author to remain unnoticed. The author pretended that the letters were written by the Queen in secret ink, and that he had deciphered them by means of a compound of sulphur. In one of the letters, the Queen is made to give an account of Mary Grey's death by some priests at Paris.[1] Some years before this book was published, Fuller offered to give evidence before the House of Commons of a pretended plot, but his character was so well known, that the House voted him to be a notorious imposter and false accuser; yet notwithstanding this severe rebuke, he had the effrontery to publish the book relative to James's son. In 1702, the very year of his publication, he was sentenced to stand in the pillory for a libel.[2]
The treatment which Fuller received shews, that there was no wish to revive the silly story of the Prince's illegitimacy: and it is very evident, that it was originally invented for party purposes. He was, "as it suited with the designs of party, lawfully born, or a supposititious child."[3] But the imputation
- ↑ A full Demonstration that the pretended Prince of Wales was the son of Mrs. Mary Grey, undeniably proved by original letters of the late Queen and others: and by depositions of several persons of worth and honour, never before published: and a particular account of the murther of Mary Grey, at Paris. Humbly recommended to the consideration of both Houses of Parliament; by William Fuller, Gent. London, 8vo. 1702.
- ↑ Salmon's History, i. 265. 319.
- ↑ Life of Ormonde, 210. Ralph was severe upon the Duchess of Maryborough on this point. She passes over the subject in her account of her own life. He says that the world "expected that many important secrets would have been brought to light: that especially no consideration whatever would have prevailed with you to stifle all you knew relating to that birth which has been so often represented as an imposture, though never proved to be one." Ralph's Other Side of the Question, &c. pp. 5, 6.
