Antoine Hamilton

Anthony Hamilton PC (Ire) (c. 1645 – 1719), also known as Antoine and comte d'Hamilton, was a soldier and a writer. As a Catholic of Irish and Scottish ancestry, his parents brought him to France in 1651 when Cromwell's army overran Ireland.

At the Restoration the family moved to England and lived at Whitehall. When Catholics were excluded from the army, Anthony followed his brother George into French service and fought in the Franco-Dutch War (1672–1678). He was wounded in the Battle of Entzheim. After the accession of the Catholic James II in 1685, he joined the Irish Army and fought for the Jacobites in the Williamite War (1689–1691). He saw action in the battles of Newtownbutler and the Boyne. The defeat led him to his last French exile.

In France Hamilton lived at the exile court at Saint-Germain-en-Laye where he became a courtier, poet, and writer. He chose French as his language and adopted a light and elegant style, seeking to amuse and entertain his reader. He wrote the Mémoires du Comte de Grammont, which focuses on the time his brother-in-law Philibert de Gramont spent at the court of Charles II. These memoirs are a classic of French literature and a source for the history of the Stuart Restoration. Hamilton also wrote many letters, poems, and five tales.

Birth and origins
Anthony was born in 1644 or 1645 in Ireland, probably at Nenagh, County Tipperary. He was the third son of Sir George Hamilton and his wife Mary Butler.

His father was Scottish, the fourth son of James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Abercorn. He supported the lord lieutenant of Ireland, James Butler, Marquess of Ormond, during the Irish Confederate Wars and the Cromwellian conquest and called himself a baronet.

Anthony's mother was half Irish and half English, the third daughter of Thomas Butler, Viscount Thurles, and his English Catholic wife Elizabeth Poyntz. Thurles (courtesy title) predeceased his father, Walter Butler, 11th Earl of Ormond, and never succeeded to the earldom. The Butlers were Old English. She was a sister of James Butler, making Anthony's father a brother-in-law of the lord lieutenant.

Anthony's father has been confused with his granduncle George Hamilton of Greenlaw and Roscrea. Both are called George and both married a Mary Butler. In 1640 Ormond had granted Anthony's father Nenagh for 31 years. Anthony was probably born there. Hamilton's parents had married in 1635.

Anthony was one of nine siblings. They are listed in his father's article, but also see James, George, Elizabeth, Richard, and John individually. Anthony's parents were both Catholic, and so was he.

Irish childhood
Hamilton was born during the Irish Confederate War. His father, despite being Catholic, sided with the lord lieutenant against the Confederates. The war had been halted by a truce in 1643. An attempted peace failed in March 1646. After a last extension the truce expired on 1 May. The newborn Anthony, his mother, and his siblings were brought to Dublin in May for their security.

In 1647 Ormond abandoned Dublin to the parliamentarians and left for England. Anthony, his mother, and siblings seem to have stayed behind in Ireland. Ormond together with Anthony's father returned to Ireland in 1648. In 1649, during the Cromwellian conquest, Ormond made Anthony's father receiver-general of the revenues as well as governor of Nenagh Castle, which he in vain tried to defend against Henry Ireton in November 1650.

First exile
Having lost the leadership to the Catholic clergy, Ormond left for France in December 1650. Hamilton's father followed with his family in spring 1651. Anthony was about seven. They were accommodated by Anthony's aunt Elizabeth Preston, the Marchioness of Ormond, near Caen, Normandy. His father and his elder brothers, James and George, served Charles II in various functions. Lady Ormond left for England in August 1652, whereas Anthony's mother moved to Paris, where she lodged in the Convent of the Feuillantines. The Hamilton brothers frequented Charles II's and his mother's, Henrietta Maria, exile court at the Louvre.

Restoration
In May 1660 the Restoration brought Charles II on the English throne. Hamilton's father and his elder brothers moved to Whitehall, where the court was. Charles II restored Donalong, Ulster, to Hamilton's father. About that year Charles allegedly created Hamilton's father baronet of Donalong and Nenagh.

Hamilton's elder brothers, James and George, became courtiers at Whitehall. The King arranged a Protestant marriage for James. Early in 1661 Hamilton's father also brought his wife and younger children to London, where they lived all together in a house near Whitehall.

In January 1663, at the court, the Hamilton brothers met Philibert, chevalier de Gramont, who had been exiled by Louis XIV for courting a maid of honour, on whom he had set his eyes.

Gramont integrated easily as French was spoken at the court. Hamilton befriended Gramont, who soon became part of the inner circle. Gramont courted Hamilton's sister Elizabeth.

An anecdote tells how George and Anthony intercepted Gramont at Dover, asking him whether he had not forgotten something in London. He replied "Pardonnez-moi, messieurs, j'ai oublié d'épouser votre sœur." (Forgive me, Sirs, I have forgotten to marry your sister). This episode might have happened in autumn 1663 when Gramont's sister Susanne-Charlotte told him in error that he could return to France. He went but found that he was not welcome. However, perhaps Gramont attempted to leave Elizabeth later, in December just before he announced his intention to marry her.

