Pickle the Spy; Or, the Incognito of Prince Charles

‘As to the King of Prussia, Pickle can say but little about him, having never been employd in that Quarter, and knows no more than what he has been told by the Young Pretender, which was, that he had sent Collonel Goring to Berlin to ask the K. of Prussia’s Sister in marriage; that Goring had been received very cooly, and had had no favourable answer; that he afterwards had sent Sir John Graeme, whose reception was better, and that he soon went himself to Berlin, where he was well received, but the affair of the marriage was declin’d. That the K. of Prussia advised him to withdraw himself privately from Berlin, and retire to Silesia, and to keep himself conceal’d for some time, in some Convent there. That the K. of Prussia told the Pretender he would assist him in procuring him six thousand Swedes from Gottenburgh, with the Collusion of the Court of France, but Pickle understood that this was to take place in the Event only of a War breaking out.

‘Pickle since his return to England, has been but once at a Club in the City, where they drink very hard, but at which, upon account of the expence, he cannot be as frequently as he would wish to be, nor can he afford to keep company with people of condition at this end of the Town. The Jacobites in England don’t choose to communicate any of their schemes to any of the Irish or Scots, from the latter of whom all that they desire, is a rising upon a proper occasion; – That he does not personally know much of the heads of the Party in England – only as he has seen lists of their names in the Pretender’s and Ld. Marishall’s hands; – such as he knows of them would certainly introduce him to others were he in a condition of defraying the expence that this would be attended with, which he is not, being already endebted to several people in this Town and has hitherto had no more than his bare expences of going backwards and forwards for these three years past.. ’

It is needless to say that this piece deepens the evidence connecting Pickle with Glengarry. Poor James Mohr had no estates and no seaboard whereon to land arms. At the close of the letter, in autumn 1753, Pickle speaks of his three years’ service. He had, therefore, been a spy since 1750, when he was in Rome. Now James Mohr, off and on, had been a spy since 1745, at least.

We may now pursue the course of intrigues with Prussia. Frederick, on June 6, 1753, the day before Cameron’s execution, wrote to the Earl Marischal. He wished that Jemmy Dawkins’s affair was better organised. But, ‘in my present situation with the King of England, and considering his action against me, it would be for the good of my service that you should secretly aid by your good advice these people’ (the Dawkins conspirators). 160 So the Cham of Tartary does interfere in the Bangorian Controversy, despite Mr. Carlyle! It is easy to imagine how this cautious encouragement, sous main, would be exaggerated in the inflamed hopes of exiles. The Earl Marischal had in fact despatched Dawkins to Berlin on May 7, not letting him know that Frederick had consented to his coming. 161 Dawkins was to communicate his ideas to Marshal Keith. The Earl did not believe in a scheme proposed by Dawkins, and was convinced that foreign assistance was necessary. This could only come from Prussia, Sweden, France, or Spain. Prussia has no ships, but few are needed, and merchant vessels could be obtained. The Earl would advise no Prussian movement without the concurrence of France. But France is unlikely to assent, and Sweden is divided by party hatreds. He doubts if France was ever well disposed to the House of Stuart. The Spanish have got the ships and got the men, but are hampered by engagements with Austria and Savoy.

Frederick saw Dawkins at Berlin, but did not think his plans well organised. He preferred, in fact, to await events, and to keep up Jacobite hopes by vague encouragement. On June 16, 1753, Frederick writes to his agent, Michell, in London. He does not believe that England will go to war with him for a matter of 150,000 crowns, ‘which they refuse to pay to my subjects,’ on account of captures made by English privateers. But, ‘though the English King can do me much harm, I can pay him back by means which perhaps he knows nothing of and does not yet believe in.. I command you to button yourself up on this head’ (de vous tenir tout boutonné), ‘because these people must not see my cards, nor know what, in certain events, I am determined to do.’ 162 He was determined to use the Jacobites if he broke with England. On August 25, 1753, Frederick wrote to Klinggraeffen, at Vienna, that the English Ministry was now of milder mood, but in September relations were perilous again. On July 4, 1753, the Earl told Marshal Keith that a warrant was out against Dawkins. 163 In fact, to anticipate dates a little, the English Government knew a good deal about Jemmy Dawkins, the explorer of Palmyra, and envoy to His Prussian Majesty. Albemarle writes from Paris to Lord Holdernesse (December 12, 1753): 164

