Military Eloquence

Military Eloquence is one of a series of caricatured portraits (all listed as being published on January 6th, 1795) illustrating eight kinds of eloquence, and sometimes associated with particular, real-life individuals. For more about the series as a whole, see my Overview.

In this case, the print was likely intended as a portrait caricature of King George's second son, Prince Frederick, the Duke of York, who had been put in charge of the relatively small number of British troops initialy thought necessary for the war against the French.

Unlike the expressions quoted in Bar Eloquence or Pulpit Eloquence which could be put in the mouth of any lawyer prosecuting a case or any member of the clergy beginning a sermon, this decidedly un-military example of military eloquence, "You Lie by G__!" only makes sense if the speaker is the Duke of York.

Puffed up by some early successes in the Flanders campaign, the young Duke of York and his staff soon got the reputation of celebrating too early and too often, as in Gillray's Fatigues of the Campaign in Flanders ()May 20, 1793). And by 1795 when the full extent of the mismanagement of the Flanders campaign was evident, it was easy enough to blame the young Prince for what was clearly a group effort of incompetence on the part of Pitt, Dundas, and others in the Ministry.

The Duke, as seen here, vigorously denied all the charges, and he later contributed to a reorganization of the army that was overdue but effective.

Sources and Reading

• Commentary from the British Museum on Military Eloquence.
• "Samuel Collings," Wikipedia
• "Prince Frederick, Duke of York and Albany," Wikipedia
• "title," Wikipedia

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