Victorian visitors to Christchurch: A horny lawyer and a drunken nuisance

Victorians can be a right bunch of hypocrites (people from the nineteenth century I mean, not those from the state of Victoria). All prim and proper on the surface, but full of vice underneath. Particularly awful were those who were supposed to be 'our betters' (ugh).

Two such examples who spent time in Christchurch are Christopher George 'Kit' Hodgson (1827 - 1877) and Lord Frederick Montagu (1828 - 1854).

Let's take a look.

The Horny Lawyer

Kit Hodgson came from London and was educated at Eton. Like his father he became a lawyer. He arrived in New Zealand in 1855 on the Royal Stuart, and purportedly practiced law in Kaiapoi. However he is described in the Burke Manuscript as a 'very little practising' solicitor. He also was heavily involved in the Canterbury Jockey Club, but his Macdonald dictionary entry describes his contribution as secretary as 'inefficient'. He and Charles Ferrers Knyvett owned the run that became Leslie Hills, but apparently the place was 'very poorly run'. Oh dear. But why was he so horny?

In our archives we have a letter from Kit to his chum Charlie back in London. Kit has been up country for a while and:

there is no such thing as a loose female in the place – I am a virgin ever since I left London – what do you think of that!!!
(Archive 851)

Now, I don't know who all the women are who he mentions in the letter, but I do get a possible hint of capital R Rakishness:

You do not enter into particulars about Lizzie she has not written to me for some time. Do you suppose she has forgotten me? I cannot think so.

I am rather surprised not to have had a message by you from Harriet I thought she would have written to me before this.

(Ibid)

Hmmmmmm. He ends the letter thusly:

I have just been summoned to the other room where some pals are having a champagne burst.
(Ibid)

He married Katherine, the only daughter of John Shand in 1857, poor woman. They returned to England in 1861. In the 1871 census on Ancestry his profession is given as 'unemployed lawyer', so things were obviously not going well. He died in 1877 and is buried in Camden, London.

The Drunken Nuisance

How times change! We really wouldn't get excited about the arrival of aristocrats to New Zealand these days. Yet in the early 1850s, Australian newspapers were getting their knickers in a twist about potential new arrivals to the Canterbury settlement:

It is the reported intention of the sons of the Duke of Manchester - Viscount Mandeville, MP, and Lord Frederick Montagu - to embark for Canterbury, New Zealand, as settlers, with the new bishop of that colony. 'An air of dignity and respectability, (says the London correspondent of the Manchester Spectator) cannot fail to be thrown around the emigration movement by these aristocratic removals to the antipodes, the full effects of which we can now hardly venture to anticipate.'

THE CANTERBURY SETTLEMENT. (1851, January 15). South Australian Register (Adelaide, SA : 1839 - 1900), p. 4.  

Um, hate to burst your bubble, but the estimable Charlotte Godley spills the tea on just how dignified and respectable Frederick Montagu was! (Viscount Mandeville never made it to Christchurch, but Mandeville Street is named after him.)

‘Ld. F. Montagu, who came out in the Castle Eden, is quite a nuisance here, drinking, swearing, cheating at cards, and so on, and amongst the lowest public-house set, for no one else now I believe will notice him......... My husband had some letters about him, because his Grand-mother, Lady Olivia Sparrow, knew Mr Godley [snr] so very well, but in their first interview he told him that hearing the language he used, with oaths between every word, it was out of the question his asking him to come to his house, or into the society of ladies.'

Godley, 185-6

He also managed to offend the new bishop and his family on the voyage out:

'Mrs Jackson told me he had been unbearable in the ship, and used such language, the first day she was at dinner, that she and Dr. J., and their boys, always afterwards dined in their own cabin.’

Godley, 186

However, a later newspaper article (love you Paperspast) reveals that he brought some livestock with him on the Castle Eden, which was appreciated:

The cattle were a Godsend to the travellers, for fresh milk was available all the voyage.
A VETERAN TARANAKIAN TARANAKI DAILY NEWS, 22 AUGUST 1932, PAGE 12

Frederick, unsurprisingly did not last long in Canterbury, but he sold on at least one of his cows. He had arrived in February 1851 and by April had gone to Australia. He spent the rest of his life around the New South Wales gold fields, and he died in 1854 after being thrown from his horse.

His life was short, sordid and eventful - he had been a soldier in the 24th Foot, fighting in the Second Sikh War (1848-9), and at the time of his death he and his brother were involved in a scandalous court case. His mother, who had died in 1848, had cut them out of her will when they were teenagers due to their bad and extravagant behaviour. The case was covered in extensive detail in the newspapers on the day - why not pop into a library and read all about it in the British Newspaper Archive?

Conclusion

I feel like both Kit and Frederick represent some of the worst aspects of Victorian hypocrisy - full of vices, but being placed on a pedestal because of their position in society. I do hope we've moved on.