of a letter in the king's name from General Acton, the Neapolitan prime minister (Hamilton to Nelson, 17, 26 June 1798, in Clarke and McArthur, Life of Nelson, ii. 64; Hamilton to Lord Grenville, 18 June, 4 Aug., enclosing copy of letter from the governor of Syracuse to Acton, 22 July, in Sicily, vol. xliv.) If, as is just possible, the queen, through Lady Hamilton, added a further letter to the Sicilian governors, it does not appear to have been used; and Nelson's own letters to Sir William (22, 23 July, Nicolas, iii. 47) and to Lady Hamilton (22 July, Morrison MSS.; Edinburgh Review, clxiv. 549) prove conclusively that no secret orders had been sent to the Sicilian ports. And the statement repeatedly made and insisted on, that on Troubridge and Hamilton's going together to Acton a council was summoned, which, after an hour and a half, ended in disappointment and refusal (Harrison, i. 244; Blackwood's Mag. cxliii. 643; Jeaffreson, Queen of Naples, ii. 309), is entirely false. There was no council; the interview with Acton lasted half an hour, in which time Acton, on his own authority and in the king's name, wrote and handed to Troubridge the letter addressed to the governors of Sicily, and which at Syracuse proved sufficient. Nelson's acceptance of Lady Hamilton's version of the story, in spite of his certain knowledge of the actual facts, is only one out of very many instances of his extraordinary infatuation.
In a flying visit to Naples in September 1793 Nelson had first met Lady Hamilton; he had then described her to his wife as ‘a young woman of amiable manners, and who does honour to the station to which she is raised’ (Nicolas, i. 326); it was not till his return in September 1798, after the battle of the Nile, that he can be said to have made her acquaintance. She had already, some three weeks before, publicly shown the most extravagant joy at the news of the victory, and on Nelson's arrival she, with her husband, and attended by a large party of friends in a procession of boats, went out into the bay to meet him. She went on board the Vanguard, and, on seeing ‘the conquering hero,’ exclaimed, ‘Oh God, is it possible!’ and fainted in his arm. ‘Tears, however,’ as Nelson wrote to his wife, ‘soon set matters to rights’ (ib. iii. 130). A few days later she gave a magnificent fête in honour of Nelson's birthday (29 Sept.), when ‘H. N. Glorious 1st of August’ was the favourite device. ‘Eighty people,’ Nelson wrote to his wife, ‘dined at Sir William Hamilton's; 1,740 came to a ball, where 800 supped’ (ib. iii. 139; Jeaffreson, Lady Hamilton, ii. 8). The Hamiltons seem to have but kept pace with the general enthusiasm. Within a couple of months war was declared against France, and an army of 35,000 men was levied, only to be swept away by the first advance of the French troops. Lady Hamilton afterwards considered that she had forced the war policy on the queen, who brought the king over to it; and that she had inspired her husband, Nelson, and Sir John Acton, and brought pressure on the council (Pettigrew, ii. 617; Jeaffreson, Queen of Naples, ii. 313). In point of fact the war policy was determined in concert with the Austrian government; the defensive and offensive treaty was formally ratified at Vienna on 16 July, and reached Naples on the 30th; the declaration of war followed as a matter of course when the plans of the two governments were ripe; and Lady Hamilton had nothing to do with it beyond serving as the queen's occasional intermediary with the English ambassador. Of the same nature was her real share in the conduct of the celebrated flight to Palermo on the scattering of the Neapolitan army. The measures relating to the royal family and their property were arranged by the queen; Lady Hamilton was the medium of correspondence with the English admiral, and through her the cases of treasure and other valuables were transmitted (Nicolas, iii. 210; Gagnière, p. 94). The popular story (Pettigrew, ii. 617–18) that the queen's timidity was controlled by Lady Hamilton's high spirit is the very reverse of the fact, though there is no doubt that Lady Hamilton behaved admirably under very trying circumstances. On this point, as a matter that came under his own notice, Nelson's evidence is indisputable (Nicolas, iii. 213). She afterwards stated that, to avert suspicion of the intended departure, Hamilton sacrificed property to the value of 30,000l., and she herself sustained a loss of 9,000l. But Hamilton's most valuable property had been shipped several months before for carriage to England, and lost in the wreck of the Colossus; and though the household furniture was left behind at Naples, Nelson, writing with direct information from Hamilton, and urging his claim for compensation, estimated the total loss, in the Colossus and at Naples together, at 10,000l. (Egerton MS. 1614, f. 12). As to Lady Hamilton, she did not possess property of the value of 9,000l., and carried away the greater part of what she had (Jeaffreson, Lady Hamilton, ii. 35–8). Her statement that she had bought corn to the value of 5,000l. for the relief of the Maltese is equally false; she had no such sum of money at her disposal (ib. ii. 132–5).
