RESIGNATION OF BUTE, APRIL 1763

499

few minor Whigs who remained in the administration then resigned to mark their disapproval.

On 25 November the King's Speech at last contained that allusion to the "bloody and expensive war" which Pitt's insistence had removed from the royal declaration of two years before. Parliament was informed that Preliminaries of Peace had been concluded and advised of the actual terms in December. Pitt violently attacked the Preliminaries in the Commons but could muster only 65 votes against 329. Bute admitted that £25,000 was paid out of the Secret Service money in December 1762.1 Of this sum £10,000 had always been drawn from the Secret Service Fund at this time of the year. The extra £15,000 was probably spent in pensions given to adherents on the waiting list for pensions. This was, of course, a usual procedure on the entry of a new ministry into office, and the sum does not seem a very large one. The amount does not enable us to suggest that the size of the Government majority in the Commons was due to bribery alone. In the Lords, Newcastle, Hardwicke and Grafton opposed the peace but found a "great majority" against them. Fox, who seems to have already acted with great success in influencing waverers, showed neither scruple nor mercy in a campaign against the Whig placemen. He removed the Whig magnates from their lordlieutenancies, and hunted their dependents from places and from pensions, "in order to be revenged on me", said Newcastle. No such severity in proscription had ever been known, and it is the more remarkable because the parliamentary consent to peace had already, in fact, been secured by triumphant majorities.

2

Fresh surprises were in store for the Opposition. On 10 February 1763 peace was finally signed. On 11 March, Bute spoke to Fox of resigning office, on the 18th the terms of peace were placed before Parliament, and Bute laid down his office early in April. There seems to be no reason to doubt that his resignation was due to a simple cause. He had taken office with but one object, to assist his young master in carrying the peace to a successful conclusion. This he had now done. He was ready to resign, and perhaps hoped still to pull wires behind the scenes. He was disinclined for the "bullfight" of politics and fully aware that his own great unpopularity might easily be transferred to his master. That he loved the young King with a deep affection his private letters show. That he was without personal ambition, and only desirous of being useful to his master, his whole conduct seems to prove. The amazement of his contemporaries at his conduct is indeed the best proof of his personal disinterestedness.

His conduct of the peace negotiations is naturally open to criticism,

1 See Bute to the King of 4 Nov. 1769. Fortescue, Correspondence of George III, 11, no. 735, pp. 109-10.

2 No debate on them is recorded.

though we can understand his motives and the practical possibilities better than his contemporaries did. The plan was simple. Bute, like his master, ardently desired peace, and he told Choiseul so frankly enough. "Instead of going the ordinary way of forming pretensions much stronger than one would wish to conclude, I have traced the plan of an equitable peace such as France could accept with honour."1 He added that he had not hesitated to make great sacrifices for this result, wishing to make a permanent alliance instead of a plâtrée peace. Viry certainly thought, and Choiseul sometimes admitted, that Bute had acted up to his professions. The aim was in itself a high and noble one and worthy of a great statesman, but the prospect of a permanent alliance was certainly premature, and almost absurd. There was no prospect even of more than a truce. In fact, Choiseul began reorganising the French fleet and increasing his armaments so soon as peace was concluded and remained decidedly aggressive until his fall seven years later.

Bute failed equally in his lesser aim of securing good terms by avoiding the diplomacy of the auction-room and offering le dernier prix. The secrecy of the negotiation gave Choiseul endless opportunities of playing Bute off against his own colleagues and against Spain, which he was not slow to use. Bute's worst error would appear to have been his over-zeal for peace, and his disregard of the fact that the military events were likely to tell in England's favour. His conduct towards Frederick cannot be entirely defended either as moral or as expedient. The operations in Germany, in fact, gave Bute a valuable lever in negotiation which he rashly threw away at the outset.

