The Prince of Wales’s Will
This my last Will & Testament, written in my own hand & executed by me, signed & sealed this 10th day of January in the Year of our Lord 1796.
GEORGE P.
Carlton House, 10 Jan. 1796
To thee, Oh! ever merciful & Almighty God, do I in these my last moments with the truest fervor & devotion & with all humility, address myself to unveil my whole soul, & before my eyes are for ever closed, to speak that truth & to render that justice to others as well as to myself before my Creator as well as before the whole world, without which, when brought before thy great & aweful Tribunal I could never expect that mercy & justice to which all Christians are taught to look forward & in which faith as a true professor of the Christian religion I have lived & now die.
By this, my last Will & Testament, I now bequeathe, give & settle at my death all my worldly property of every discription, denomination & sort, personal & other, as shall be hereafter discribed to my Maria Fitzherbert, my wife, the wife of my heart & soul, & though by the laws of this country she could not avail herself publicly of that name, still such she is in the eyes of Heaven, was, is, & ever will be such in mine, & for the truth of which assertion I appeal to to [sic] that gracious God who I have here invoked to witness this my last disposition of my property, together with such explanations & declarations as are necessary for me to make to enable me to quit this life with a clear conscience & even without a sigh except at the thoughts of leaving her (& perhaps too without first receiving the blessing of her forgiveness) who is my true & real wife, & who is dearer to me, even millions of times dearer to me, than that life I am now going to resign. As much as has been said in the world relative to our separation I take it upon myself now thus to declare that she (my Maria Fitzherbert) has been most infamously traduced, that her person, her heart & her mind are, & ever have been from the first moment I knew her, down to the present moment, as spotless, as unblemished, & as perfectly pure as anything can be that is human & mortal. Had it not been for the most infamous & basest of calumnies, my too credulous & perceptible heart, & which knew no other feeling in life but for her, could never have been brought even for a single instant to harbour a thought of separating from such worth, nor was such a separation, Oh! my God, as thou well knowest, voluntarily sought by me. (But as entering further upon this point would involve others whom I pray Heaven to forgive, & lead to more than I am able now to write, I shall bury this part in oblivion.) As to her, (I must also in justice to myself so far say) I am most confident that had not similar base, vile & scandalous wretches calumniated me to her & represented me in lights & in a manner I here avert in the presence of my Creator, I never deserved, she never could or would have persevered with such an apparent cruelty & obduracy so foreign to the generous feelings of her soul, in rejecting for so great a length of time every explanation, every submission, every step my tortured heart frequently offer’d & was most ready & anxious to make, & which finally drove me to despair.
I now therefore, George Augustus Frederick, Prince of Wales, Duke of Cornwall, &c., &c., &c., do by this, my last Will & Testament, leave, will & bequeathe after my death all my estates, all my property, all my personalities of whatever kind or sort to my Maria Fitzherbert who is my wife in the eyes of God, & who is & ever will be such in mine. I leave, will & bequeathe unto her all such monies as may be in my bankers hands, or may be due unto me, as also the house & estate & appurtenancies thereunto belonging, bought by me of Field Marshall Conway, as well as all the other grounds & houses that I have bought in Pall Mall or in the neighbourhood of Carlton House, & on a peice of which ground part of the circular room in Carlton House must consequently, if that room is wish’d to be retain’d as part of Carlton House, be bought of my Maria Fitzherbert at whatsoever price she may be pleased to fix upon it. I likewise will & bequeathe & leave to her the whole of the furniture of Carlton House as it is all bought with my own money, together with all the bronze & ornamented chimney peices, all the hangings, chairs, tables, ornamented & inlaid tables, bronzed tables, cabinets & concoles, girandoles, clocks, whether of bronze or of other materials, all my fine pier glasses, glasses of every sort & denomination whatever, all my lustres, whether of bronze, glass or whatever they may be constructed of, all my plate of every discription of sort, all my branches that carry lights or that are made either for use or ornament, all my china or earhten ware of every discription, all my wine & liquors in all my cellars, all my books, plans, maps, prints & drawings, all my jewells, all my rings, trinkets, watches, boxes, all the furniture, goods & property I may have or be found to have in all my houses in the country. Such ground or grounds as I have purchased or as have been granted to me in & about the Pavillion at Brighthelmstone or at Brighthelmstone itself, as well as such property and furniture as I may have in the said Pavillion, or in the next house to it, all my horses & carriages, in short, every article of property that is mine, or may be found out even hereafter to belong to me or that I am entitled to, or that has belong’d to me & which I may have forgotten to mention here, & all this do I once more repeat, I do by this, my last Will & Testament, will, bequeathe & leave to my Maria Fitzherbert, my beloved & adored wife.
