Tory Historian returns after an unconscionably long period of silence with news of a book, published in 2005 and bought in one of the few remaining second-hand bookshops in Charing Cross Road.
The Princess and the Politicians subtitled Sex, Intrigue and Diplomacy in Regency England is a biography of the Princess Lieven by one of our conservative (and Conservative) historians, John Charmley.
Tory Historian recalls the intriguing (in both senses of the word) character of the Princess Lieven appearing in history books as a minor character. That, says Professor Charmley, is how she has, quite erroneously in his opinion, viewed by historians who have too often assumed that politics remained an exclusively male sphere for the centuries before women had the vote.
Feminist historians, on the other hand, have not been particularly interested by aristocratic ladies who played a very large part in political life in Britain. As Professor Charmley does not add (perhaps he is being uncharacteristically charitable) this attitude has prevented many feminist historians from perceiving women's achievements in the past.
Nobody could call Professor Charmley a feminist (or any other kind of -ist) historian. His task here is to restore an important historical figure to her rightful place of which she has been deprived by being female, foreign and of somewhat lose morals.
More reports of the book will follow as Tory Historian progresses with the reading.
Tory Historian has reluctantly decided to mention a Whig Prime Minister of some importance: Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey, the man who piloted the Great Reform Act through Parliament in 1832.
Today is his birthday. He was born on March 13, 1764 in Falloden, Northumberland.
His biography is one of an immensely worthy politician, what with presiding over that Reform Act, the abolition of slavery in the British Empire in 1833 (though, as we know slave trade was abolished some time before that) and the restrictions on the employment of children.
There is, however, a surprising aspect to his personality. He seems to have been very highly sexed. The fact that his wife produced 16 children (while, according to accounts, remaining cheerful) may just point to the fact that he was keen on doing his duty. But few school textbooks that expostulate on the Great Reform Act ever mention the fact that the Earl Grey was the great love of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, who even bore him a daughter (a fairly scandalous occurrence even among the lax Whig aristocracy).
This is not that daughter but the oldest one, Georgy, born well in wedlock. Still, Reynolds’s picture, exhibited at the moment at the Royal Academy is a delight.
