure to Queen Anne the adhesion of the Mistress of the Robes, Lady Churchill, the clever wife of the brilliant soldier, afterwards Duke of Marlborough.

This remarkable woman, who, without possessing great talents, and with the disadvantage of an imperious and capricious temper, exercised for so long a period such exceptional influence over public affairs, was the second of the three daughters of Richard Jennings, a country gentleman of good family but moderate fortune, her mother being Frances Thornhurst, daughter of Sir Gifford Thornhurst, of Agnes Court, in Kent, and his heiress. She was born at Holywell, near St. Alban’s, 29th May, 1660, the very day of the restoration of Charles the Second. In recompense for the services rendered by their father during the civil wars, the two elder sisters were received when very young into the household of the Duchess of York.

When only twelve years old, Sarah Jennings had the good fortune to become the inseparable companion of the Princess Anne, who was about the same age. Her beauty was not characterised by regularity of feature, but she possessed an animated countenance, with eyes full of fire. She was small of stature, more piquante than imposing, and her chief charms were centered in her magnificent tresses, the delicacy of her features, and certain peculiar graces of mind and person. These attractions were enhanced by a conversation full of vivacity and intelligence. Prudent and virtuous—for even Swift, who was otherwise the remorseless enemy of the Duke and Duchess of Marlborough, renders homage to the virtue of the latter—in the midst of a corrupt Court, and enjoying the highest favour of the Royal Family, she had for admirers some men of the highest rank in England. Amongst those who aspired to her hand may be cited the admired Earl of Lindsay, afterwards Marquis of Ancaster, “the star and ornament of the Court,” whose suit she rejected for that of the young and handsome Colonel Churchill. A single trait suffices to prove the lady’s attractiveness—the avaricious John Churchill wooed and wedded her although all along he knew Sarah to be altogether portionless.

This successful wooer—afterwards Lord Churchill and Duke of Marlborough—who had entered the army at sixteen, was the son of a poor cavalier knight who had come to London after the Restoration. Love, not War, was the first stepping-stone to his subsequent high fortune. The Duke of York, heir to the Crown, “young and ardent in the pursuit of pleasure,” became enamoured of Arabella Churchill one of the maids-of-honour to his first wife, and afterwards his avowed mistress. Through this lady’s interest, her elder brother John obtained a pair of colours in the Guards. In his twenty-third year he made his first campaign in the Low Countries when Charles and Louis united their forces against Holland. Distinguished by his commanding stature and handsome face, he was known to the French soldiery as the “handsome Englishman.” Turenne complimented him on his gallantry and “serene intrepidity” before the allied armies. The Marshal had been attracted to him by his courage, and is said to have laid a wager, which he won, on the subject of Churchill’s gallantry, on the occasion of a post of importance having been abandoned by one of his own officers. “I will bet a supper and a dozen of claret,” said he, “that my handsome Englishman will recover the post with half the number of men commanded by the officer who lost it.” The event justified the Marshal’s opinion. Emboldened by the praise of such a general, Churchill solicited but did not obtain the command of a regiment from Louis XIV.,[39] the great King refusing his services, as he declined those of Prince Eugene a few years later. He was esteemed one of the handsomest and most attractive gentlemen of the day. Lord Chesterfield, the arbiter elegantiarum, declared that the grace and fascination of young Churchill was such, that he was “irresistible either by man or woman.”

On his return to London at the close of the war, the young soldier became attached to the household of the Duke of York, and rose rapidly in that witty, gallant, and corrupt Court, where shone the Grammonts, Rochesters, and Hamiltons, and where Churchill sought the society of the sultanas who shared with Charles the government of England. The handsome Churchill became, for a short time, the object of the violent but fickle fondness of the head sultana, the Duchess of Cleveland. On one occasion the audacious gallant was very nearly caught in the frail beauty’s apartments by “old Rowley,” and only escaped by leaping from the window at the risk of his life. For this exploit the grateful Duchess presented her daring lover with five thousand pounds. Churchill made no scruple of receiving the money, so early had the sordid propensity for gain taken hold of him, and with it he at once bought an annuity of five hundred a year, well secured on the estate of Lord Chesterfield’s grandfather, Halifax.[40]

After some disputes and obstacles on the part of the Churchill family, which the Duchess of York herself took the trouble to obviate, the two lovers were united in the month of April, 1678: and whilst the husband advanced in the confidence and favour of James, his wife made still more rapid progress in the affections of the young Princess, his daughter.

During many years of married happiness, Churchill testified the greatest affection for his wife, and always kept her minutely informed—even amidst councils and battle-fields—upon the state of public affairs, and showed the most entire deference and the liveliest affection for her. Most of his letters end with these words: “I am yours, heart and soul.” Lady Churchill governed this great man, in fact, like a child—who himself governed kings. Like the Princess des Ursins, she possessed incontestably certain qualities, a liking and capacity for public business, a knowledge of men, the shrewdness of her sex, the obstinacy of her race, an inconceivable love of domination; but she was hard, vindictive, insatiable of honours and wealth, and united to the pride of a queen the rage of a fury.