On the other hand, the Newcastle-Hardwicke section of the Cabinet, while wishing to retain St Lucia and to get compensation for Havana, contributed largely to Bute's blunders over the Spanish question. Under the influence of Ligonier and Anson they seemed to have been obsessed with the idea that Spain and France would be too strong for England and that any concession was justified to avert that result. It may be doubted whether any concession could have done so, and, as it turned out, England proved stronger than France and Spain combined. But it is only fair to say that Legge, the ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer (and by no means friendly to Newcastle), expressed in a paper, written on 11 February 1762,2 the view that immediate peace was necessary, to avoid bankruptcy. So the Whigs had technical advice from naval, military and financial quarters, all in favour of a speedy peace. On the other hand, the Duke of Cumberland, their honourable and impartial adviser, was strongly against giving way over the Newfoundland fisheries or discontinuing the war in Germany, and deeply suspicious of any

1 Shelburne MSS, vol. xi, Viry to Solar, 26 June 1762, reporting Bute.

2 Brit. Mus., Add. MSS, 35839, ff. 262-3. (An endorsed "abstract of Mr Legge's paper".)

THE VALUE OF THE PEACE

501

concessions to Spain.1 And, when it came to the point, the Newcastle party had refused to give up St Lucia.

If the Newcastle policy represents the nadir, that of Pitt represents the zenith, of possible diplomatic achievement. Choiseul lost no opportunity of declaring Pitt's policy to have been undiplomatic in the highest degree, and he has been followed by the most distinguished French historian of this period. Even Stanley, an excellent judge, thought Pitt's diplomatic methods too harsh, and declared he could have made peace had the concessions of 17 August been made earlier. But Stanley did not know what we now know. Such criticism assumes either that the Franco-Spanish union could have been averted, or that it did not mean war. Both propositions seem doubtful. Spain would hardly have approved of Choiseul's private Memorial of July 1761 if she was not prepared to risk war. And Charles III seems to have been prepared to run that risk in order to reduce the increasing predominance of England in America. He had told England this in so many words nearly two years before. If the balance of power was thus really disturbed, soft words from Pitt would not have prevented Spain from joining France.

Assuming war to be inevitable after the signature of the Pacte de Famille, Pitt's policy of cowing or attacking Spain was right. Bold counsels were necessary and the first blow would have been struck by England. The conduct of the war was much weakened by his departure, for no other minister could awaken the moral enthusiasm or appeal to the commercial needs of the country. He had not only united England behind him; he had made "trade flourish by means of war". To take two instances: shipping went up from 451,000 tons in 1755 to 561,000 in 1763; the slave trade had almost doubled in amount between 1758 and 1762.2 A continuance of the war under such leadership would not have led to bankruptcy and would certainly have led to greater victories, or at any rate, to a greater price being exacted for victories.

Was it possible for Bute to have exacted a greater price? There is a beautiful tale of how old Lord Granville signed the treaty papers as he lay dying, quoted Homer over them, and pronounced the peace "very glorious" to his country. It was the last utterance of an able and disinterested statesman who had himself censured Bute for faintheartedness during the negotiation. Weight too must be attached to the utterance of Choiseul himself: "There is no modern example in which a peace has been made when the conquerors kept the whole of their conquests".3 True as this dictum was, the contrast between what England retained at the peace in the New World, and what she restored, was astonishing.

1 Lord Granby favoured the peace, as it stood. His technical military opinion is some offset to that of the Duke of Cumberland, but he seems to have been influenced by political motives. 3 Memo. of 25 May 1762.

2 Slave trade figures in C.C. 325/2.

She gave back to France Belleisle, Goree, and a share of both the disputed fisheries in Canada: she restored Martinique, Guadeloupe, Marie Galante and St Lucia. She gave back to Spain Cuba in the Caribbean and Manila in the Pacific. Pitt's own plan is difficult to ascertain, for he might have approved in office some of the cessions which he condemned in opposition. That he was sincere in his opposition is certain, for he severed all political connection with anyone who had had a hand in the peace at the time and even maintained this attitude three years later. The Board of Trade's Secret Report on terms of peace of 13 April 1761 went further than Pitt himself in demanding the exclusion of the French not only from the Newfoundland fisheries,1 but also from Louisiana and from the Neutral Islands and Guadeloupe. Pitt had agreed to some compromise over the Newfoundland fisheries, though he did not accept Bute's eventual settlement. In this he would seem to have erred, for a report from Newfoundland in 17672 showed that the results of the treaty had enabled English trade to increase at the expense of French, and had reduced the number of French fishers by about 1000.

