A Scandalous Life. Mary S. Lovell

weeks later tragedy struck the house of Ellenborough. Little Arthur Dudley Law, just a month short of his second birthday, had again been ill with a childish infection, and Ellenborough had sent him in the care of his nurse, Mrs Mowcock, to the seaside in the belief that the fresh air would help alleviate the symptoms. All seemed to be under control on 27 January:

      My Lord,

      Master Arthur is in very good spirits but his tonsils have been very [troublesome]… Mr March has been to see him today and says it is his teeth and he will bleed him tomorrow to correct it. He will be all the better for it but is much fawling [sic] away. The weather is so very wet so he could not go out today.¹⁷

      The next letter, from Mr March himself, only two days later, must therefore have come as a shocking blow. Ellenborough noted on the envelope that he received it as he returned home from a Cabinet meeting:

      Worthing 29th January 1830

      My dear Lord,

      I am distressed beyond description to be compelled to relate the melancholy fact that your dear infant has ceased to exist. He was attacked this morning by a convulsive fit which caused his extinction in a few minutes. Everything was done judiciously by the nursery assistant who was on the spot instantly but so violent was the attack that all was over before I could get to him.

      He passed a tolerably quiet night till about 5… up to the time of the fit which seems to have been immediately caused by some accidental noises, there was no reason to consider the child in the slightest danger as everything was going well.¹⁸

      It was distressing news for all concerned, the Digby grandparents as well as the father. The black-edged mourning letters expressing shock and grief, as well as concern for Ellenborough, carefully folded back into their original envelopes, still exist in a pathetic stack neatly tied with deep-purple ribbon among Lord Ellenborough’s papers.¹⁹

      It might be assumed, because of the history of the marriage and the fact that the child had spent a lot of his time away from his parents, that his death was of no great moment to them. But Ellenborough, whose ambitions for his son now lay in ruins, mourned him with genuine grief. Like Jane he found consolation in writing poetry throughout his life, and on this occasion wrote:

      Poor child! Thy mother never smiled on thee

      Nor stayed to soothe thee in thy suffering day!

      But thou wert all the world to me,

      The solace of my solitary way.

      Despite any bitterness he might have felt towards Jane, Ellenborough wrote to her, as always in a kindly manner, to break the news and thoughtfully enclose a lock of Arthur’s soft, fair hair. A messenger delivered the letter to her personally, under Ellenborough’s seal. She kept it with her, through all her travels, until her death.

      A week later Jane set out for Paris with her baby daughter. It is clear, from a poem written in December 1830, when fresh tragedy struck, that she was distressed about Arthur’s death. She was also depressed after the birth of Mathilde, and worried about her future. Just as her father had warned, Felix had confirmed that his religion would not allow him to marry her and, further, her reputation could damage his career. Jane optimistically believed that once she joined Felix their former love would reassert itself and he might find a way. Meanwhile, at least they would be together.

      In England, Ellenborough too was concerned for the future. The forthcoming divorce hearings would, he knew, be extremely unpleasant. Jane would not – could not – contest the charge of adultery. However, it was important that his own behaviour did not come under close scrutiny, for under the prevailing laws a divorce could not be granted if both he and Jane were found equally guilty to adultery. Yet with the death of his son and heir it was even more important, now, for him to obtain a divorce in order to remarry.

      Jane decided to keep the name of Madame Einberg when she arrived in Paris. Felix had rented an apartment for her in the fashionable quarter of the Fauberg Saint-Germain,²⁰ and she lived there for some weeks while she searched for something more suitable for herself and her child. Primarily, though, simply being with Felix was all she asked. It was perhaps just as well that she chose to live quietly under an assumed name. Within weeks she was to become the most notorious woman in England.

       6 A Fatal Notoriety 1830–1831

      Until comparatively recent years The Times newspaper was renowned for its front page which consisted of classified advertisements. In May 1966, when the front page was changed to a news format, there was an outcry of protest. However, there was a precedent: 136 years earlier, in April 1830, the editor broke with tradition and placed the Ellenborough divorce case on the front pages.

      On 1 April the entire right-hand column of the first page and two-thirds of the second page were given over to the story. It was a sell-out. On 2 April virtually the entire front page and part of page 2 were given over to a complete transcript of the Ellenborough divorce hearing. For weeks the name of Lady Ellenborough was in every newspaper and Jane’s misdemeanours became the breakfast-table tittle-tattle of the entire country, causing her name to become a byword for scandalous behaviour for generations. Indeed, for decades small news items continued to appear (they were often incorrect) about her adventures, always referring to her as Lady Ellenborough, though after 1834 she never again used this name.

      The preliminary hearing by the Consistory Court, held in relative privacy on 22 February, readily established from the assembled evidence that Jane was guilty of adultery. That was the easy part. But Ellenborough’s application for his marriage to be dissolved then had to be examined, under law, by both Houses of Parliament, in public. Divorce was a difficult and highly complicated legal matter. As a lawyer Ellenborough knew that only too well. The social ignominy and sheer cost of obtaining a divorce meant that few were applied for.

      On 9 March 1830, in the House of Lords, the Clerk read out the Order of the Day:

      being the Second Reading of the Bill entitled, ‘An Act to dissolve the marriage of the Right Honourable Edward Baron Ellenborough with the Right Honourable Jane Elizabeth Baroness Ellenborough his now Wife, and to enable him to marry again; and for other purposes therein mentioned’, and for hearing Counsel for and against the same, and for the Lords to be summoned.¹

      The witnesses were called, gave their evidence and were cross-questioned at length by Lord Ellenborough’s counsel and subsequently by any member of the House who wished to query the facts. Jane was not represented and offered no defence; no attempt was made to mitigate her actions. Ellenborough’s counsel, Mr Wigram, began calling staff from the Norfolk Hotel, who detailed the couple’s movements during their overnight stay in Brighton. Robert Hepple, the night porter on the evening of 7 February 1828, was questioned minutely about what he had heard after watching the prince go into Lady Ellenborough’s room at midnight:

      Q: Did he lock the door after him?

      A: He did.

      Q: Did you still watch him?

      A: I waited a short time at the door … a quarter of an hour the first time: then I went again … and remained there, I daresay, nearly an hour …

      Q: How near to the door?

      A: Quite close … I heard two persons talking, a man and a woman in the room … the language was foreign to me, it was not a language I understood at all.

      Q: Did you hear anything more?

      A: I heard him get into bed … and I heard them kissing.

      The entire performance was repeated again in early April in the House of Commons, where radical members were not inclined to allow an easy passage of the reading to accommodate Lord Ellenborough. Not surprisingly, Jane’s grandfather did not take his seat for the hearing. On this occasion Robert Hepple was constrained to take his answer at the same point in the proceedings a step further:

      Q: What did you hear then?

      A: