Ireland Shakespeare Forgeries - Aftermath

Aftermath

For the Irelands, father and son, the failure of the play, coupled with Malone's exposure of the hoax, was an unmitigated disaster. Samuel Ireland still believed the papers to be Shakespeare's, and refused to listen to anything his son had to say. William Henry confessed the forgery to his sisters, to his mother, and to Albany Wallis, but his father did not believe his story. The public, not surprisingly, accused Samuel Ireland of the fraud. Sales of his books suffered.

Blaming Malone for his misfortunes, Samuel Ireland set out to write a book that would destroy the scholar's reputation. With the aid of Thomas Caldecott he attacked Malone for using forensic techniques like handwriting comparison to settle a literary question, rather than relying on taste and aesthetic sensibilities. Concerned for his father's reputation William Henry rushed into print with a pamphlet confessing to the forgeries, and his father replied immediately with a vindication of his conduct in the whole affair. This combination roused suspicions. George Steevens accused the two of collusion:

The hopeful youth takes on himself the guilt of the entire forgery, and strains hard to exculpate his worthy father from the slightest participation in it. The father, on the contrary, declares that his son had not sufficient abilities for the execution of so difficult a task. Between them, in short, there is a pretended quarrel, that they may not look as if they were acting in concert on the present occasion.

The charge would stick. George Chalmers' Apology for the Believers and Samuel Ireland's Investigation concentrated on attacking Malone rather than exonerating Samuel, and the public verdict was probably summed up in a print by John Nixon depicting the entire Ireland family engaged in forging the papers.