Gramont married Elizabeth in London, either in December 1663 or early in 1664. In March 1664, Louis XIV, having heard of Gramont's marriage, allowed him to return.

Second exile
In 1667 the King dismissed from his Life Guards the Catholics who refused to take the Oath of Supremacy. Among them was Anthony's brother George, who in 1668 went to France. Anthony probably accompanied him. In 1671 George recruited a regiment in Ireland for French service. Hamilton seems to have accompanied him and in May helped his cousin John Butler to extinguish a fire in Dublin Castle. Hamilton then took service in his brother's regiment, fighting in the Franco-Dutch War (1672–1678). George and Anthony were later joined by their younger brother Richard. In 1672 the regiment garrisoned Liège and then occupied Utrecht in June. In 1673 Hamilton, by now a Captain, was in Limerick recruiting for the regiment.

[[File:Anthony Hamilton from NPG color lowres.jpg|thumb|alt=A painted bust-length portrait of Anthony Hamilton showing a young man wearing a long and high wig, clad in armour covering his breast and arms|left|During his second French exile

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Anthony probably fought together with George under Turenne against Imperial troops in the Battle of Sinsheim in June 1674, and did surely so at Entzheim in October, where both were wounded. In the winter 1674–5 Anthony, George, and Richard travelled to England from where George returned to France while Anthony and Richard continued to Ireland to recruit. French ships picked up the recruits at Kinsale in April 1675, after a missed appointment at Dingle in March. Hamilton's Irish voyage caused him to miss Turenne's winter campaign in which Turenne marched south and surprised the Germans in upper Alsace, beating them at Turckheim.

In July 1675 Hamilton's regiment was at Sasbach, where George witnessed Turenne's death. At the retreat from Sasbach in August, the regiment suffered 450 casualties in the rearguard actions of the Battle of Altenheim. Louis XIV called in Condé, who stopped the German advance but retired at the end of the campaign. In the winter 1675–6 George, accompanied by either Anthony or Richard, again went recruiting and visited Lady Arran, wife of Richard Butler, 1st Earl of Arran, in January 1676. She called them "ye monsieurs". The regiment quartered that winter in Toul.

Luxembourg commanded on the Rhine in the campaign of 1676. In June George was killed in a rearguard action at the Zaberner Steige (Col de Saverne), where Imperial troops under the Duke of Lorraine pursued the French who were retreating eastward to Zabern (Saverne) in lower Alsace. Reputedly, Hamilton succeeded his brother as comte d'Hamilton, but that title may never have existed. Thomas Dongan, who had been lieutenant-colonel, was preferred over Hamilton as the new colonel of what had been Hamilton's regiment. Louis XIV told Anthony that he had no regiment for him. Anthony left while Richard became lieutenant-colonel.

The Franco-Dutch war ended with the Treaties of Nijmegen, concluded between August 1678 and October 1679. The regiment was disbanded in December, anticipating the signature in February 1679 of the peace between France and the Emperor.

Ireland
Hamilton had returned to Ireland by 1677. His father died in 1679. His nephew James, the future 6th Earl of Abercorn, then aged 17 or 18, inherited the family's lands.



Hamilton may have visited France and have been the "comte d'Hamilton" who in January 1681 played a zephyr in the performance of Quinault's ballet Triomphe de l'Amour, to music by Lully, at the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye before Louis XIV. However, possibly, this was Richard. In summer 1681 Anthony lived in Dublin.

In February 1685 the Catholic James II acceded to the English throne. In April James sent Richard Talbot to Ireland to purge the Irish Army of "Cromwellians". Talbot replaced Protestants with Catholics, recruiting among others Anthony and his younger brothers Richard and John. Anthony was appointed lieutenant-colonel of Sir Thomas Newcomen's infantry regiment. In June James created Talbot earl of Tyrconnell. In August Hamilton was also made governor of Limerick, where his company of Newcomen's regiment was garrisoned, replacing Sir William King, a Protestant. Hamilton attended Mass in public. In October 1685 the king appointed Henry Hyde, 2nd Earl of Clarendon, a Protestant, lord lieutenant of Ireland. Clarendon arrived in January 1686. He considered Hamilton a moderate Catholic and possible ally. Clarendon praised Hamilton, saying that he understood the regiment better than its colonel. Clarendon also stated that Hamilton objected to replacing good Protestant officers with mediocre Catholic ones. Near the end of 1686, Hamilton became a member of the Irish privy council. In 1687 he was promoted colonel. In 1688 Hamilton was colonel of a regiment of foot.

