Europe, British Isles, South-Central England, Northamptonshire, Deene Park [Map]

Deene Park, Northamptonshire is in Deene, Northamptonshire.

1843 Death of Princess Charlotte

1868 Death of Lord Cardigan

1869 Buckingham Shrewsbury Duel

On 12 Aug 1566 Edmund Brudenell (age 45) received Queen Elizabeth I of England and Ireland (age 32) at Deene Park, Northamptonshire [Map].

Death of Princess Charlotte

Adeline Horsey Recollections. After my dear mother's death I visited a great deal with my father (age 53), and one year we went for the shooting to Lord Huntingfield's place, Heveningham Hall, Suffolk. I slept in the bedroom once occupied by the famous Chevalier d'Éon, who had been a frequent guest at Heveningham, and about whom there were many stories told. It was said that the Chevalier was the one and only lover of cross-grained Queen Charlotte, and that her son, George IV, was the result of their intimacy, although his paternity was of course admitted by King George III. The animosity always displayed by the old Queen to her grand-daughter, Princess Charlotte, was supposed to arise from the fact that as heiress to the throne she innocently dispossessed the other Royal Dukes from the succession. It is certainly a fact that the Princess's untimely death in childbirth was attributed to foul play at the time, and when later the accoucheur Sir Richard Croft, committed suicide, all classes of society were loud in condemnation of the Queen and the Prince Regent. I do not vouch for the accuracy of Queen Charlotte's love affair. I only give the Heveningham gossip as I heard it.

Note A. D'Eon was undoubtedly one of the most picturesque and mysterious personages of the eighteenth century I was naturally interested in these somewhat scandalous stories.

The Chevalier died when he was eighty-three years of age, after a most extraordinary career. He was at one time aide-de-camp to the Comte de Broglie, and fought in the French army; but later on for some mysterious reason he discarded man's attire and passed as a woman for thirty-four years. Often when I went into my room I half expected to see a ghostly figure seated at the escritoire where the Chevalier wrote his secret cipher communications, and I wondered whether the brocade crowns and frills and furbelows that he wore as a woman had ever hung in the old wardrobe which I used.

My father and I also stayed with the Westmorlands at Apethorpe Hall; we visited the Earl (age 38) and Countess of Chichester (age 36) at Stanmer Park, and we were welcome guests at Cadlands, Silverlands, Chiswick House, West Park, and my uncle Lord Stradbroke's place, Henham Hall, which was afterwards burnt down.

I had visited Deene Park, Northamptonshire [Map] with my mother in 1842, but I must deal with my future home in the chapter devoted to Deene and its associations.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. Lord Cardigan's father, the sixth Earl, was a splendid-looking man, and his seven daughters were lovely girls and great heiresses. They all married men of title, and each received a dowry of £100,000 on her wedding day.

When the old Earl was lying dangerously ill at his house in Portman Square, he asked the doctor to tell him whether there was any chance of his recovery. "You are to tell me the truth", he insisted. The doctor was silent. "I see by your manner that you can hold out no hope", said the Earl; "well, death has no terrors for me - but tell me, how long have I to live? "There was a pause, and at last the doctor stammered, "Two or three days, your Lordship!".

The Earl sat up, and rang the bell placed on the table by his bedside. A servant answered the summons. "Order my carriage", said the dying man.

"Good gracious, my Lord!" exclaimed the terrified doctor, "your Lordship cannot realise what you have said".

"I do realise it", the Earl calmly answered, "but if I am going to die, I will die at Deene [Map] and not here". Remonstrance was useless: Lord Cardigan was carried to his carriage and taken to Deene, where he died a few days afterwards.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. For twelve years Cardigan (age 50) remained a grass widower, consoled by many fair friends, and bills no doubt being as numerous then as they are now, certain ladies were always ready to stop at Deene [Map] without their husbands.

I knew Lady Cardigan (age 50) quite well, and on my first visit to Deene with my mother in 1842 she was very kind, and gave me some beautiful Northamptonshire lace, which I still possess.

There is a not unamusing story told about her and a certain Mrs. Browne, well known in Society. Mrs. Browne had fallen desperately in love with Lord Cardigan, and although she did not know him she sent him quantities of billets doux begging for an interview. Lady Cardigan accidentally got hold of one of these letters, and she determined to play a trick on the love-sick lady. Mr. Baldwin, a very handsome man, was Cardigan's agent at the time, and Lady Cardigan persuaded him to personate her husband, and keep a bogus appointment she had made with Mrs. Browne.

