The Life and Adventures of William Cobbett. Richard Ingrams

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СКАЧАТЬ of receiving torrents of abuse from ‘one Cobbett, an English alien who then resided in Philadelphia’,⁹ and in October 1797 he issued a writ for libel. But if he was hoping thereby to silence his antagonist, he was unsuccessful. ‘The Doctor,’ Cobbett wrote, ‘finds his little reputation as a physician, in as dangerous a way as ever a poor yellow fever man was in, half an hour after he was called to his aid. We wanted no hints from Dr Rush. We know very well what we ought to do; and, if God grants us life we shall do it completely.’

      Cobbett accordingly redoubled his attacks on the doctor. Among other misdeeds, Rush, he claimed (7 October 1797), had ‘appointed two illiterate negro men and sent them into the alleys and bye places of the city, with orders to bleed and give his sweating purges, to all they should find sick, without regard to age, sex or constitution; and bloody and dirty work they have among the poor miserable creatures that fell in their way … I know several that he terrified into chilly fits, some into relapses and some into convulsions, by stopping them in the street and declaring they had the fever – You’ve got it! You’ve got it! was his usual salutation upon seeing anyone with a pale countenance.’

      Rush’s action against Cobbett for libel was set down for trial in December 1797. Realising that he had little chance of successfully defending the suit in Philadelphia, Cobbett had made an application to Chief Justice McKean to have the case transferred to the Federal Court – which, he claimed, as an alien, he was entitled to do by the American Constitution:

      It was towards the evening of the last day of the session when Mr Thomas [Cobbett’s lawyer], albeit unused to the modest mode, stole up gently from his seat, and in a faint and trembling voice, told the Bashaw [Pasha] McKean that he had a petition to present in behalf of William Cobbett. For some time he did not make himself heard. There was a great talking all round the bar; Levi, the lawyer was reading a long formal paper to Judges, and the judges were laughing over the chitchat of the day. Amidst the noisy mirth that surrounded him, there stood poor Thomas, with his papers in his hand, like a culprit at school just as the boys are breaking up. By and by, one of those pauses, which frequently occur in even the most numerous and vociferous assemblies, encouraged him to make a fresh attempt. ‘I present’ says he ‘may it please your honours, a petition in behalf of William Cobbett.’ The moment the sound of the word Cobbett struck the ear of McKean he turned towards the bar, and having learnt the subject of the petition, began to storm like a madman. A dead silence ensued. The little scrubby lawyers (with whom the courts of Pennsylvania are continually crowded) crouched from fear, just like a brood of poultry, when the kite is preparing to pounce in amongst them; whilst hapless Thomas, who stood up piping like a straggled chicken, seemed already to feel the talons of the judicial bird of prey. He proceeded, however, to read the petition, which being very short was got through with very little interruption, when he came to the words, ‘subject of his Britannic Majesty,’ McKean did, indeed grin most horribly, and I could very distinctly hear, ‘Insolent scoundrel!’ – ‘damned aristocrat’ – ‘damned Englishman!’ etc etc from the mouths of the sovereign people. But neither their execration, nor the savage looks that accompanied them, prevented me from fulfilling my purpose. I went up to the clerk of the court, took the book in my hand, and holding it up, that it might be visible to all parts of the hall, I swore, in a voice that everyone might hear, that I preserved my allegiance to my King; after which I put on my hat, and walked out of the Court followed by the admiration of the few and by the curses of the many.

      McKean, predictably, threw out the petition, and after many delays the case finally came in on 13 December 1799. By this time, anticipating certain defeat, Cobbett had left Philadelphia and was living in New York. The move was only partly dictated by prudence. The political mood had changed, the pro-French frenzy had subsided – Napoleon had taken charge in France – and as a result the circulation of Porcupine’s Gazette, which had relied so much on attacking the Jacobins, had declined. Cobbett’s intention, however, was to resume publication of the paper in New York, where he would be out of McKean’s jurisdiction. ‘Yesterday,’ he wrote to his friend Edward Thornton at the British Embassy (18 November 1799), ‘all my goods sailed for New York, so that they are no longer, I hope, within the grasp of the sovereign people of Pennsylvania. I have some few things left at my house in 2nd Street, which will there be sold by auction, under the direction of one of my friends: in the meantime I am preparing to follow the rest, and I propose to set out from here about this day week.’ Cobbett left town on 9 December, and four days later McKean brought on the Rush libel action before three of his old colleagues. The president was Justice Edward Shippen, a candidate for McKean’s former position of Chief Justice. At the end of the case, which lasted only two days, the jury awarded Rush damages of $5000, and four days later Justice Shippen was rewarded with the job.

      It was a shattering blow for Cobbett, who claimed that the damages amounted to more than the total of all those ever awarded by the Philadelphia court in libel actions. One of his lawyers, Edward Tilghman, advised him to flee the country immediately, but, very typically, Cobbett was determined to stand his ground. He wrote to Edward Thornton (25 December 1799):

      ‘No,’ said I to Tilghman, in answer to his advice for immediate flight. ‘No, Sir, the miscreants may, probably, rob me of all but my honour, but that, in these degenerate times, I cannot spare. To flee from a writ (however falsely and illegally obtained) is what I will never do; for though, generally speaking, to leave the United States at this time, would be little more disgraceful than it was for Lot to run from Sodom under a shower of fire and brimstone; yet with a writ at my heels, I will never go.’

      Nancy Cobbett was in full agreement:

      Though she feels as much as myself on these occasions, nothing humbles her; nothing sinks her spirits but personal danger to me or our children. The moment she heard Tilghman’s advice, she rejected it … she nobly advised me to stay, sell off my stock, pay the money, and go home with the trifle that may remain. It is the misfortune of most wives to be cunning on these occasions. ‘Ah, did I not tell you so!’ – Never did I hear a reproach of this kind from my wife. When times are smooth she will contradict and blame me often enough in all conscience; but when difficulties come on me, when danger approaches us, then all I say and do, and all I have said and done is right.¹⁰

      Cobbett had his revenge on Rush by publishing a new paper, running to five numbers in all, called the Rush-Light, which for the power of its invective outclassed anything he had so far done. Dubbing Rush variously ‘the noted bleeding physician of Philadelphia … the Philadelphia phlebotomist … the Pennsylvania Hippocrates’, he subjected the doctor, his character and his career to savage ridicule, seizing on all his more preposterous theories – his belief that Negroes were black because of leprosy and would turn white once the disease had been eradicated – or the fact that in the grounds of the Pennsylvania Hospital Rush had erected a kind of gallows ‘with a rope suspended from it … for the purpose of curing insanity by swinging’. He went on to demonstrate the absurdity of Rush’s claim that the yellow fever of 1793 constituted no more of a threat than measles or the common cold simply by producing the daily mortality figures following Rush’s pronouncement:

      Thus, you see, that though the Fever was, on the 12th September, reduced to a level with a common cold; though the lancet was continually unsheathed; though Rush and his subalterns were ready at every call, the deaths did actually increase; and, incredible as it may seem, this increase grew with that of the very practice which saved more than ninety-nine patients out of a hundred! Astonishing obstinacy! Perverse Philadelphians! Notwithstanding there was a man in your city who could have healed you at a touch, you continued to die! Notwithstanding the precious purges were advertised at every corner, and were brought to your doors and bedsides by Old Women and Negroes; notwithstanding life was offered on terms the most reasonable and accommodating, still you persisted in dying! Nor did barely dying content you. It was not enough for you to reject the means of prolonging your existence, but you must begin to drop off the faster from the moment that those means were presented to СКАЧАТЬ