Episode 29 - The Sinning Part

Your Most Obedient & Humble Servant
Episode 29 - “The Sinning Part”
Published on February 2, 2022

Note: This transcript was generated by Otter.ai with light human correction

Kathryn Gehred 

Hello and welcome to Your Most Obedient and Humble Servant. This is the Women's History podcast where we feature eighteenth and early nineteenth century women's letters that don't get as much attention as we think they should. I am your host, Katherine Gehred. Welcome to week three of my multi part series on Martha Washington's in-laws. In our last episode, we discussed William Byrd II, and a lot of fart jokes, frankly. This week, we're going to discuss the death of Daniel Parke. So that is Martha Washington's first husband's grandfather, we have talked about Parke in our very first episode, he was something of a slashing blade of a gentleman, and where we left off with him it was 1706 he had been granted the governorship of Antigua in the Leeward Islands. By all accounts, this was supposed to be a comfy post, it was supposed to make them a lot of money, it was fairly prestigious, the fact that he had this post and also presumably loved his daughters was why his daughters were able to attract such well to do husbands. This episode, we're going to find out what happened in the Leeward Islands. The document that I'm going to read for this episode is not actually a letter, it's a newspaper article, but the article does include the full text of a letter from the Duke of Marlborough to the Duchess of Marlborough. So, if you're really hankering for some women's correspondents, we've got you covered, and heads up before I read this, this article includes descriptions of violence that might be particularly jarring for people with penises, so heads up. T

"The political state of Great Britain being an impartial account of the most material occurrences ecclesiastical, civil and military in a monthly letter to a friend in Holland. January 1710 through 1711. The tragical end of Colonel Parke, Governor of the Leeward Islands. A merchant of this city received the news of the most tragical end of Colonel Daniel Parke, Governor of the Leeward Islands, concerning whom I have procured the following account. He was the son of a tobacco planter in Virginia, who when he was but 15 married him to a great fortune in that country. Though about 10 years older, however, he had two daughters by his wife, but having taken a disgust to her by that time, he had reached five and 20 He left her in Virginia, came over to England and falling in love with the wife of a gentleman of the lifeguards got her from her husband, and entertained her as his mistress. He afterwards took her along with him to Virginia, where having stayed two or three years to settle his affairs, he came back to England with his mistress still leaving his wife behind him. Upon his return hinter, he drove the tobacco trade having ships of his own for that purpose, the taking of one of which was the occasion of the condemnation of 24 Pirates 13 of whom were executed, and the rest pardoned having bought in a state of about five or 600 pounds a year, near Whitchurch and Hampshire, he stood for Parliament man of that corporation and for a good sum of money carried the election. But a petition being put up in the notorious bribery proved upon him, he was expelled the House and ordered to be prosecuted. However, he was protected by the Earl of P[emborke], his friend, who warded off the prosecution. Sometime after he went over to Flanders, made a campaign as a volunteer, and having been recommended to the Duke of Marlborough attended his grace in the quality of one of his aides to camp in the ever famous campaign of Germany in the year 1704. But, upon a quarrel with the Colonel in the Queen's guards, he thought fit to quit the service, and so took leave of his grace a day or two before the Battle of Blenheim yet continued at the camp till it was fought by reason there was a very probable expectation of a sudden action, upon the very nick of time when victory began to declare for the allies, he told my Lord Duke he was just upon his departure for England, and humbly desired His Grace to favor him with a line or two to acquaint the queen with that glorious action. His request was readily granted, and there upon His grace rode on horseback with a leaden pencil the following note to his Duchess. 