The unsuspecting lady received a note purporting to come from Cardigan, saying he would visit her on a certain evening. He further stipulated that as he was so well known he did not wish to see any of Mrs. Browne's servants, and that she must receive him in the dark ! Any one but an infatuated woman would have queried the genuineness of the letter, but Mrs. Browne did not, and when Mr. Baldwin arrived, he was duly received in darkness as black as Erebus. He and Mrs. Browne were mutually well pleased with the result of their meeting, and under cover of the darkness of the small hours of a winter's morning they said good-bye. It was not until long afterwards that Mrs. Browne found out that she had entertained an agent unawares, and no doubt she hated Lady Cardigan for the unkind deception of which she had been the victim.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. Clarence Trelawney was a friend of mine, and the poor fellow came to a sad end. After his wife's death he married an American lady, but unfortunately he got into debt. He appealed to his relations, who were very wealthy but apparently equally mean, for they refused to lend him the £400 he asked for, and driven desperate by worry he blew out his brains.

From Paris we came to London and stayed at Lord Cardigan's town-house in Portman Square Marylebone; then we went to Deene [Map] on December 14, where we met with a royal reception, six hundred tenants on horseback escorting our carriage from the station to the house.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. The estates were heavily mortgaged, and since Cardigan's death I have paid off £365,000 of the mortgages, which by the terms of the will was not compulsory for me to do. I have also spent £200,000 on the estate, and the many modern improvements now at Deene [Map] (which in past years was more gorgeous than comfortable) are entirely due to me.

After the will had been read. Lord Ernest Bruce (age 47) and my brother, Colonel de Horsey (age 33), went for a stroll in the park. They were discussing the contents of the will, and Lord Ernest said cheerfully, "Well, it's a good thing for Robert (age 13), as Lady Cardigan won't last long ". "Look here, my Lord", replied my brother in an icy tone, "you seem to forget you are talking about my sister".

I looked delicate in those days, and my death would have been "a good thing for Robert", but forty years have passed, and he is still waiting for his inheritance!

Adeline Horsey Recollections. Our marriage was a veritable romance; we enjoyed all the good things life could give us, but in his own happiness Cardigan (age 61) never failed to extend a helping hand to the less fortunate, and among our tenantry the name of the Earl of Cardigan is even now a synonym for all that is generous and kind.

We entertained a great deal both at Deene [Map] and Portman Square, and for the first three years of our married life Lord Cardigan never allowed any one but himself to take me in to dinner. I had to persuade him at last to give up this very flattering habit, and so he did not monopolise me quite so much in future.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. At Deene [Map] I was always with my husband. Lord Cardigan did not care much for the books, music and painting which appealed so strongly to my temperament; he only cared for walking, driving and riding, and naturally I put my own hobbies aside and entered into all his favourite pursuits. We constantly rode together. I had beautiful horses, and my husband delighted in praising my "graceful carriage" and my "fine horse-manship", which was much talked about in hunting circles.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. The house [Map] has been very judiciously added to, each architect retaining the motif of the old house, so it has not a patched appearance. My husband's father built the dining-room, and in 1861 Lord Cardigan added the ball-room, especially to please me. It is 70 feet long and 40 feet high; and I designed the heraldic stained-glass windows which represent the family's forbears of Royal descent. The windows were executed by Lavers and Burrow, but my aid as an artist reduced their account by £200 ! There is a magnificent marble fireplace in the ball-room, which has an oak floor and a musician's gallery.

Death of Lord Cardigan

Adeline Horsey Recollections. One fine March morning he told me that he was going to ride and see a gamekeeper who had accidentally shot himself.

He asked me and Sir Henry Edwards (age 55) to accompany him, but when we reached the keeper's cottage he told us to return to Deene [Map], saying that as he intended to sit an hour with the man he would come on later. We declared our willingness to wait, but Cardigan would not hear of it, and so we somewhat reluctantly rode home without him.

The luncheon hour arrived, but Lord Cardigan did not come; the afternoon dragged on, and still there were no signs of him. I had a horrible presentment that something must have happened, and at once ordered some of the servants to go in search of his Lordship.