‘As yet my suspicions of an underhand favourer of their cause being come from England, and addressing himself to the late Lord Marshall, can only fall on one person, and that is Mr. Dawkins, who has a considerable property in one of our settlements in the West Indies. This is the gentleman who travelled in Syria with Mr. Bouverie (since dead) and Mr. Wood, who is now with the Duke of Bridgewater, and who are publishing an account of their view of the Antiquities of Palmeyra. Mr. Dawkins came from England to Paris early the last spring (1753), and was almost constantly with the late Lord Marshall. He used sometimes to come to my house too. In May he obtained a pass from this Court to go to Berlin, by the late Lord Marshall’s means, as I have the greatest reason to believe, for he never applied to me to ask for any such, nor ever mentioned to me his intention of taking that journey, and by a mistake, Monsr. de St. Contest put that pass into my hands, as it was for an Englishman, which I have kept, and send it enclosed to your Lordship. But whether Mr. Dawkins never knew that it had been delivered to me, or was ashamed to ask it of me, as it had not been obtained through my Channell, or was afraid of my questioning him about it, or about his journey, I cannot say; however he went away without it, not long after its date, which is the 2d. of May. And he returned from thence to Compiègne, the latter end of July, which was a few days before the Court left that place.

‘Since that he went to England, where, I believe, he now is, having had the Superintendency of the Publication of the work above mentioned [on Palmyra]. Mr. Dawkins, as well as his Uncle, who lives in Oxfordshire [near Chipping Norton], is warmly attached to the Pretender’s interest, which with the circumstances I have related of him, which agree with most of those hinted at in Your Lordship’s letter, particularly as to times, are very plausible grounds of my mistrusts of him. I shall make the strictest inquiries concerning him, as he is the only person of note, either British or Irish, who to my knowledge came here from England about the time your Lordship mentions – who frequented assiduously the late Lord Marshall [attainted, but alive!] who passed from thence to Berlin – and in short whose declared principles in the Jacobite Cause, and whose abilities, made him capable of the commission he may be supposed to be engaged in.

‘I shall not be less attentive to get all the intelligence I can, of any other person under this description, who may at any time, frequent the late Lord Marshall, and to give Your Lordship an exact account of what shall come to my knowledge. If, on Your Lordship’s part, you could come at any further discovery concerning Mr. Dawkins, I hope you will inform me of so much of it as may be of any service to me in my inquiries. The extreme caution and prudence with which, Your Lordship informs me, the late Lord Marshall conducts himself, for fear of risking the secret, will, I apprehend, make it impossible for me to penetrate into the instruction he may be charged with, in this respect, from his master, or how far he is intrusted with His Prussian Majesty’s intentions. I have not the least doubt of the late Lord Marshall’s being in correspondence with the Pretender’s elder Son, who was lately (as I was informed some time after he left it) at the Abbaye of S. Amand, not far from Lisle, which is most convenient for him, his brother, the Cardinal, being, as I am assured, Abbot of that Monastery. As for the lady described under the character of la bonne amie de Monsieur de Cambrai, that is Mrs. Obrian, whose husband is, by the Pretender’s favour, the mock Earl of Lismore, a follower of his fortunes, and supposed to have a considerable share in his confidence.’

From the Same‘Paris: Tuesday, December 18, 1753.

‘.. I must take this opportunity to rectify a small mistake in my last letter, relating to the Abbaye of St. Amand, of which I had been informed that the Pretender’s younger Son, the Cardinal, was Abbot. It is the Abbaye of Aucline of which he is Commendatory, and which is at much about the same distance from Lille as the other. It is the more probable that the Pretender’s Elder Son was there last autumn, as he might take that opportunity of seeing the Princess of Rohan [a relation of the Prince of Soubise], an ancient flame of his who went to Lille at the time of the encampment in Flanders, under that Prince’s command.’

Apparently the warrant against Jemmy Dawkins was not executed. We shall meet him again. Meanwhile there were comings and goings between Goring and the Earl Marischal in July 1753. In September, Goring was ill, and one Beson was the Prince’s messenger (July 2, September 5, 1753). On September 5, Charles made a memorandum for Beson’s message to the Earl Marischal. ‘I will neither leave this place, nor quit ye L. [the lady, Miss Walkinshaw]. I will not trust myself to any K. or P. I will never go to Paris, nor any of the French dominions.’ The rest is confused, ill-spelled jottings about money, which Beson had failed to procure in London. 165 On September 12; Charles scrawls a despairing kind of note to Goring. He writes another, underscored, dismissing his Avignon household, that is, ‘my Papist servants!’ ‘My mistress has behaved so unworthily that she has put me out of patience, and as she is a Papist too, I discard her also!.. Daniel is charged to conduct her to Paris.’

