Pains and Penalties Bill 1820 - Defence Case

Defence Case

In a letter to the King, the Prime Minister Lord Liverpool summarised the progress of the trial. He said the evidence had made an impression in the House, but the bill was by no means secure. The Queen was still immensely popular. Over 800 petitions totalling nearly a million signatures were received in her favour. Liverpool warned the King that Majocchi and Demont were discredited as witnesses, and the evidence produced by the defence could damage George severely. The divorce clause was especially unpopular, he wrote, though it might pass the Lords, it would not pass the Commons. He suggested that it be dropped. George would not decide to do so.

After the presentation of the prosecution case, the trial was adjourned for three weeks, and the Queen's solicitor, Denman, visited Cheltenham Spa for a break. Once his identity was discovered, a supportive crowd gathered outside his lodgings. Meanwhile, Caroline's defence team assembled their evidence. Letters exchanged between them and Italian correspondents show that Colonel Carlo Vassalli, Caroline's equerry, said there was nothing improper between Caroline and Pergami. Caroline shared a room with Victorine, Pergami's daughter, and Caroline's behaviour with Pergami was no different than with other men. Pergami wrote from Pesaro in Italy that he would swear that his bed was not slept in because he was sleeping with Demont, and that he never had intercourse with the Queen.

The defence opened on 3 October with a speech from Brougham. His speech was considered the "most magnificent display of argument and oratory that has been heard in years", "one of the most powerful orations that ever proceeded from human lips", and "one of the most magnificent speeches ever made in this or any other country". According to Thomas Creevey, it astonished and shook the aristocracy. In it, Brougham threatened to reveal facts about George's own life, even if they damaged the country, if it was the only way to ensure justice for his client. He attacked the character of the prosecution witnesses, and claimed that Italian witnesses could be purchased like a commodity. He read from a letter from an Italian correspondent, "There is nothing at Naples so notorious as the free and public sale of false evidence. Their ordinary tariff is three or four ducats." He reminded the Lords that Majocchi was forgetful, that Demont was a liar, and that Cuchi was a lecherous wretch who spied on his female guests through a keyhole. He produced a letter from George to Caroline written in 1796, which became known as the "letter of licence". It appeared to forgive any transgressions on either Caroline or his part, and allow them to lead separate lives. "Our inclinations are not in our power," George had written, "nor should either of us be held accountable to the other."

The defence witnesses included Lord Guilford, Lord Glenbervie, Lady Charlotte Lindsay, Lord Landaff, The Hon. Keppel Craven, Sir William Gell, Dr Henry Holland, Colonel Alessandro Olivieri, and Carlo Vassalli, all of whom swore that there was nothing unusual about Caroline's behaviour. The King was incensed; "I never thought that I should have lived to witness so much prevarication, so much lying, and so much wilful and convenient forgetfulness", he wrote. Under cross-examination, Lord Guilford was unable to recall leaving a handsome Greek servant alone with Caroline for three-quarters of an hour, and Lady Charlotte had on occasion said "I do not recollect", but without the same disdain that had met Majocchi's constant refrain of non mi ricordo. British servants who had been in Caroline's household, including Keppel's valet John Whitcomb, also testified in Caroline's favour. Whitcomb admitted that he had slept with Demont, who was already known to have slept with the coachman Sacchi, thus further ruining Demont's tarnished reputation. A French milliner, Fanchette Martigner, further testified that Demont had told her that Caroline was innocent, and the charges against her "were nothing but calumnies invented by her enemies in order to ruin her".

The trial seemed to be going Caroline's way, especially after Sacchi's testimony was refuted by the nephew of the Duchess of Torlonia, Carlo Forti. Forti claimed that the Countess Oldi (Pergami's sister) sat between Caroline and Pergami in the carriage, which was also shared with Victorine (Pergami's daughter), and so there could have been no intimacy between them. However, the cross-examination of two of the witnesses damaged Caroline's case. Lieutenant John Flynn and Joseph Hownam had both been on the same Mediterranean cruise with Caroline and Pergami. Flynn said nothing incriminating but during the course of the cross-examination, he fainted, which left a bad impression. Pressed by Gifford, Hownam admitted that Caroline and Pergami had both slept in the same tent on deck because, he claimed, Caroline was afraid of pirates, and wanted a guard in the tent with her. In an attempt to regain ground, Brougham produced two Italian witnesses, Giuseppe Giroline and Filippo Pomi, who revealed that the prosecution witnesses had been paid 40 francs each, and given free food and board. The Whigs now claimed that the trial was tainted as there was prima facie evidence of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice by paying witnesses for their testimony. Lord Liverpool countered Whig demands to abandon the bill by saying that there was other evidence, from non-Italian witnesses, that could be relied upon.

Brougham attempted to investigate the claim of conspiracy further in the hope that it would discover the man behind the conspiracy, who paid for the witnesses and hired the prosecution team. Disingenuously referring to "this mysterious being, this retiring phantom, this uncertain shape", Brougham knew full well that "this uncertain shape" was the King. The King knew it too, and took Brougham's words to be a direct reference to his massive size, as the King was vastly overweight. The Tories challenged Brougham's line of questioning, as they claimed it implicated persons who could not be called as witnesses, and widened the investigation beyond the relevance of the bill.