My fears were only too well grounded; my husband was found lying insensible on the roadside, nearly lifeless. A roadmender told us afterwards that Lord Cardigan had passed him and spoken a few words and seemed apparently quite well; the horse he was riding shied at a heap of stones and commenced to rear and plunge rather wildly, but my husband kept the animal well under control, for the roadmender saw him ride quietly away. The effort must, however, have afterwards brought on a seizure, for Cardigan fell from his horse, and lay helpless until he was found and brought back to Deene [Map].

For three dreadful days and nights he lay quite unconscious, gasping for breath, and the knowledge that he could not speak to me and did not recognise me intensified my grief a thousandfold. But mercifully his suffering was not prolonged, and on March 28, 1868, my beloved husband passed away.

There are some griefs that are too deep to speak of, even after Time's soothing touch has taken away the first deadly pain of a great sorrow. When I look back and remember the kindness and love which my husband lavished on me, I feel proud to think he often said that the happiest period of his life was after he married me, and that his great possessions and military fame were as nothing compared to the wife he adored.

Lord Cardigan's body lay in state in the ballroom at Deene [Map] for twelve days, during which time six thousand people came to look their last at the remains of the leader of the Charge of the Light Brigade. On April 9 he was buried in Deene Church [Map]; the whole regiment of the 11th Hussars attended the funeral, and he was carried to his last resting-place by eight of his old officers.

When the will was read, it was found that he had left everything to me.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. After Lord Cardigan's death I remained quietly at Deene [Map] for some months. I felt quite overwhelmed by my loss, for as I had known his Lordship nearly all my life I mourned for a dear friend as well as for a beloved husband. My two friends, Miss Hill and Miss Hunt, stayed with me a great deal, but I sank into such a state of apathy and depression that they became alarmed, and begged me to go up to town and see what result change of scene and society would have on my shattered nerves.

I was very loth to leave the country, but I yielded to their entreaties, and went to London, where I saw a few of my intimate friends, and I gradually began to take an interest in life once more.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. One evening my sister-in-law, Mrs. de Horsey, persuaded me to go to the Gaiety Theatre with her and Lord Robert Bruce (age 23). I was idly scanning the stalls when my attention was riveted by the sight of a gentleman sitting near some members of the Austrian Embassy. Impossible though it may seem, it is nevertheless true that this stranger was the living image of my late husband. He had Cardigan's features, his carriage, his colouring, and the likeness was so painfully real that I was naturally greatly agitated.

"Robert", I said, pointing the stranger out to him, "do you see that gentleman in the stalls; he's Cardigan's double. I feel I must make his acquaintance, I must know who he is; do try and ascertain for me, and if possible present him to me? ".

Lord Robert doubtless thought me very unconventional, but I did not care, my one desire was to speak to the person who was so like my husband, and I was delighted when Robert returned and told me that the gentleman was Count Lindemann, a Franco-Bavarian nobleman, and that he could introduce him to me through a mutual acquaintance at the Embassy.

Count Lindemann and I became great friends, but the friendship on his part changed into love, and he begged me to marry him. I refused, partly on account of a fortune-teller having told me that I should marry twice, and that my second husband would die before me.

"I like you so much as a friend", I told him, "that I could not possibly be happy if marriage meant losing you". The Count was a fine steeplechaser, and he was constantly at Deene [Map]. After some years his mother, who was in bad health, begged him to return to Bavaria and take charge of her estates. Lindemann did not wish to leave England, but as his mother threatened to leave her money and property to the Church if he did not, he eventually complied with her wishes.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. I spent much of my time at Deene [Map] after I had begun to recover from the shock of Lord Cardigan's death. He had always expressed a wish that if he predeceased me I should still keep up the traditional hospitality of the house, so I commenced to entertain large house-parties.

One evening I gave a dinner-party to which I had invited some very dull neighbours, Mr. and Mrs. H. Aubrey Coventry was staying at Deene, and he suggested playing a joke on Mr. H., a very pompous, snobbish person, who "dearly loved a Lord". Aubrey accordingly dressed himself up as a woman. He was laced into the cook's stays, and my sister-in-law lent him one of her exquisite tea-gowns. He wore an effective wig, and I must say he made a very striking-looking woman. He was introduced to the H.s as Lady Aubrey Coventry, and sat between Mr. H. and John Vivian at dinner. Mr. H. talked a great deal to "Lady Aubrey", who told me afterwards that out of sheer mischief he kept treading on Mr. H.'s foot all through dinner, and he wickedly enjoyed watching the growing embarrassment on that gentleman's face !