'August 13 1704. I have not time to say more than to beg of you to present my duty to the Queen, and to let her Majesty know that her army has had a glorious victory. Monsignor Tillard, and two other generals are in my coach, and I'm following the rest. The bearer, my aide de camp, Colonel Parke, will give her majesty and account of what has passed. I shall do it in a day or two more at large Marlborough. With this note, the colonel rode away post but had the prudence to take in his way several courts of Germany where he received considerable presents such as large gold medals and chains and having with great diligence reached for the brill hired a fisher boat to carry him over to England, so that he had the happiness to be the first that brought the queen that joyful news, being introduced by the Duchess of Marlborough and was by Her Majesty presented with 1000 Guineas and her picture set in gold. From this time, the colonel was very assiduous at court, and the government of the Leeward Islands being vacant by the death of Sir William Matthews, he was preferred to it by the interest of the Duke of Marlborough, who was ever very kind and generous to those about him. He continued in England about a year after his advancement to that post, and having put to see in April 1706, touched at the Isle of Madras, where he was nobly received and entertained both by the governor and all the superiors of the monasteries. And tis remarkable that several of the Franciscan monks paid so great a veneration to the Queen's picture which the colonel always carried hanging in his waistcoat that they kneel down before it and kissed it. From Madras, the criminal proceeded on his voyage to his government, where the inhabitants soon found a vast difference between their late and present governor. For Sir William Matthews, being a person of an easy temper good morals and integrity, amicably composed such differences as arose among the inhabitants of the Leeward Islands and contented himself with the just income and emoluments of his place, which, however, were much increased to him by the voluntary gifts of the rich planters who loved and respected him as their common father. On the contrary, Colonel Parke being of a proud, surly, imperious and rapacious nature, and ill morals fomented divisions by which he thought he might be a gainer, arbitrarily confiscated the goods and slaves of several inhabitants, and committed other excesses to gratify his voluptuousness, which, in a short time, drew upon him the general hatred of the people under him. The council and assembly of Antigua endeavored to reclaim him by a wholesome advice and humble representations, but these proving ineffectual they sent hither their complaints about two years ago. The Earl of Sunderland, then Secretary of State having laid the matter before the Queen and council, Her Majesty ordered him to be recalled, but he refused to comply either with a queen's command or the repeated desires of the inhabitants of those islands, saying he would never part with his commission, but with his life. Here upon the principle planters encouraged by Mr. Peejoe, Mr. Jarvis, Mr. Turton and Mr. Young resolved to rid themselves of their petty tyrant, of which Colonel Parke having either an information or suspicion and being under a just apprehension of being sacrificed, settled his worldly affairs received the sacrament and tripled his ordinary guard. Not withstanding the this precaution on the ninth of December 1710. The inhabitants of Antigua rose by common consent came in all well armed and dividing themselves into two parties under the command of Captain Peejoe and Captain Painter marched to the Colonel's house, threatening to kill him unless he would immediately surrender his commission, according to the Queen's command. The Colonel refusing to comply, they attacked and forced his guard entered his house, broke open his chamber door and shot him, after which they broke his backbone, dragged him by the heels down the stairs shot him again in several places, and some whose marriage bed tis thought he had defiled revenge themselves on the sinning parts, which they cut off and exposed. The criminals guards having made great resistance, about 30 men were killed and as many wounded on both sides, and among the first Captain Peejoe, one of the leaders of the inhabitants was shot by Captain Aon, who stood by Colonel Parke. It is to be wished that the tragical end of this gentleman may be a warning to all governors of our American plantations, not to abuse the large power with which they are entrusted, but rather to follow the example of Sir Will Matthews, his predecessor, whose name and memory are still reverenced by the inhabitants of the Leeward Islands. About the beginning of April, the Queen appointed Walter Douglas, Esquire, to succeed criminal Parke in that government.'"   

So, yeah, when I found this document, I was thrilled. I had been trying to find out what was going on with Martha Washington and her ancestry, and I saw something about Daniel Parke and I kept seeing these sort of little short mentions of Daniel Parke is something of a cad. Basically, I found a reference to Daniel Park, and it was just your average encyclopedia entry trying to be very dry trying to be very balanced, and then right at the end, it said he was murdered by a mob in the Leeward Islands, which, to me, I first thought, oh, is this a slave uprising, and then I saw he was killed by the planters, which then led me down this rabbit hole, which led me to find this article and basically lose my mind. I was like running around the office trying to tell it to people. When I got to the part about them cutting off the sinning part, I took a screenshot and I sent it to my husband like, oh my gosh, but I forgot that my husband is the historian, and I'm used to reading documents that have the long "s." So it looks like an "f." So my husband responded like, the "finning" part. Did he have fins? What are you talking about? But yes, this is just such an incredibly juicy article, and it was just so satisfying to read that I just got a huge kick out of it. Having found this article I was, I really wanted to believe everything that was written in here because it's so juicy, and fascinating, and interesting, but we have to talk for a minute about primary sources. It's really tempting to take this article at face value. It covers a lot of facts, it backs up a lot of things we know about Daniel Parke, a lot of times you find something you're like, "Oh, this is some this is from 1710." This is this is a primary source, this must be correct. But that's not necessarily true. Just because something was written contemporaneously to an event doesn't make it a perfect primary source. This was actually published in a political pamphlet called "The Political State of Great Britain," which was written, edited, and published by a man named Abel Boyer. Boyer was an English author, he was a historian, he was a journalist, and a propagandist. Interesting sidenote, the time this pamphlet was published, he was in a print war with Jonathan Swift, the guy who wrote Gulliver's Travels, and a modest proposal, so those two hated each other and Swift had actually charged him with seditious libel at the time this came out. So, I am not an expert on this period of politics. I am sure there's somebody out there who could go into wonderful detail about all of this. But what I can say is that Boyer was a Whig, and his pamphlet, "The Political State of Great Britain," it was written sort of as a propaganda for the Whigs, that doesn't mean that he's completely lying. That doesn't mean this is completely fake news, just that he has a point that he is trying to make. Now, from what we know, from corroborating sources, Daniel Parke was kind of a jerk, you can see that from the treatment of his wife, you can see that from the consistency with which Daniel Parke is sort of run out of positions of power is enough to make the argument that this was a difficult person to deal with. But, if you look at the article itself, he's trying to make a point about government. He's writing during the Enlightenment at a time period where the idea that you only governed by the consent of the governed is something that is beginning to appear in the public consciousness. He's spinning facts that he doesn't 100% have assured in order to kind of make this argument. There's a section in the story which talks about Daniel Parke, defiling some marriage beds. This is one of those things that is very difficult to backup, certainly something that you could use to get people's ire up in a propaganda pamphlet, and most of the time, it would be something that was like, well, he was accused of this, but there's nothing we can do to prove it. There is more corroborating evidence on this though, because fascinatingly, Daniel Parke sort of backs it up in his will, he had a very unusual will, which he did write up shortly before his death. So in his actual will, he wrote that