Aided by his sister, by the King’s imperious mistress and his own incontestable merit, Churchill climbed fast up the ladder of preferment. He obtained successively the command of the only dragoon regiment in the service, a Scotch peerage, and the post of Ambassador to the Court of France. Lord Churchill, however, was destined to be advanced still higher in court favour through the influence of his wife and his own genius as a general.

At the Revolution of 1688, he coldly foorsook James II., his benefactor, and carried over his formidable sword to the House of Orange. The Revolution augmented his fortune. Created Earl and General by William III.; Duke, Knight of the Garter and Commander of the British Armies by Queen Anne. Marlborough was one of those men whom conviction astonishes, devotedness confounds; who acknowledge no other law than that of their own interest, no other deity than success, and which the uncontrollable current of human affairs not unfrequently brings rapidly to the surface. Cradled in revolutions, he had seen the Commonwealth pass away, the Stuarts fall, the House of Orange proclaimed. He had taken part in intrigues, plots, apostacies, defections: doubt alone survived every other political instinct of his heart. Faithful to the very brink of misfortune, he ever adhered unswervingly until the dawning of the evil days. Well aware how quickly dynasties expire in a country convulsed by revolutions, he had learnt to anticipate approaching catastrophes, and to secure to himself beforehand an appui amongst the victorious survivors. Whilst he was defending the cause of the House of Orange in Europe, he corresponded secretly with the Stuarts, kept up assiduous relations with the little Court of St. Germains, and made underhand preparations for marrying one of his daughters with the Pretender, then ex-King (James III.), at St. Germains, and, perhaps, on the morrow de facto King of England. But if Marlborough’s soul was mean and sordid, his genius was vast and powerful. In parliament, at St. James’s, in foreign councils, in foreign courts, on the field of battle, everywhere he dominated men. His education had been so very much neglected that he could scarcely write correctly his native English, and yet, when he rose to speak in the House of Lords, the entire assembly hung upon his words, and the most consummate orators, the heads of the British forum, were envious of that natural eloquence which without effort went straight to the heart; and he exercised that charm even upon his foes, to such a degree that Bolingbroke once remarked to Voltaire, when speaking of him: “He was such a great man that I have forgotten his vices.”[41]

At the period of which we are now treating, Marlborough was the most powerful personage in England: by his wife, the Queen’s favourite, he ruled the household; by the Whigs, become his friends, parliament and the ministry; by his rank and his military popularity, the army; by Prince Eugene, his comrade in arms, the councils of Austria; by his old friend Heinsius, the States-General; by the weight of his name, his conduct and address, the suppleness of his character, Prussia and the princes of the Empire. It was he who raised their regiments, who regulated their subventions, who appeased their quarrels. He was the head and arm of the coalition. As potent as Cromwell, more of a king than William III.; without affection or hatred, he justified the saying of Machiavelli: “The universe belongs to the phlegmatic.”

We will now revert to his no less celebrated wife, who, as Lady Churchill and Duchess of Marlborough, so long and wholly swayed the mind and ruled the court of Queen Anne. Brought up in such close intimacy with the Princess, Lady Churchill had assumed from childhood an absolute ascendancy over her mind. Anne was indolent and taciturn; she delighted in the lively talk of her companion and bosom friend, and loved her in spite of her haughty temperament, to which her own easy disposition yielded without offering the slightest resistance. Married to a sullen and insignificant husband, whose sole delight was centred in a crapulous love of the bottle; she had lost her only son during his minority—had seen her father, James II. dethroned, her brother, the Chevalier St. George, proscribed, and, to the exclusion of that well-beloved brother, she was compelled to leave her crown to a stranger—the Elector George of Hanover, for whom she felt an invincible aversion. Anne confided all her griefs to her favourite Mistress of the Robes, and by degrees an ardent affection for her inseparable companion, which had in it all the delicate tenderness of feminine friendship, sprung up in the Princess’s bosom. Such was the strength of the attachment that it was the desire of the Princess that all distinction prescribed by etiquette should be waived. She required that in their epistolary correspondence they should treat each other as equals, under the assumed names of Mrs. Morley and Mrs. Freeman. Lady Churchill chose the latter, which would be, she said, the emblem of her “frank, open temper.” Under these assumed names they wrote frequently to each other to communicate their sentiments of joy, anguish, hope or fear, according to the events of the day, and gave themselves up unrestrictedly to the momentary impulse of their hearts.

“I both obtained and held the place in her service,” the favourite goes on to relate, “without the assistance of flattery—a charm which, in truth, her (the Princess’s) inclination for me, together with my unwearied application to serve and amuse her rendered needless; but which, had it been otherwise, my temper and turn of mind would never have suffered me to employ. Young as I was when I first became this high favourite, I laid it down as a maxim, that flattery was falsehood to my trust, and ingratitude to my dearest friend.... From this rule I never swerved: and though my temper and my notions in most things were widely different from those of the Princess, yet, during a long course of years, she was so far from being displeased with me for openly speaking my sentiments, that she sometimes professed a desire, and even added her command, that it should be always continued, promising never to be offended at it, but to love me the better for my frankness.”