WILLIAM WICKHAM, MASTER SPY: THE SECRET WAR AGAINST THE FRENCH REVOLUTION
The Enlightenment World: Political and Intellectual History of the Long Eighteenth Century
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Series Co-Editors: Jack Fruchtman, Jr Iain McCalman Paul Pickering
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1 Harlequin Empire: Race, Ethnicity and the Drama of the Popular Enlightenment
David Worrall
2 The Cosmopolitan Ideal in the Age of Revolution and Reaction, 1776-1832
Michael Scrivener
3 Writing the Empire: Robert Southey and Romantic Colonialism
Carol Bolton
4 Adam Ferguson: History, Progress and Human Nature
Eugene Heath and Vincenzo Merolle (eds)
5 Charlotte Smith in British Romanticism
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6 The Scottish People and the French Revolution
Bob Harris
7 The English Deists: Studies in Further Enlightenment
Wayne Hudson
8 Adam Ferguson: Philosophy, Politics and Society
Eugene Heath and Vincenzo Merolle (eds)
9 Rhyming Reason: The Poetry of Romantic-Era Psychologists
Michelle Faubert
10 Liberating Medicine, 1720-1835
Tristanne Connolly and Steve Clark (eds)
11 John Thelwall: Radical Romantic and Acquitted Felon
Steve Poole
12 The Evolution of Sympathy in the Long Eighteenth Century
Jonathan Lamb
13 Enlightenment and Modernity: The English Deists and Reform
Wayne Hudson
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The Edinburgh Review in the Literary Culture of Romantic Britain: Mammoth and Megalonyx
William Christie
Montesquieu and England: Enlightened Exchanges, 1689-1755
Ursula Haskins Gonthier
The Language of Whiggism: Liberty and Patriotism, 1802-1830
Kathryn Chittick
Romantic Localities: Europe Writes Place
Christoph Bode and Jacqueline M. Labbe (eds)
The Sublime Invention: Ballooning in Europe, 1783-1820
Michael R. Lynn
The Spirit of the Union: Popular Politics in Scotland
Gordon Pentland
British Visions of America, 1775-1820: Republican Realities
Emma Vincent MacLeod
William Wickham, Master Spy
The Secret War against the French Revolution
By
Michael Durey
First published 2009
by Pickering & Chatto (Publishers) Limited
Published 2016
by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017, USA
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
Taylor & Francis 2009
Michael Durey 2009
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BRITISH LIBRARY CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION DATA
Durey, Michael.
William Wickham, master spy: the secret war against the French Revolution.
(The Enlightenment world)
1. Wickham, William, 17611840.2.SpiesGreat Britain Biography. 3. Espi
onage, British History. 4. Anglo-French War, 1793-1802 Secret service.
I. Title II. Series
327.1'2'092-dc22
ISBN-13: 978-1-85196-983-8 (hbk)
Typeset by Pickering & Chatto (Publishers) Limited
Contents
IN MEMORY OF my father Victor John Durey (1920-2005) and my father-in-law Frank Powis Morris (1916-2009) Ganges men both
William Wickham (1761-1840) has been a brooding presence in my life for a decade. On occasions during this time I have set aside my research, either to work on other projects or to take stock. At one point, I had the great privilege of holding the position of Fowler Hamilton Research Fellow at Christ Church, Oxford, Wickham's alma mater , but having lost during my return to Australia the only disc on which copies of draft chapters existed, I decided to abandon the project. Instead, I published two articles on Wickham, 'William Wickham, the Christ Church Connection' in English Historical Review and 'When Great Men Fall Out' in Parliamentary History . As a result, I have taken the liberty of occasionally plagiarizing myself in places in this book.
A combination of an inability to get Wickham out of my mind and the encouragement of Dr Michael Davis, of the University of Tasmania, eventually persuaded me to return to the word processor. Another very important trigger was the sudden arrival, totally unannounced, of the rare two-volume Correspondence of the Right Hon. William Wickham , edited by his grandson and published in 1870. Not long after this I received, again totally unannounced, microfiche copies of the Wickham family's correspondence that had been placed in the Hampshire Record Office since my last visit. My benefactor was the late Nicolas Wickham-Irving, who had always been quietly supportive of the project. It is my greatest regret that he did not live to see the results of his kindness. I hope he would have approved.
I have greatly benefited from the assistance and professionalism of librarians and archivists of many repositories where Wickham or related materials now lie: at the Bodleian Library and Christ Church Library, both in Oxford, the British Library in London, the University of Nottingham library, the Huntington Library in California, and the Library of Trinity College Dublin; at the county record offices of Hampshire, Devon, Kent and Gloucestershire; and at the great national repositories, the National Archives (formerly the Public Record Office) in Kew and the Irish Public Record Office in Dublin. I am grateful to all, but must make special mention of Sarah Lewins at the Hampshire Record Office and Judith Curthoys at Christ Church.
On occasions I have dragged family members and friends of the family into my quest. I thank my sister Sheila Ward, my son Robert, Nina Allen and Jamie Buck for their help. I am also very grateful for the support and interest shown by past and present staff and students at Murdoch University: Dr Ian Waterston, whose own work has greatly aided mine; Dr Greg Brotherson and Jane Grimes (and not just for being superb tutors); Professor Bob Reece, for his enviable prose and more; Emeritus Professor Brian De Garis, for keeping the world shipshape; Dr Danny Cusack, for his help in obtaining Irish sources; James Crossland, for his help at the National Archives; and Pam Mathews, representative of university librarians at their best. Two colleagues require special mention: Dr Gavin Daly (now at the University of Tasmania) and Associate Professor Michael Sturma. For years we discussed, over coffee, a mixture of history, cricket and association football (and occasionally human beings being fired from torpedo tubes). Unknown to us, we had been dubbed 'The Three Musketeers'. The Three Amigos would have been more appropriate. Together, Gavin and Mike proved on a daily basis the importance of collegiality.
In the wider field of academic life I have had the good fortune to make friends with, and receive good advice from, many scholars interested in the late eighteenth century. Most, it must be said, will probably have forgotten their influence and, moreover, might not agree with my approach to the counter-revolutionary Wickham. Nevertheless, for their help on various parts of this book I would like to thank Michael Ball, Tom Bardett, Gavin Daly, Mike Davis, Karl de Leeuw, John Ehrman, Ed Jaggard, Nigel Little, Iain McCalman, Tom Munch-Petersen, Mark Philp, Tom Pocock and Elizabeth Sparrow.
