Statesmen in Caricature

The Great Rivalry of Fox and Pitt the Younger in the Age of the Political Cartoon

N. G. Howe

• Publisher: I.B. Tauris
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN:
  9780755627134
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9781786726650
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Political History & Theory
• Index: Politics & International Relations

The years 1780 to 1820 have long been seen as the Golden Age of the English satirical print. This period witnessed a number of changes in style which had far-reaching consequences, including an increase in the effectiveness of the caricature as visual propaganda. William Pitt the Younger and Charles James Fox were the leading politicians of the age, continuing a family rivalry begun by their fathers. They were amongst the most caricatured men of their time and became emblems of the two sides of the political debate whilst gathering personal followings, based upon personality rather than filial or political patronage. Fox and Pitt the Younger came to represent a more modern notion of the party leader, in an age before formalized political parties and structures. Neil Howe here shows how `stock images' came to the fore and examines the central role they played within the visual representation of politicians during the late-eighteenth century. His book also chronicles how the biggest political rivalry of the age played out within contemporary caricature, from the emergence of Fox and Pitt as big political beasts in the wake of the American Revolution, though the East India Bill Crisis; Regency Crisis and French Revolution to the death of both men in 1806.

1

Stock Images

Stock images are the principal images used by satirical artists to represent an individual or group. Richard Godfrey has argued that ‘for the most important and frequently recurring characters it was important from the beginning to define a prototype that could be used again and again, allowing for instant recognition’.¹ The notion of a ‘stock image’ dates back to the emergence of graphic satire and in its earliest form tended to be allegorical, consisting of emblems, symbols and visual puns. For instance, John Stuart, third Earl of Bute, was consistently portrayed as a jackboot throughout the mid-eighteenth century, owing to visual punning between his titular name Bute and boot.² Likewise, Henry Fox, later first Baron Holland, was consistently represented as a fox sporting a wig;³ therefore, it was no surprise that when his eldest two children first appeared in print, they were portrayed as fox cubs.⁴ This provided a clear link between father and son, effectively dynasticizing the trope. This style of play on words between surnames and emblems was not uncommon and helped the audience identify individuals within the prints, given time and suitable repetition.

Stock images also had the ability of acting as a visual shorthand, with notable examples including the British people being personified through the person of John Bull⁵ and the Royal Navy through his cousin, Jack Tar. The emblem of John Bull as the British people sat well alongside Britannia as a visual embodiment of the British nation and her sister Hibernia, who performed the same role for Ireland. Indeed, Gwyn A. Williams has suggested that James Gillray’s John Bull became the ‘voice of the people’.⁶ During the eighteenth century, John Bull was portrayed as a yokel farmer, who was being played and bamboozled by politicians. Through the caricaturist’s representation of how a certain policy would affect John Bull, the reader could envisage how the policy might affect them by substituting themselves for John Bull. Miles Taylor has argued that ‘John Bull embodied a common and widely used critique of political power in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries’.⁷ The fact that the character of John Bull readily lent itself to public empathy enabled artists to reduce the number of individuals required to construct the message and thus render their comment all the more biting.

The aim of this chapter is to examine the evolution and development of the stock images of Charles James Fox and William Pitt the Younger during their careers and to highlight the importance of the ‘stock image’ when caricaturing individuals in the late eighteenth century. Key questions that this chapter will address are: What is the purpose of stock images? How do they develop over time? Are old versions revisited? The chapter will focus upon the four ‘stock images’ of Charles James Fox: Fox as a fox, Fox as ‘The Man of the People’, Fox as a Jacobin and Fox as a traitor; it will also look at the ‘stock image’ of William Pitt the Younger: Pitt as minister. While there are several prints of Fox as Carlo Khan during the ‘East India Bill crisis’ and as Oliver Cromwell, they have not been included here as the image of him as Carlo Khan was really a response to his East India policy and as such would be more properly considered within the discussion of that policy, while the image of Fox as Oliver Cromwell is a constituent part of the stock image of him as a traitor.

Fox as a fox

One of Charles James Fox’s earliest appearances in caricature came in The Child; or a Legacy for the House of Commons, published in 1771.⁸ His representation as a fox not only fits with the pre-‘Golden Age’ method of emblematic representation but also overtly links him to his father and brother, and accordingly acts as a comment upon the filial nature of his early political line. Within this early ‘stock image’ of Fox as a fox, there are clear references to his passion for gambling and position as a leading figure within macaroni fashion.⁹ Many of these early prints of Fox, unlike the later prints from the 1780s, were published by small publishers and within periodical magazines such as The Town and Country Magazine and Oxford Magazine.¹⁰

The Young Heir amongst Bad Councellors, or the Lion Betray’d¹¹ is another early political print containing a depiction of Fox. It is also noteworthy for its association of the young Fox with a number of significant political figures. The central figure is that of George III as the English lion. He is surrounded by several of his senior advisers: John Montagu, fourth Earl of Sandwich; Lord Frederick North; Augustus Henry Fitzroy, third Duke of Grafton; and William Murray, first Earl of Mansfield. Sandwich can be identified by the presence of an anchor on top of his hat, indicating his position as First Lord of the Admiralty, while North is depicted as a dog and his identification is aided by the presence of a compass symbol, N, above his head.¹² He holds a chain attached to the lion’s right front paw, indicating his position as First Lord of the Treasury at the same time suggesting that the King should ‘be guided by me and go North about’. One of his legs has a spiked point, which pierces the lion’s chest, causing him to bleed, while his left leg is in a jackboot, hinting at the influence of John Stuart, third Earl of Bute. Fletcher Norton is also present and is identified through his Speaker’s robes and Charles James Fox portrayed as a fox.

