Hello. We’ve been writing this blog every day for around eleven and a half months now. As it was our intention to find out why every single day of the year is BRILLIANT, we’re almost there and it seemed appropriate to have some sort of countdown. If we make it, there will be thirteen more posts after this one. You can also find this blog on Wordpress, along with a short explanation of how it came about, and in which we reveal which of us has actually written all of this on the ’about’ page. Thank you all for reading, liking and re-posting.
Why March 2nd is BRILLIANT
A Poem for the Queen
On this day in 1882, Queen Victoria survived her eighth and final assassination attempt. We were surprised to find out that Queen Victoria had been such a regular target. So we thought we’d take a closer look at who these people were. The first attack was in June 1840 when she was pregnant with her first child. Victoria and Albert were out driving in their carriage when Edward Oxford fired two pistols at them. Both shots missed. He was arrested and afterwards sent to Australia. He said he had done it for the notoriety it would bring him.
We were even more surprised to find out that attempts two and three were carried out on two consecutive days, in 1842, by the same man. John Francis was an angry out of work stage carpenter and failed tobacconist who felt he deserved better in life. On the first occasion, his gun failed to go off. He was only seen by Prince Albert and one other person. The next day, the Queen and Prince somewhat recklessly agreed to go out again to see if he would put in another appearance. This time Robert Peel, who was then Prime Minister, had several police officers stationed along the route. One of these was Constable William Trounce. He had been watching a rather furtive looking man for some time. But as the Queen’s carriage approach, he was torn between the job he was meant to be doing and showing respect for his queen. He chose wrong. He decided to salute her. John Francis chose that moment to fire his weapon. Luckily the shot missed and the constable was able to arrest him. John Francis was sentenced to be drawn, hanged and quartered which is not quite the same thing as being hung, drawn and quartered. A condemned person would be drawn (dragged) on a hurdle to the place of execution, hanged until dead and then cut into four parts. His sentence was later commuted to transportation for life. Constable Trounce did not lose his job.
Shortly after that, there was a fourth attack. This time by a man called John Bean. His pistol, which was loaded with paper and bits of broken clay pipe, failed to go off. It seemed like there was a bit of a mania for taking pot-shots at the Queen. Oddly, Robert Peel responded by making it a lesser crime punishable, not by hanging, but by flogging and imprisonment. Even more oddly, it seemed to work. There were no more attempts for another seven years. We don’t know if Queen Victoria ever used the parasol lined with chain-mail that she was given for protection.
In 1849 she was shot at by William Hamilton. He was an unemployed bricklayer who felt he would have a better life in prison. He was jailed on Gibraltar for seven years. Her fifth attacker was Robert Pate in 1850. He is generally described having been often seen behaving eccentrically in London Parks. We tried to find out more but just came up with the fact that his clothes were unusual and there was a vague mention of goose stepping. He was the only one who actually hurt her. He hit her on the head with his stick, giving her a black eye and a scar that lasted for ten years. The Queen insisted on attending the opera a few hours later just so everyone could see that she hadn’t been badly hurt. Her ladies in waiting insisted that she shouldn’t go, as she clearly was hurt. “Then” she said, “they will see how little I mind.”
Her sixth attacker, in 1872, was a young Irishman who imagined himself a martyr to the cause of Irish Nationalism. He wanted her to sign a document he had written which ordered the freeing of Irish political prisoners. He expected to be shot by firing squad and die a hero. But the Queen’s servant and very good friend John Brown knocked the pistol from his hand. He was arrested and sent to Australia.
This brings us to March 2nd 1882 and Roderick Maclean. Maclean had suffered a head injury in 1866, declared of unsound mind in 1772 and committed to an asylum in 1880. However, in 1882, he was pronounced ‘cured’ and released. From that time, he had wandered about the country, convinced that anyone wearing the colour blue would cause him harm, as would anything to do with the number four. He had sent a poem to the Queen which had been rejected on her behalf by one of her ladies in waiting and he was upset about it. He sold his scarf and concertina, bought a gun and headed for Windsor. He managed to take a single shot at Victoria before he was grabbed by some Eton schoolboys and hit over the head with an umbrella. He was probably the only one of her attackers who was completely insane. He was committed to Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum for the rest of his life.
We don’t know what his rejected poem was, but we can tell you about another poem connected with the incident. It is by William Topaz McGonagall, who many consider to be the worst poet in the English language. We’re definitely not going to inflict all of it on you, but here’s a snippet:
God prosper long our noble Queen, And long may she reign! Maclean he tried to shoot her, But it was all in vain.
For God He turned the ball aside Maclean aimed at her head; And he felt very angry Because he didn’t shoot her dead.
Caricature of the assassination attempt on the Duke of Wellington in Paris, by Charlet, 1818. Source: Bibliothèque nationale de France
Although the Duke of Wellington did not face as many assassination attempts as Napoleon did, there were at least two serious plots to assassinate him. In the first attempt, the bullet fired by the would-be assassin failed to hit the Duke. The second attempt, in which Wellington was one of many intended victims, was foiled before it could be carried out. For details, see “Assassination Attempts on the Duke of Wellington.”
The jacket sits oddly against their shoulders. Rich seamwork and heavy, fine-spun material feel like the memory of a dream more than a piece of their past. Cyril does up the buttons on their cuffs, pulls their arms across their chest, then circles them, feeling the pull of the fabric across their back and around their arms. With a sigh, they rotate their wrist and undo the cuff-links. It will slow them if they need to move quickly. Not by much, but even a half-second can carry the weight of a life kept or lost.
The thought jars against the slide of the smooth fabric of their dress shirt on their skin, rips a hole in the thick, weighty pall of their old life settling over them. They would never have considered movement over attire when they were alive.
Alive, yes – they were alive, years ago, and they stand here and breathe and think and hurt now but will they ever truly be as alive as they were the first time they put on this suit? Esme did up their cuffs that time, warm, blunt fingers caressing their wrist as he laughed about something inconsequential. It rings against the shell of their memory, golden-edged and bright, a spray of seafoam captured in the curl of an empty home that once protected something which no longer fits.