This was on November 12. On October 29, Miss Walkinshaw’s child, Charlotte, had been baptized at Liège. Charles’s condition was evil. He knew he was being tracked, he knew not by whom. Hope deferred, as to Prussia, made his heart sick. Moreover, on August 19, 1752, Goring had written from Paris that he was paralysed on one side (Pickle says that his malady was a fistula). Goring expressed anxiety as to Charles’s treatment of an invalided servant. ‘You should know by what I have often expressed to you [Charles answered on November 3] that iff I had but one Lofe of Bred, I would share it with you. The little money that I have deposed on my good friend’s hands you know was at your orders, and you would have been much in ye rong to have let yourself ever want in ye least.’

Again, on November 12, he writes to Goring:

To Mr. Stouf‘November 12.

‘I am extremely concerned for yr health, and you cannot do me a greater Cervice than in taking care of yrself for I am not able to spare any of my true friends.’

Dr. King, as we have said, accuses Charles of avarice. Charles II., in exile, would not, he says, have left a friend in want. Though distressed for money, the Prince does not display a niggardly temper in these letters to Goring. He had to defray the expenses of many retainers; he intended to dismiss his Popish servants, his household at Avignon, and to part with Dumont. We shall read Goring’s remonstrances. But the affair of Daniel’s ‘close’ proves how hardly Charles was pressed. On December 16, 1752, he indulged in a few books, including Wood and Dawkins’s ‘Ruins of Palmyra,’ a stately folio. One extraordinary note he made at this time: ‘A marque to be put on ye Child, iff i part with it.’ The future ‘Bonny Lass of Albanie’ was to be marked, like a kelt returned to the river in spring. ‘I am pushed to ye last point, and so won’t be cagioled any more.’ He collected his treasures left with Mittie, the surgeon of Stanislas at Lunéville. Among these was a couteau de chasse, with a double-barrelled pistol in a handle of jade. D’Argenson reports that the Prince was seen selling his pistols to an armourer in Paris. Who can wonder if he lost temper, and sought easy oblivion in wine!

CHAPTER X

JAMES MOHR MACGREGOR

Another spy – Rob Roy’s son, James Mohr Macgregor – A spy in 1745 – At Prestonpans and Culloden – Escape from Edinburgh Castle – Billy Marshall – Visit to Ireland – Balhaldie reports James’s discovery of Irish Macgregors – Their loyalty – James Mohr and Lord Albemarle – James Mohr offers to sell himself – And to betray Alan Breck – His sense of honour – His long-winded report on Irish conspiracy – Balhaldie – Mrs. Macfarlane who shot the Captain – Her romance – Pitfirrane Papers – Balhaldie’s snuff-boxes – James Mohr’s confessions – Balhaldie and Charles – Irish invasion – Arms in Moidart – Arms at the house of Tough – Pickle to play the spy in Ireland – Accompanied by a ‘Court Trusty’ – Letter from Pickle – Alan Breck spoils James Mohr – Takes his snuff-boxes – Death of James Mohr – Yet another spy – His wild information – Confirmation of Charles’s visit to Ireland.

From the deliberate and rejoicing devilry of Glengarry, and from Charles’s increasing distress and degradation, it is almost a relief to pass for a moment to the harmless mendacity of a contemporary spy, Rob Roy’s son, James Mohr Macgregor, or Drummond. This highland gentleman, with his courage, his sentiment, and his ingrained falseness, is known to the readers of Mr. Stevenson’s ‘Catriona.’ Though unacquainted with the documents which we shall cite, Mr. Stevenson divined James Mohr with the assured certainty of genius. From first to last James was a valiant, plausible, conscienceless, heartless liar, with a keen feeling for the point of honour, and a truly Celtic passion of affection for his native hand.

As early at least as the spring of 1745, James Mohr, while posing as a Jacobite, was in relations with the law officers of the Crown in Scotland. 166 James’s desire then was to obtain a commission in a Highland regiment, and as much ready money as possible. Either he was dissatisfied with his pay as a spy, or he expected better things from the Jacobites, for, after arranging his evidence to suit his schemes, he took up arms for the Prince. He captured with a handful of men the fortress of Inversnaid; he fell, severely wounded, at Prestonpans, and called out, as he lay on the ground, ‘My lads, I am not dead! By God! I shall see if any of you does not do his duty.’ Though he fought at Culloden, James appears to have patched up a peace with the Government, and probably eked out a livelihood by cattle-stealing and spying, till, on December 8, 1750, he helped his brother Robin to abduct a young widow of some property. 167 Soon after he was arrested, tried, and lodged, first in the Tolbooth, next, for more security, in Edinburgh Castle.