Fox appears in the right foreground and is examining the scene through a looking glass. He sports a bagwig, linking in to his fondness for the macaroni style of fashion. His left foot is stuck in a dice box, with a pair of dice next to it and the playing card in his right hand, which reflected his fondness for gambling. Fox is recognizable predominantly due to his portrayal as a fox cub, an echo of his father’s representation as a fox and a visual pun on his surname. In May 1771, Fox was already a junior minister, was a member of the Admiralty Board and was already viewed as one of the leading debaters in the House of Commons. His youth and lack of political experience, combined with the junior nature of his office, are reflected within his portrayal as a cub rather than a fully grown fox. Later, as Fox gained in years and experience, he began to be represented as an adult Fox; however, his father’s death in July 1774 might have also influenced this change. Indeed, Lord John Russell recorded a comment from Fox’s nephew Henry Fox, third Baron Holland, who always thought that it was most fortunate for the interests of both liberty and truth and the comfort, happiness and character of Fox’s political career that he had quarrelled with North, prior to the American Question coming to the fore. He went on to suggest that Fox’s dismissal from office and subsequent loss of his father provided him with ‘an opportunity of exercising an unbiased and impartial judgment on that great question, [that of America] and the important principles involved in it’.¹³

Matthew and Mary Darly developed a reputation during the mid-eighteenth century for publishing prints concerning macaroni fashion. According to the BM Catalogue, the Darlys published two prints of Charles James Fox, in human form and as a macaroni.¹⁴ While he is fairly recognizable in The Macaroni Cauldron,¹⁵ the figure in The Original Macaroni¹⁶ is less obviously Fox, being rather slender. However, the fox’s brushes attached to either end of the pole, which he holds, and one at the back of his head, acting as the ponytail on a bagwig, indicate that the figure is intended to be a member of the Fox family. The Original Macaroni emphasizes the continued importance of emblems in early prints attempting to represent individuals using human features as a means of rendering them widely recognizable to viewers, particularly when their physical appearance was not widely known. This is key as it is likely that at a time before paparazzi photos in the newspapers, the satirical print was the closest likeness that people who were not directly acquainted with the individual in question might see.

The Young Politician (Plate 3),¹⁷ published in 1771, is another print of Fox in macaroni guise; however, unlike the Darly images, Fox is portrayed as a fox. In contrast to The Young Heir, where Fox is portrayed as a cub, in The Young Politician he has grown into a young adult; however, there remains a suggestion that Fox has not reached full maturity. There are also hints of his early politics and accusations of Toryism in the fact that the barbers attending to his wig are tearing strips off a copy of the Magna Charta [sic], which Fox is holding to help style his wig.¹⁸ Again in this print Fox is recognizable by his vulpine features, including a fox’s head and brush. Meanwhile, his macaroni fashion is clearly indicated by his floral breeches and the sword and floral jacket resting on the chair in the corner. While Fox’s representation as a macaroni places him as a man of fashion, it could also be intimating that he was perceived as a Francophile. The style of his clothing, alongside the array of bottles on the table behind his valet containing ‘Bergamont’, ‘Essence’, ‘Rouges’ in addition to a bag of ‘Poudre à la Maréchale’ on the floor, also hint at Fox following French fashion. Meanwhile, on the floor, there is an open book, ‘A New Essay on Politiks by C- F- Esq^r’, and this could be an ironic reference to his defending his father in the House of Commons in 1771 over his involvement in the Massacre of the Pelhamite Innocents.¹⁹

One print that clearly demonstrated Fox’s political maturity is James Gillray’s Changing Places; – Alias; Fox Stinking the Badger Out of His Nest (Plate 4).²⁰ Fox stands in the centre of the print, this time as a fully grown fox. Under him is an open money bag, labelled ‘Faro Bank’, spilling money onto the ground. There are two playing cards next to it, three in front of Fox and one under his front right paw. The cards again refer to his gambling addiction as does the money bag, which also refers to the Faro Bank that Fox established at Brooks’s along with his brother-in-law, Richard Fitzpatrick, with the financial aid of Brooks himself, in order to combat their indebtedness.²¹ To the left of him is the running figure of Lord North, depicted as a badger, a compass on his head bearing the word ‘north’ along the length of his snout and a blue garter ribbon tied around his body.

