of Prussia, whose acquaintance he made during his visits to Berlin. Parliament granted him an additional income of 18,000l. a year, and the king gave him 7,000l. a year on the Irish revenue, which sums, with the revenues of the bishopric of Osnaburgh, raised his income to 70,000l. a year. The marriage was celebrated at Berlin on 29 Sept. 1791, and at the queen's house, London, on 23 Nov. The princess was received with enthusiasm in London, where it is noted among other demonstrations of respect that, a great sale was found even for imitations of the princess's slipper. The husband and wife soon separated, and the Duchess of York retired to Oatlands Park, Weybridge, Surrey, where she amused herself with her pet dogs, and died 6 Aug. 1820, being buried in Weybridge church.
On the outbreak of war in 1793 George III insisted that York should take command of the English contingent despatched to Flanders to co-operate with the Austrian army under the Prince of Coburg. The campaigns of 1793, 1794, and 1795 in Flanders served to prove that the English army was unable to cope with the enthusiastic French republicans, and that York was not a born military commander. His staff, and especially his adjutant and quartermaster-generals, Craig and Murray, were chiefly responsible; the duke showed himself brave but inexperienced, and there is much truth in Gillray's caricatures and Peter Pindar's squibs, which represented him as indulging too freely in the prevalent dissipation of his officers. In 1793 the allied army drove the French army out of Belgium, defeated it at Tournay and Famars, and took Valenciennes on 26 July. Then came a difference between the generals; the Prince of Coburg wished to march on Paris, while York was ordered to take Dunkirk. The armies separated, and Carnot at once concentrated all the best French troops and attacked the duke in his lines before Dunkirk. After severe fighting at Hondschoten on 6 and 8 Sept. the English had to fall back, and, after the defeat of the Austrians at Wattignies, finally joined them at Tournay, where both armies went into winter quarters. In February 1794 the duke joined the headquarters of the army in Flanders, and the new campaign opened with some slight successes at Cateau Cambrésis, Villiers-en-Cauche, and Troixville. But on 10, 14, and 18 May the French army under Pichegru attacked the English army at Tournay. In the last engagement the English were entirely defeated, and would have been destroyed but for the conduct of Generals Ralph Abercromby and Henry Edward Fox. York himself was nearly taken prisoner. After this defeat the English army steadily fell back, in spite of the arrival in July of ten thousand fresh troops under the Earl of Moira. The duke was, in fact, driven out of Belgium after several severe engagements. There followed the terrible winter retreat of 1794-5, which concluded the unsuccessful campaign. York shared the perils of the retreat up to the beginning of December, in which month he returned to England.
The duke's reputation had not been raised. Nevertheless George III promoted him to be a field-marshal on 18 Feb. 1795, and made him commander-in-chief of the army 3 April 1798. Amherst, the retiring commander-in-chief, was an old man, who had allowed countless abuses in the discipline and administration of the army. The duke by his high rank could be considered as belonging to no party, and he was able from his position to put down much of the jobbery which had disgraced his predecessor's tenure of office. He was not a man of brilliant parts, but he determined to remove some of the abuses which he had seen in Flanders.
In 1799 he was appointed to command an army destined to invade Holland in conjunction with a Russian corps d'armée. The vanguard of this army, under Sir Ralph Abercromby and Admiral Sir Charles Mitchell, performed an important duty in capturing the Dutch ships in the Helder; but when the main force arrived under the duke on 13 Sept. nothing but disaster followed. Generals Brune aud Daendaels collected an army, which, though defeated on 19 Sept., 2 Oct., and 9 Oct., managed to keep the English and Russians penned on the narrow strip of land seized by Abercromby, and on 17 Oct. the duke signed the disgraceful convention of Alkmaer, by which the victors were allowed to leave Holland on condition that eight thousand French prisoners of war should be surrendered to the republic. This failure confirmed the general opinion that the duke was unfit for the command of an army in the field.
The attention of the public was now turned to the state of the army; money was not spared by parliament, and while Abercromby was engaged in the Mediterranean in restoring the true spirit of discipline in the field, the duke devoted himself to the task of weeding out incapable officers, and encouraging those who did their duty. It was nothing short of a disaster that York was on 18 March 1809 forced to retire from his post of commander-in-chief. He had become entangled with a handsome adventuress, Mary Anne Clarke [q. v.], who made money out of her intimacy with the commander-in-chief, by promising promotion to officers, who paid her for her recommendations. This matter was