When the ladies retired, Mrs. H. pounced on "Lady Aubrey", and began to get so confidential that poor Aubrey was quite confused, and pleading sudden indisposition he went to his room. A few hours afterwards, clothed in his own garments, he was dancing at the ball which took place later in the evening, and I believe the H.s remained in happy ignorance of * Lady Aubrey's * real identity.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. The wicked Countess and her lover lived at Clieveden [Map] - "the bower of wanton Shrewsbury and of love" - and her spirit is supposed to haunt the beautiful riverside retreat, but I am thankful to say she has never appeared in the old home of her innocent girlhood. Her portrait by Sir Peter Lely hangs in the White Hall at Deene, and is a fine example of the artist's well-known very décolleté style of "robes loosely flowing, hair as free", with the usual mise en scène of a beauty of Charles II's time. The third Earl of Cardigan was Master of the Buckhounds to Queen Anne; he married a daughter of the Earl of Ailesbury, and their fourth son inherited the Ailesbury title and estates. Lord Cardigan's eldest son married the heiress of the Duke of Montagu in 1766 [Note. Married on 07 Jul 1730. He was created Duke in 1766]. He was a friend of Horace Walpole, the influence of whose pseudo-Gothic tastes may still be seen in the south front of Deene [Map], built at this time, and which now incorporates the great ball-room built for me by my dear husband.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. The Brudenells have been landowners in Northamptonshire since the time of Henry III, and in 1518 Sir Robert Brudenell, a Justice of the King's Bench [Map], bought Deene [Map] from William Litton. Robert Brundenell made a large fortune, and his wife, Margaret Entwyssel, became heiress to her brother's estates of Staunton Wyvile, which naturally added to the wealth of the family. In 1520 Sir Robert settled Deene on his eldest son, Thomas, and eleven years later he died and was buried in the transept of Deene Church [Map].

Adeline Horsey Recollections. Sir Thomas, who was a hospitable and generous man, died in 1549, and Deene [Map] passed to his son Edmund, who married Agnes Bussey, a member of the great Lincolnshire family. Sir Edmund Brudenell carried out extensive building operations at Deene, and the numerous initials of E. and A. and the many shields with the Brudenell and Bussey arms show that he considered his alliance with their family an important one. Camden mentions that Sir Edmund had literary and antiquarian tastes, which were also possessed by his nephew Thomas, who succeeded to the estates in 1606. He also built largely, but the great Tower was not finished until about 1628. Sir Thomas was a staunch cavalier, who raised soldiers for the King's garrisons, and he was made a Baron by Charles I. After the Royal cause was lost he suffered the penalty of his loyalty and was imprisoned in the Tower [Map] for twenty years. The brave old cavalier kept a most interesting diary during his imprisonment, which is still preserved in the library at Deene; it consists of about 30 or 40 volumes of MS., which give interesting details of his confinement and the principal events of the time.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. In 1661, Charles II rewarded his father's faithful adherent by creating him Earl of Cardigan on April 22, but the old man did not live long to enjoy his new honours, for he died at Deene [Map] in 1663, aged eighty.

Buckingham Shrewsbury Duel

Adeline Horsey Recollections. The second Earl became a Roman Catholic, and spent most of his long life of 102 years at Deene [Map]. His daughter, Lady Anne Brudenell, was one of the most lovely of the beauties associated with the Court of Charles II She married the Earl of Shrewsbury, and the story is well known of how she, dressed as a page, held the Duke of Buckingham's horse whilst he fought with and slew her husband.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. Allan Fea, in his interesting book, "Nooks and Corners of Old England", describes how, "some time before the poor little plain Duchess (of Buckingham) suspected that she had a formidable rival in the beautiful Countess, she was returning from a visit to Deene [Map] to her house at Stamford, where her reckless husband found it convenient to hide himself, as a warrant for high treason was out against him, when she noticed a suspicious little cavalcade travelling in the same direction. Ordering the horses to be whipped up, she arrived in time to give the alarm. The Duke had just then set out for Burleigh House with some ladies in his company, and the serjeant actually saw the Duke alight and lead a lady into the house, but he and his soldiers were not in time to force an entrance, and so the Duke escaped!".