North is fleeing from the smell of Fox breaking wind in the midst of which Gillray has etched the word ‘eloquence’, a reference to the forcefulness and fluency of Fox’s continual attacks upon North in the House of Commons. Immediately behind North stands a broken signpost with a hand holding the top of a halberd on the end of the left-hand arm pointing the way to ‘Tower Hill’. North makes off in this direction, a reference to the speculation that Fox and other members of the opposition sought to have him impeached for his disastrous prosecution of the war against the American colonists. The right-hand arm of the signpost droops down and points towards a hole in the middle of the print. The inscription upon this arm reads ‘to the Treasury’, while the hole it points to is almost certainly the entrance to the set that North has just fled from. In the background, George III can be seen hunting. The fact that Fox is seen to be effectively forcing Lord North from office is significant, as it demonstrates his rise to political maturity and prominence, not only within the ranks of the Rockingham Connection²² but also in the House of Commons more generally. It should also be remembered that Fox twice served as a junior minister, once at the Admiralty and once at the Treasury in Lord North’s administration. There is clear evidence that Gillray saw in Fox a flawed personality, for example, with references to his heavy gambling debts.

This is highlighted not only by the references to his gambling addiction but also by the statue of the two-headed Roman God Janus behind him, the second face of whom is a fox, while his headdress, which could be meant for a dice box, has a pair of dice on top of it. In the middle of the print is a small barrel of ‘small beer’ and some bars of soap. The bundle is inscribed ‘Budget’ and is a clear reference to Lord North’s budget of 11 March in which he proposed to increase a number of taxes including those on soap, tea, beer and tobacco in order to fund the war in America.²³

Fox’s emergence as a fully fledged party leader is reflected in many of the attacks upon the Fox–North Coalition. Strikingly, the coalition (contemporaneously christened the Fox–North Coalition) derived its name from the secretaries of state rather, as had hitherto been the custom, from that of the First Lord of the Treasury, who in this instance was the third Duke of Portland.²⁴ The Opposition Whigs held a staunch belief that the principal office of state should be filled by a member of the first rank of society. Accordingly, they required an aristocrat to be their nominal leader should their de facto leader be a member of the House of Commons. One print that highlights Fox’s position as the effective leader of the old Rockingham Connection was Shelb-n Badgered and Foxed.²⁵ In this print, one can clearly see Lord North, once again depicted as a badger, wearing a garter ribbon, uniting with Fox, depicted as an adult fox, attacking the incumbent First Lord of the Treasury, Lord Shelburne, and his plans for peace at the end of the American War of Independence.

Lord Shelburne can be seen seated in the middle of the print holding a paper ‘Preliminaries’. On his left, Lord North bites the tail of his jacket, while on his right Fox is urinating and defecating against his left leg, clawing at his right with his left front paw and biting the paper he is holding. It is apparent, therefore, that Fox was viewed by the artist as the senior partner in the coalition, in spite of his youth and lack of experience when compared with his coalition partner.

The depiction of both Lord North and Fox is reminiscent of Changing Places and demonstrates an attempt by the artist to arrive at a consistent image for Fox and North, which would have made them more recognizable. In the background, behind Lord North, stands some gallows with Britannia pointing towards it saying ‘impeach’, a reference to the fact that it was anticipated that Lord North would have been impeached by Fox over his American policies had he not joined him. On the left of the print in the background stands a folly in which a statue of Lord Shelburne (depicted for a second time) stands on a plinth holding two documents, one of which is inscribed ‘Preliminaries’. A coronet sits on top of the folly, above which is inscribed ‘the idol of the Lords’ while the roof of the folly is inscribed ‘Corruption’. Three peers can be seen kneeling round the base of the statue of Shelburne. The print attacks not only Lord Shelburne’s policy of pursuing peace with the American colonists but also the coming together of Charles James Fox and Lord North in opposition to Shelburne’s administration. Such formal unified opposition to an administration was alien to the eighteenth-century House of Commons. That said, there was strong opposition to all governments in the early part of the century (1700–15) as well as to Walpole during the 1720s and 1730s, but this opposition was divided between the Tory opposition and Opposition Whigs and the two were not always united. The inscription under the print, however, praises the actions of honourable and right honourable members of the House of Commons who had voted in favour of an address. The Peace Preliminaries had been rejected by the House of Commons on 17 February 1783; however, an address to the King on the Preliminary articles was also debated in the House of Lords and House of Commons on 17 February and it is presumably to these addresses that the print refers.²⁶

It might not have been entirely coincidental that after the death of his parents and brother in 1774, Fox’s image in caricature began to evolve, taking on human form, with either a Fox’s head, brush or both. Later in his career, however, artists would return to portraying Fox as a fox. A late example of this is Charles Williams’s The Lucky Hit or The Crafty Reynard – Once More at Large,²⁷ published after the d...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Dedication Page
• Contents 
• List of Plates
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• 1. Stock Images
• 2. The Rivalry Begins
• 3. 1784 Election and Westminster Scrutiny
• 4. Pitt the Younger’s First Administration
• 5. Divisions Emerge
• 6. Reform, Abolition and Legacy: The Final Salvo
• Conclusion
• Notes
• Select Bibliography
• Index
• Imprint