There being an immense sum of money due to me from the Crown & from the nation on the arrears of the Duchy of Cornwall which has remain unpaid to me ever since the hour of my birth till my coming of age, & for interest due on such sums of money from the time of my coming of age, that is to say from the day I attained the age of one & twenty years to the present moment, I do will & bequeathe that such a part of sums which must be refunded as my due to my executors shall be employed in the liquidation of the remaining part of my debts & that whatever may remain beyond that, after upon fair & ample investigation all just debts have been liquidated, I also will, bequeathe & leave to my Maria Fitzherbert as well as everything & the whole of everything I have mention’d in this paper, which is my free & last Will & Testament.
Having now, I trust, made all the retribution that is in my power to this most excellent woman, there only remains for me to hope that when she is made acquainted with this entire & free disposition of the whole of my property for her, of this my candid avowal & of the just tribute I have paid to her merits, she will no longer withhold her forgiveness from me, accompanying it with her blessing, assuring her as I now do & calling God to witness at the same time, that I shall die blessing her as my only true & real wife with my parting breath & praying the Almighty & allmerciful Being to whom in this paper I have open’d the innermost recesses of my heart & of my soul to bless, protect & guard her through this life, looking forward with confidence to the blessed moment when our souls in a better world may again be united, never again to part.
Having now fullfill’d my first duty to the beloved & adored wife of my heart & soul, I next turn myself to my dear parents: I ask their forgiveness for any faults I may have ignorantly & unguardedly been guilty of towards them, assuring them that if there have been such, I trust that they will ascribe them to the errors of judgment & youth, & not to any intentional error of my heart. My blessings & prayers attend them as well as my much-loved brothers & sisters, to whom in my conscience I beleive I have ever proved myself a good & an affectionate brother, but if in any moment, & which now in no way occurs to me, I have been at all erring towards them in any respect, I must trust I hope that they will accept of my contrition & grant me their forgiveness upon the same grounds that I have asked & hope to receive that of my beloved parents.
As to my daughter, who is just born, I bequeathe the whole & sole management & care of her to the King, my father, whilst he lives, & whenever it shall please Providence to call him from hence, to the Queen, my dearest & most excellent mother, admitting of her (should she so wish it) adjoining to herself in this trust my sisters Augusta & Mary, my brothers, the Duke of Clarence, Edward & Ernest, or such of them here mentioned as she may please, but whenever the hour is come when her virtues are to receive their due & just reward in a better world, then I appoint my said brothers, William Duke of Clarence, Edward & Ernest, & my sisters the Princesses Augusta Sophia & Mary, to have the sole care of the person & education of my infant daughter till such time as she shall have attain’d the years of discretion, namely the age of one & twenty years, & then for her to be mistress of herself & such trust then to be dissolved. This I have been so far induced to be explicit upon, meaning that the mother of this child, call’d the Princess of Wales, should in no way either be concern’d in the education or care of the child, or have possession of her person, for though I forgive her the falsehood & treachery of her conduct towards me, still the convincing & repeated proofs I have received of her entire want of judgment & of feeling, make me deem it incumbent upon me & a duty, both as a parent & a man, to prevent by all means possible the child’s falling into such improper & bad hands as hers.
Having nothing to leave but what I have already bequeathed to my Maria Fitzherbert, all I can do is in general to recommend to the King’s gracious protection as well as to my daughter when she become of a sufficient age, & in the meantime to my brother those domestics who have been in the habits of constant attendance on my person, hoping that when I am gone that they will not let them starve, but amongst them all I must particularly recommend my old & faithful servant Santague, who from the time I was nine years of age, has attended me with a parent’s care & solicitude, & who never has deserved a rebuke; he is now very far advanced in years & all I hope is that his latter years may be rendered as comfortable in point of income & of his circumstances as they were when he was in my service.