On November 16, 1752, James, by aid of his daughter (Mr. Stevenson’s Catriona), escaped from the Castle disguised as a cobbler. 168 It has often been said that the Government connived at James’s escape. If so, they acted rather meanly in sentencing ‘two lieutenants’ of his guard ‘to be broke, the sergeant reduced to a private man, and the porter to be whipped.’ 169

The adventures of James after his escape are narrated by a writer in ‘Blackwood’s Magazine’ for December 1817. This writer was probably a Macgregor, and possessed some of James’s familiar epistles. Overcoming a fond desire to see once more his native hills and his dear ones (fourteen in all), James, on leaving Edinburgh Castle, bent his course towards the Border. In a dark night, on a Cumberland moor, he met the famed Billy Marshall, the gipsy. Mr. Marshall, apologising for the poverty of his temporary abode, remarked that he would be better housed ‘when some ill-will which he had got in Galloway for setting fire to a stackyard would blow over.’ Three days later Billy despatched James in a fishing boat from Whitehaven, whence he reached the Isle of Man. He then made for Ireland, and my next information about James occurs in a letter of Balhaldie, dated August 10, 1753, to the King over the Water. 170 Balhaldie’s letter to Rome, partly in cypher, runs thus, and is creditable to James’s invention:

‘James Drummond Macgregor, Rob Roy’s son, came here some days agoe, and informed me that, having made his escape from Scotland by Ireland, he was addressed to some namesakes of his there, who acquainted him that the clan Macgregor were very numerous in that country, under different names, the greatest bodies of them living together in little towns and villages opposite to the Scottish coast.’ They had left Scotland some one hundred and fifty years before, when their clan was proscribed. James ‘never saw men more zealously loyal and clanish, better looked, or seemingly more intrepid and hardy… No Macgregors in the Scotch highlands are more willing or ready to joyn their clan in your Majesty’s service than they were, and for that end to transport 3,000 of their name and followers to the coast of Argileshyre.’ They will only require twenty-four hours ‘to transport themselves in whirries of their own, even in face of the enemy’s fleet, of which they are not affrayed.’

The King, in answer (September 11, 1753), expressed a tempered pleasure in Mr. Macgregor’s information, which, he said, might interest the Prince. On September 6, 1753, Lord Strathallan, writing to Edgar from Boulogne, vouches only for James’s courage. ‘As to anything else, I would be sorry to answer for him, as he had but an indifferent character as to real honesty.’ On September 20, James Mohr, in Paris, wrote to the Prince, anxious to know where he was, and to communicate important news from Ireland. Probably James got no reply, for on October 18, 1753, Lord Holdernesse wrote from Whitehall to Lord Albemarle, English ambassador in Paris, a letter marked ‘Very secret,’ acknowledging a note of Lord Albemarle’s. Mr. Macgregor had visited Lord Albemarle on October 8th and 10th, with offers of information. Lord Holdernesse, therefore, sends a safe-conduct for Macgregor’s return. 171 We now give Macgregor’s letter of October 12, 1733, to Lord Albemarle, setting forth his sad case and honourably patriotic designs:

MS. Add. 32,733.

‘Paris: October 12, 1753. Mr. James Drummond.

‘My Lord, – Tho’ I have not the Honour to be much acquainted with Your Lordship, I presume to give you the trouble of this to acquaint your lordship that by a false Information I was taken prisoner in Scotland in November 1751 and by the speat [spite] that a certain Faction in Dundas, Scotland, had at me, was trayd by the Justiciary Court at Edinburgh, when I had brought plenty of exculpation which might free any person whatever of what was alledged against me, yet such a Jurie as at Dundas was given me, thought proper to give in a special verdict, finding some parts of the Layable [libel] proven, and in other parts found it not proven. It was thought by my friends that I would undergo the Sentence of Banishment, which made me make my escape from Edinburgh Castle in Novr. 1752, and since was forced to come to France for my safety. I always had in my vew if possable to be concerned in Government’s service, 172 and, for that purpose, thought it necessar ever since I came to France to be as much as possable in company with the Pretender’s friends, so far as now I think I can be one useful Subject to my King and Country, upon giving me proper Incouragement.