"All the estate in these islands both lands, houses, negros, debts, etc. to Thomas Long esquire and Mr. Caesar Rodney, for use of Mrs. Lucy Chester, being the daughter of Mrs. Catherine Chester, though she has not yet christened, if said youngest daughter of the said Mrs. Catherine Chester lives to marry and have children, then her eldest son and heirs made provided he calls himself by the name of Parke, and said youngest daughter of Mrs. Catherine Chester, to alter her name and call herself Parke and my use of coat of arms, etc, which is that if my family of the county of Essex, but if she refuse to my godson, Julius Caesar Parke, then to heirs of my daughter, Frances Custis, then if my daughter, Lucy Byrd, always to call themselves Parke, etc."

Now, this requires a little bit of translating. I have spent a lot of time poring over this will, but what he's essentially saying is that he is leaving all of this valuable estate that he has in Antigua, to the youngest daughter of a woman named Mrs. Catherine Chester. Maybe Mrs. Catherine Chester is a widow. But regardless of whether she's married and having this child, or not, this is an illegitimate child because he is married to a woman in Virginia. So, for him to basically say, this youngest daughter of this woman is getting all of my valuable property, and then to really dig in that this is his child without saying this is my daughter by making her change her last name to Parke, and then even when she marries, her husband has to take the last name Parke, so if they don't take the last name Parke, they don't get any of this valuable property. So if she refuses at this point, she's still young, she hasn't even been christened yet. So, this is a baby that he's leaving all of his property to. If she refuses, then it all goes to his other illegitimate child, Julius Caesar Parke, and if he passes away or he refuses, then finally, that profitable estate in the Leeward Islands will go to his two legitimate daughters in Virginia, Francis Custis, and Lucy Byrd and their heir, and then he still adds it something to call themselves Parke. So it's it's not clear whether he's expecting them to change their names to park as well, but he definitely is very interested in making sure that the name Parke lives on. And those of you are familiar with Martha Washington's kids and grandkids may notice there's Eleanor Parke Custis, Elizabeth Parke Custis, they're all Parkes. So, even for the time, this is a buck wild will. This is acknowledging an illegitimate child and then legally making it so that all of his money goes to them. And, now even again, maybe this wasn't that weird. Maybe this was something that happened all the time. It's 1710. I don't know what people were like back then. We have the responses from one of the London merchants writing about this will to John Custis. And he writes,

"But what shall we say to such a man who would make his bastard children so easy to have all that he had mulked together and was ready money and tie all of his debts and legacies upon his estate in England and Virginia."

So, even people at the time, this was a crazy situation. So now we have a situation where William Byrd and John Custis have married women with the expectation of a handsome dowry. They didn't go in this for love, they wanted to get all of Daniel Parkes money, and instead, their father in law is killed. And they are loaded with debt, and barred from any of the profit of property in the islands that they were basically marrying these women for. And these marriages that they married into for money, are not the happiest of marriages, we've covered Byrds.

But next time on Martha Washington's in-laws, we're finally going to get to Martha Washington's father-in-law, John Custis IV, and we're going to talk about how that marriage turned out and what effect that has on Martha Washington's prospects.

Thank you very much for listening. I will have links to some of the documents, the documents that I'm able to share in the show notes. And until next time, I am as ever, your most obedient and humble servant. Thank you very much.