Memoirs of the Courts and Cabinets of George the Third | Page 8

I otherwise should have done. It also prevented my being able to profit of the honour you proposed to me of calling here this evening.
I will call at the Duke of Richmond's before two o'clock to-morrow, and I hope that his Grace and I shall have the honour of meeting your Grace at the House of Lords, between two and three o'clock; I should imagine, any time before three o'clock will afford us time for the honour of some conversation together.
I have the honour to be, with great regard,
Your Grace's most obedient and most humble servant,
Rockingham.
Grosvenor Square. Wednesday night, past Nine o'clock, Jan. 30th. 1782
THE MARQUIS OF ROCKINGHAM TO LORD TEMPLE.
My dear Lord,
I felt myself much honoured by the very kind intimation which you sent to me by Mr. T. Grenville, that your Lordship would not be unwilling to come to town, to attend in the House of Lords, in case any matter was likely to come on, which might appear to me to be of importance in the present miserable state of the affairs of this country.
I should have wrote to your Lordship to have apprized you of the motions intended by the Duke of Richmond on the subject of the execution of Colonel Harris in Charlestown in North America, and of the proclamation which had in consequence been issued by General Green. I was very doubtful in regard to the probable day on which the business might come to be discussed.
On the Duke of Richmond's first mentioning the subject, it came out that the Ministers at last acknowledged that they had no official information; but as a vessel had arrived from New York, and some officers had also arrived from Charlestown on Friday or Saturday last, I thought it probable that on Monday or yesterday we might have heard that they had got official information, and that possibly some papers would be to be laid before the House, and the discussion of the matter would then have been fixed for some day, and regularly proceeded upon.
The event was different: they continued to say that they had no official information, but chose to enter into a justification of the whole proceeding, in part urging some accounts which they said had been in a Pennsylvanian Gazette.
I am now to inform your Lordship, that the Duke of Chandos, who had thrown out an idea of inquiring into the causes of the loss and capture of Earl Cornwallis and his army, has been wished and desired to move it on Thursday next.
The Duke of Richmond, the Duke of Chandos, and Duke of Manchester, and some friends, have been here this morning, and have prepared the enclosed motion for the inquiry, and also motions for papers which would be necessary. Lord Shelburne and Lord Camden have been acquainted with the intention; the Duke of Grafton is also in town; so that I should imagine the business will be well supported. I have no expectation of any success in the House of Lords; but upon such a calamity and national disgrace, it surely will become us to propose to bring on an inquiry. Perhaps we may learn whether the Ministers intend to throw the blame either on their Commander-in-Chief, General H. Clinton, or on Earl Cornwallis, or (what some suppose), on Lord Greaves. The public at large have a right to know whether the real cause has not arose from the neglect, inability, or some other cause, in His Majesty's Ministers.
As the business is now fixed for Thursday next, I have taken the liberty of apprizing your Lordship by a messenger, who I hope will arrive before your Lordship goes to bed to-night.
I wish I could have wrote earlier. I shall be very happy in the honour of seeing your Lordship, which I hope may be soon, even if your Lordship could not at this time come to London.
I have the honour to be, with great truth and regard,
Your Lordship's most obedient and obliged humble servant,
Rockingham.
Grosvenor Square, Tuesday, Four o'clock, Feb. 5th, 1782.
On the 22nd of February, General Conway moved an Address to the King, imploring His Majesty to abandon the war. After a protracted debate, which lasted till two o'clock in the morning, the Ministers found themselves in an alarming majority of 1. But they persevered in the face of these disasters, and, sustained in office by the tenacity of the King, refused to submit to the constitutional warning of Parliament. Three months before, the Duke of Richmond, writing to Lord Rockingham, anticipated the obstinacy of the Cabinet, expressing his conviction, that "no essential change of measures was meant, and none of men if it could be avoided. When I say the Ministry," he added, "I mean the King; for his servants are the merest servants that ever were."
Nor was it only by