Adeline Horsey Recollections. One of my friends has often said that to visit Deene [Map] is to step back into the past, for the place bears upon it no impression of modernity, and even the additions made to the house are thoroughly in character with the older parts.

Deene is first mentioned in the Domesday-Book, when the surveyors noted the wood of a mile long belonging to it which joined Rocking- ham Forest. It was the property of the Abbey of Westminster [Map], and was used as a hunting-box by the Abbots. It was called the Grange, and "the monks' well" is still to be seen in the park. A most interesting feature of the house is the Great Hall, 50 feet long and 50 feet high, which is a duplicate in miniature of Westminster Hall [Map], and the carved chestnut roof, the wood of which is impervious to the ravages of insects, has never had an accident since it was first erected in 1086.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. I believe my husband replaced a great deal of the original furniture at Deene [Map] with more modern examples, but many valuable old pieces still remain. The pictures are very beautiful, including a priceless Vandyke representing Queen Henrietta Maria, in the happy days of her early married life, as a regal, gracious figure arrayed in shimmering satin. There is a lovely portrait of Louise de Keroualle and her son, the Duke of Richmond, who married a Brudenell, and there are many examples of Lely, Sir Joshua Reynolds and other eighteenth- and nineteenth-century artists. One painting by Sant represents the Prince Consort and the Royal children listening to the account of the Charge of the Light Brigade by Lord Cardigan, and there are also some interesting pictures of hunting-field incidents, depicting Cardigan and his friends on their favourite mounts.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. There are many features of interest in the old house [Map]. In the Great Hall there is a blocked-up entrance to an underground passage through which despatches were carried in the Civil War; and there is a hiding-place large enough to hold twenty people. Henry VII slept at Deene, when as Earl of Richmond he rode to Bosworth Field; the room is known as "the King's Room", and the Royal arms are sculptured over the fireplace. The Tapestry Room has a fine ceiling, and is the room always reserved for Royal guests, the last visitors who occupied it being the sons of the Infanta Eulalia, Don Alphonso and his brother, who stayed at Deene in 1907. They both thoroughly enjoyed the shooting, and used to telegraph the bags to King Alfonso, who wired that he was not having anything like such good sport !

Adeline Horsey Recollections. Deene [Map] lies like some rare jewel in a setting of peaceful lake and well-timbered parkland; its own peculiar charm would be gone for ever if it relied on blazing flower-beds and obtrusive gardening triumphs to make it attractive.

Behind the bowling-green are the kitchen gardens, where the fruit ripens on the mellowed walls, and in spring and summer, masses of old- fashioned flowers make vivid splashes of fragrant colour everywhere. The stables and the riding-school, which I built, are close to the house, and I have a most interesting collection of ancient carriages, many of them over a hundred years old and unique specimens of the coach-builder's art.

Adeline Horsey Recollections. Naturally Deene [Map] has a ghost. The story goes that when it was a Religious House, monks and nuns lived there together, an arrangement that was naturally rather dangerous to the morals of the community. A young nun is said to have loved and been loved in return by one of the monks; they both met with a tragic end, and her spirit appears at times in the Great Hall as a young and lovely woman dressed in the white robes of her Order. A curious discovery was made when the house was drained that perhaps is a silent record of dark doings in monkish days. Quantities of young children's bones were found under the floorings, and I often wonder whether the horrible practices of Gilles de Retz ever took place at Deene long ago, or if the tiny bones were those of unwanted and unwelcome babies at the Religious House !

My friend, Walter Seymour, wrote the following verses, which I set to music, about the phantom nun: ...

Adeline Horsey Recollections. For fifty years I have been chatelaine at Deene [Map]. There is no place I love so much. I saw it first as a mere child and even then it seemed to welcome me. It was the home of my married life; and I am never lonely there. Memory opens wide her gates, and from them issue the beloved dead who loved Deene. Husband, relatives, and friends surround me again, and the dream is so real that I am always happy with my dear ones who people it. The peace of the old house envelops and soothes me, and I always hope that when the time comes for me to lie by my husband's side, my spirit will be sometimes allowed to revisit the place that has always been "sweet home" to me.