Pitt's mind seems to have been exercised by the reflection, which time proved to be correct, that the main trade of Guadeloupe and Martinique must go to the North American continent in any case. And, if so, it was better that British should be substituted for French sugar, and that a potential naval reserve should be withdrawn from France. It has been ingeniously argued3 that Pitt's consent to giving up Guadeloupe in 1761 was due to the fact that he adopted the new doctrine that Canada with a growing population was a better market for home manufactures than Guadeloupe. When he demanded the retention of Guadeloupe or Martinique in 1762, it is held that Pitt had reverted to the old ideas that a sugar isle was a base of supply. But this omits to consider the political influences on Pitt in each case. He condemned the restoration of St Lucia and of Goree on strategic grounds. "They seemed to have lost sight of the great fundamental principle that France is chiefly, if not solely, to be dreaded by us in the light of a maritime and commercial Power." He pointed out the dangers of the union of the two Bourbon Crowns, and said that Spain was not to be trusted. Havana ought to be retained, for from the moment of its capture "all the riches and treasure of the Indies lay at our feet”.

On the whole Pitt was an advocate of the doctrine of the need for controlling trade routes and obtaining markets. He wished for Cuba to secure the trade of Spain, for Guadeloupe to secure that of France. He wished for St Lucia as a strategic post in the West Indies. In West Africa he desired Senegal on commercial, and Goree on strategic,

1 Jenkinson (afterwards Lord Liverpool) thought Canada hardly worth acceptance without the fisheries. For Board of Trade Report see Brit. Mus., Add. MSS, 35913, ff. 73 seqq.

Shelburne MSS, vol. LXV, 15 Dec. 1767, Hugh Palliser to Shelburne. 3 Beer, G. L., British Colonial Policy (1754-65), 1917, p. 136.

PITT AND THE PEOPLE

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grounds. He wished for the exclusive right to the fisheries of the St Lawrence and Newfoundland in order to drive French sailors from the New World.

Pitt was less of a free agent in his policy than either Bute or Newcastle. He is to blame for disdaining the one, and for making himself intolerable to the other. But he was to some extent compelled to do this, in order to retain his power. For he was "called to office", as he said in his farewell speech at the Cabinet, "in some degree by the voice of the People" and he stood for bold measures and vigorous action. Bute or Newcastle could rely on their command of pensions or of places to win support; Pitt rested on his popularity alone. And he depended in large part on the goodwill of the City, in particular of his chief supporters, Beckford, Hodges, Price and Wilkes. Burke bitterly commented that the "Great Commoner" knew nothing of the "great extensive public" but only "of a parcel of low toadeaters" and by these he meant the City Elders. All of these held that the French must be totally expelled both from Canada and the Newfoundland fisheries. The unanimity of the City Council in this matter seems to supply the reason why Pitt consented so unwillingly to any modification of our exclusive rights.1 Immediately after his fall he spoke in the Commons, declaring that he repented his concession and that, when we resumed negotiations, "we should have the exclusive fishery in the Gulf a sine quâ non",2 and he was supported in Parliament by his special friend and crony in the City, Alderman Beckford, and by Wilkes in the press.

On the West Indian question Pitt's City friends were much more divided. Beckford argued that the acquisition of French sugar isles would injure existing British isles by reducing the price of sugar. But this view was contested by others of Pitt's City friends. And Pitt was, therefore, able to take his own line more easily. He surrendered Guadeloupe indeed under pressure from his colleagues (and from some of the City) in 1761. But, as soon as he felt strong enough to oppose both, as he did in 1762, he demanded Guadeloupe as well as Canada. For he argued that their trade connection would continue even if Guadeloupe remained French, and that, therefore, she should be British.

The classic discussion as to whether Guadeloupe was more important than Canada occupied the pens of many pamphleteers from 1760 onwards. One pamphlet suggested that America might revolt, once it was safe from the French. Others with equal foresight suggested that the peopling of Canada would mean that they would produce manufactures, and that this would not be to England's 1 The meagre evidence as to Pitt's City influence is well summarised by Hotblack, Chatham's Colonial Policy, pp. 12-7.

2 For texts of this speech, 13 Nov. 1761, see Yorke, Hardwicke, III, 338; Hist. MSS Commission, Stopford-Sackville MSS, 1, 86–7.

3 See Grant, W. L., "Canada v. Guadeloupe”, Am. H.R. July 1912, pp. 735 seqq.