‘In the first place I think its in my power to bring Allan Breack Stewart, the suposd murdrer of Colin Campbell of Glenouir, late factor of the forfet Estate of Ardsheal, to England and to deliver him in safe custody so as he may be brought to justice, and in that event, I think the delivering of the said murderer merits the getting of a Remission from his Majesty the King, especially as I was not guilty of any acts of treason since the Year 1746, and providing your lordship procures my Remission upon delivering the said murderer, I hereby promise to discover a very grand plott on footing against the Government, which is more effectually carried on than any ever since the Family of Stewart was put off the Throne of Britain, and besides to do all the services that lays in my power to the Government.

‘Only with this provision, that I shall be received into the Government’s Service, and that I shall have such reward as my Service shall meritt, I am willing, if your lordship shall think it agreeable, to go to England privily and carry the murderer [Allan Breck] alongest with me, and deliver him at Dover to the Military, and after waite on such of the King’s friends as your lordship shall appoint. If your lordship think this agreeable, I should wish General Campbell would be one of those present as he knows me and my family, and besides that, I think to have some Credit with the General, which I cannot expect with those whom I never had the Honour to know. Either the General or Lieutt. Colln. John Crawford of Poulteney’s Regiment would be very agreeable to me, as I know both of these would trust me much, and at the same time, I could be more free to them than to any others there. Your lordship may depend [on] the motive that induces me to make this Offer at present to you, in the Government’s name, is both honourable and just, 173 so that I hope no other constructions will be put on it, and for your lordship’s further satisfaction, I say nothing in this letter, but what I am determined to perform, and as much more as in my power layes with that, and that all I have said is Trueth, and I shall answer to God.

‘Jas. Drummond.’

James was sent over to England, and we now offer the results of his examination in London, on November 6, 1753. The following document deals with the earlier part of Mr. Macgregor’s appalling revelations, and describes his own conduct on landing in France, after a tour in the Isle of Man and Ireland, in December 1752. That he communicated his Irish mare’s nest to Charles, as he says he did, is very improbable. Like Sir Francis Clavering, as described by the Chevalier Strong, James Mohr ‘would rather he than not.’ However, he certainly gave a version of his legend to the Old Chevalier in Rome.

Extract of the Examination of Mr. James Drummond

‘That about the 8th. of May following (vizt. May 1753) He (Mr. D.) did set out for France, and arrived at Boulogne on the 16th. where He met with Lord Strathalane, and as He (Mr. D.) was asking after the Young Pretender, His Lordship told Him that He had seen a letter from Him (the Young Pretender) lately to Sir James Harrington, at which time he (the Young Pretender), was lodged at an Abbé’s House, about a League and Half from Lisle, whereupon He (Mr. D.) communicated to his Lordship, in the presence of Capt. Wm. Drummond, and Mr. Charles Boyde, the Commission, with which He was charged. That thereupon His Lordship undertook to wait upon the Young Pretender with the Irish Proposal, and advised Him (Mr. D.) to go and stay at Bergue, till He (Lord Strathalane) came to Him there. That on the 20th. June following, His Lordship wrote Him (Mr. D.) a Letter (which is hereunto annexed) to this effect – “That he (Lord Strathalane) had laid Mr. Savage’s Proposal before the Young Pretender, who desired, that he, (Mr. D.) would repair to Paris, and that He had sent Him (Mr. D.) a Bill upon Mr. Waters (the Banker) to pay His charges. 174 That He (Mr. D.) did accordingly go to Paris, and that upon His arrival there, He first waited upon Mr. Gordon, Principal of the Scot’s College, but that nothing particular passed there. (N.B. There is not one word, in any of Mr. Drummond’s papers, of His [the Prince’s] intending to go to Berlin.) (Official Note.)’

Nobody, of course, can believe a word that James Mohr ever said, but his disclosures, in the following full report of his examination, could only have been made by a person pretty deep in Jacobite plans. For example, Balhaldie, chief of the Macgregors, did really live at Bièvre, as James Mohr says. There was in Edinburgh at this time a certain John Macfarlane, w.s., whose pretty wife, in 1716, shot dead an English captain, nobody ever knew why. She fled to the Swintons of Swinton, who concealed her in their house. One day Sir Walter Scott’s aunt Margaret, then a child of eight, residing at Swinton, stayed at home when the family went to church. Peeping into a forbidden parlour she saw there a lovely lady, who fondled her, bade her speak only to her mother, and vanished while the little girl looked out of the window. This appearance was Mrs. Macfarlane, who shot Captain Cayley, and was now lying perdue at Swinton.