I desire I may be buried with as little pomp as possible, that my constant companion, the picture of my beloved wife, my Maria Fitzherbert may be interr’d with me suspended round my neck by a ribbon as I used to wear it when I lived & placed right upon my heart; I likewise will & decree & entreat of my adored Maria Fitzherbert to permit that whenever she quits this life & is interr’d, my coffin should be taken up & placed next to hers wherever she is to be buried, & if she has no objection, that the two inward sides of the two coffins should be taken out & the two coffins then to be souder’d [sic] together as the late King & Queen’s were: it is therefore I wish to be buried not in my family vault, but any where as privately as possible in order that my ashes may repose in quiet until they are placed next to hers, or united with hers.
I have been silent hitherto respecting two persons for whom I entertain the sincerest love & affection, who I could wish to have already mention’d & for whom I could wish to have provided better than by simply expressing my affection & regard for them & thus recommending them, but never equally so, to what their real deserts claim from me. The first I shall mention is Miss Pigot, who has been so uniformly kind & attentive in her conduct both to my Maria Fitzherbert as well as to me, that it is quite impossible that we must not both of us feel most tenderly for her, & I consequently did all that was in my power whilst I enjoy’d life for her by settling five hundred pounds annually upon her, during the natural course of my life: I therefore do not doubt that my Maria Fitzherbert, out of such money as will come to her from the Duchy of Cornwall after the liquidation of my remaining debts, will try to make her easy & comfortable unless she should first, through the interest of my family who are all acquainted with Miss Pigot & with my regard for her, procure her a comfortable maintenance for the rest of her life as one of the housekeepers in one of the Royal Palaces & which will place her in a respectable & easy independance for the rest of her days. The last person I shall name, & for whom (though from unfortunate misunderstandings & circumstances I have not seen him for some time) I ever must preserve the truest affection, I mean Jack Payne, with his good heart he will not hesitate, I am certain, in forgiving me if ever I have wronged him (& which if it has been so was the furthest both from my intentions & from my heart) as freely as I do him for anything that I may have conceived he has been wanting in towards me. I assure him that everything is obliterated from my mind & that nothing now but the truest friendship & affection glows in my bosom for him, & as a proof of this & of the high opinion I entertain of him, to him do I recommend to guard & be watchful over whilst he lives the interests of her who whilst I had or have life was & is dearer to me than the whole world. His professional abilities speak & have already spoken enough for themselves, but the repeated recommendations I have already made of him will, I trust, be attended as they ought to be, especially as his merits entitle him to more than ever I could say or do for him.
My friend the Earl of Moira, who I have ever most affectionately loved, will, I trust, not object as the last testimony of his tried & long experienced regard to the being my executor, & to the seeing this my Will most scrupulously adhered to, & that he, together with Payne, will guard & protect during their lives for the sake of their departed friend, my beloved & adored Maria Fitzherbert, my wife, in short, my second self. My papers I leave only to be inspected by Lord Moira, my Maria Fitzherbert & Payne, & such only to be burnt or kept as they please; those that remain to be left in the hands of my Maria Fitzherbert. But amongst my papers there is one box mark’d thus (Private) the contents of which I do insist on being publish’d, such as they are, without any mutilation or ejection of any paper of whatever kind or sort, in order that if any objection is made from any quarter, let it be what it may to the strict arrangement I have mark’d out for the trust respecting my daughter, the world may then know why I have so justly & continuously attended to her education, & therefore why I have nominated my brothers & sisters, together with the Earl of Moira, for the sole care both of her person & education till she shall have attained the years of discretion.
Having now most fully expressed my last intentions & dispositions it becomes highly necessary for me to turn my eyes inwards towards my own heart, & to address once more that Heavenly power to which I appealed in the beginning of this paper, & conscientiously to make this, my last confession, that to the best of my knowledge I have never done any wrong to any human being, man or woman, either intentionally or premeditatedly; that if there is anyone who either is or conceives themselves to be under such circumstances, & of which I am quite ignorant, I must freely & undisguisedly ask their forgiveness, assuring Heaven that whatever faults or weaknesses may have been guilty of, they have never arisen (after the closest inspection of my own heart & of the principles by which it has ever been actuated) from the most distant propensity to vice, or vicious inclination, but from those foibles which but too often fall to the lot of those who are born to fame, & no inconsiderable advantages in this life, such as I was born to, & into which, from the heedlessness & thoughtlessness of youth, they allow themselves to run they know not how or wherefore, but for which when the hour of reflection comes they afterwards must severely pay.
Now then I address myself to the world at large, declaring that I resign my last breath in peace with all mankind & expressing my fullest forgiveness to every individual that may have either publicly or privately injured me; having thus closed the scene of a life most full of trouble & misery, I have only now to bid a last farewell to her who whilst she & I were one did contribute the sole & only happiness of that life I am now going to resign; none have I enjoyed since we separated, & none could I ever expect under any circumstances whatever unless we were once more to be united again. To thee therefore my Maria, my wife, my life, my soul, do I bid my last adieu; round thee shall my soul for ever hover as thy guardian angel, for as I never ceased to adore thee whilst living, so shall I ever be watchful over thee & protect thee against every evil. Farewell, dearest angel, if I must quit thee & the whole world in thee by decrees of Almighty Providence, be it so & the will of Heaven be obeyed, but think of thy DEPARTED HUSBAND, shed a tear o’er his memory & his grave, & then recollent that no woman ever yet was so loved or adored by man as you were & are by him.
Written & signed by me with my own hand,
GEORGE P.
turn over
There are two other copies of this Will amongst my papers, one address’d to the King, the other to the Earl of Moira. No other Will shall I make, so help me God, nor have I at any other time antecedent to this made another; should there hereafter be any trifling alterations or additions I may wish to make I may subjoin them as a codicil, but I do not think there is even the smallest likelyhood of there being any. I forgot however to mention that the jewells which she who is call’d the Princess of Wales wears are mine, having been bought with my own money, & therefore those every one & the whole of them I bequeathe to my infant daughter as her own property, & to her who is call’d the Princess of Wales I leave one shilling. I likewise think it necessary in order to avoid any difficulties whatever to declare that everything I have left my much loved & adored Maria Fitzherbert my wife, I will, bequeathe, & leave to her free from every incumbrance to do with whatever she may please & to be her own property for ever. Signed by me, George P. Carlton House, Jan. 10th 1796.
In the case of the death of my infant daughter before she attains the years of discretion I then leave those jewells I have settled upon her to be devided equally between my two sisters Augusta & Mary, or in the case of the decease of either of them before the other, to the survivor of the two, then to be her own property for ever.
GEORGE P.
Carlton House, 10 Jan. 1796
In looking over the foregoing sheets I perceive I have omitted a circumstance of the utmost importance to my peace & quiet, and that is that in the beginning of the last year, or quite at the end of the preceeding year, in consequence of an application from me to the King through Lord Loughborough, that his Majesty would be so gracious (in case of my death before my Maria Fitzherbert) as to be pleased to continue to her for life the settlement I had for some years before made upon her of three thousand pounds annually during the natural term of my life, the Chancellor, by the gracious command of the King, wrote to me in consequence that his Majesty did not think such an event likely to happen, but in the case that is should be so that he would be answerable for it: which claims my warmest acknowledgments, nor am I acquainted with language sufficiently energetick to express half what I feel to the King for this instance of his paternal & gracious goodness & consideration; if I did, I should endeavour to express, though faintly, the gratitude of my heart. My mind therefore is quite at rest upon this circumstance, as I place the fullest & most ample reliance & faith in this the King’s most kind & gracious promise. Lord Loughborough’s own letter (& of which I receiv’d a copy written in Miss Pigot’s hand & which will be found amongst my papers) I gave to Miss Pigot to deliver to my Maria Fitzherbert, which I entertain not the smallest doubt but she did, in which event it is in the possession of my Maria Fitzherbert; but supposing that she may not have done so, or that it may not have been in her power so to do, then it must be in hers. This was a circumstance which had escaped my memory & was of such serious import & of so essential a nature to my feelings that I should have deem’d myself guilty of the most unpardonable & scandalous neglect if upon the revision of all I have here written I had omitted it, especially as it tells so much for the honor, & is for the interest of all parties, as well as speaks what I owe in gratitude (& which I trust my heart never has in any instance been deficient in) to the King as my father. GEORGE P.
Liberari animam meam; God in his mercy receive my soul.
GEORGE P.
Carlton House, 12 Jan. 1796
The whole of this paper is written, signed & sealed by my own hand, so help me God.