At the eve of the Glorious Revolution in September 1688, James asked Tyrconnell to send four Irish regiments to England. Hamilton's was among them. The troops landed on the English west coast in October and marched across the midlands to southern England. Hamilton's regiment was stationed in Portsmouth, where the Duke of Berwick was governor. The regiment surrendered in Portsmouth on 20 December. On the 23 James II embarked for France. It seems that Hamilton followed him. Anthony and John returned with James II to Ireland in 1689. Richard was already there.

In 1689 during the Williamite War, Tyrconnell promoted Hamilton major-general and gave him the command of the dragoons of an army under Justin McCarthy, Viscount Mountcashel, that he sent north to Belturbet, County Cavan, to fight the rebels of Enniskillen. In the battle of Newtownbutler, in July, Hamilton commanded the horse. The outcome would show that he was "better with his pen than with his sword". Mountcashel asked him to pursue retreating enemy troops, but the enemy led him into a trap and Hamilton's dragoons were routed. Hamilton was wounded in the leg at the beginning of the action and fled the scene. With Captain Peter Lavallin of Carroll's dragoons he was court martialled by Rosen, the highest-ranking French general. Given his family's influence, Hamilton was acquitted, but Lavallin was shot. This affair destroyed Hamilton's reputation as a soldier. When in spring 1690 the Irish Brigade was formed, the French wanted neither Richard nor Anthony among its officers.

Anthony, as well as his brothers Richard and John, fought at the Battle of the Boyne in July 1690. Anthony rode in the cavalry charges. Afterwards he fought at the first Siege of Limerick. When William abandoned his siege end of August, Tyrconnell sent Hamilton to France to report the deliverance. He may not have returned. His presence at the Battle of Aughrim in 1691 is disputed, but his brother John was fatally wounded there.

Final exile, death, and timeline
Hamilton lived the last thirty years of his life at the exile court at the Château-Vieux of Saint-Germain-en-Laye. He held no office, but James II granted him a generous pension. Hamilton was also given an apartment in the castle. He was appreciated as an ornament of that court.

At Saint-Germain Hamilton got acquainted with the Bulkeley sisters, especially Anne and Henrietta. Their father, Henry, master of the household to Charles II at Whitehall and to James at Saint-Germain, died in 1698. Their mother, Sophia, was a sister of the Belle Stuart. Berwick married Anne in 1700 at Saint-Germain, as his second wife. Hamilton affectionately called her "Nanette". He was in love with Henrietta or at least wrote her admirative letters. She was about 30 years younger than him and had no dowry. Hamilton thought his pension insufficient to support a family.

About 1696 Hamilton wrote his tale Zénéyde, in which he denounces the bigotry of James's last years. Early in 1701 Hamilton accompanied Berwick to Rome to ask the new pope, Clement XI, for help. In March James suffered a stroke. Berwick was called for and arrived back in Saint-Germain in April. In September James II died at the Château-Vieux of Saint-Germain. Hamilton wrote a poem Sur l'agonie du feu roi d'Angleterre [On the Agony of the Late King of England]. His successor, James III, was 13. The court became gayer and Hamilton like it better.

In 1703 Louis XIV gave Hamilton's sister Elizabeth a house at Versailles, where Hamilton often visited. In 1704 Hamilton went to see Gramont at Séméac in Gascogne, where he decided to write his friend's memoirs. Hamilton was part of the circle around the Duchess of Maine, where he was known as "Horace d'Albion". It was partly at her seat at Sceaux that he wrote the Mémoires. In 1705 he attended the feast that Nicolas de Malézieu and the duchess gave at Châtenay.

In 1707 Gramont died in Paris. Hamilton was said to have sailed to Scotland in the attempted invasion of 1708, but only Richard went. In June Hamilton's sister Elizabeth died in Paris.

In 1712 James III left Saint-Germain as France was about to drop the Jacobites, a concession they made in 1713 at the Peace of Utrecht. Richard followed James III to Bar-le-Duc in Lorraine, whereas Anthony stayed behind at Saint-Germain and was allowed to keep his apartment. The dowager queen, Mary of Modena, also stayed. Hamilton met the young Voltaire at the suppers of the Temple Society shortly before 1715. Hamilton never married and died at Saint-Germain-en-Laye on 20 April 1719. He was buried on the 21 in the parish church. A distant cousin, John Nugent, equerry to James III, attended the funeral.

Works
Hamilton came from an English-speaking family but chose to write in French. Despite his origins he excelled in that light and elegant badinage considered typically French.

Hamilton's works were well known in the 18th century. Voltaire and La Harpe mention him honourably. Today, he is mainly known for a single book: the Mémoires de la vie du comte de Grammont, the only work published while he was alive. Hamilton also wrote at least five tales and many poems, songs, epistles, and letters (ordered by year of publication):


 * 1713 Mémoires de la vie du comte de Grammont [Memoirs of the Life of Count Grammont] (Cologne: Pierre Marteau), read online in French or English
 * 1730 Le Bélier [The Ram] (Paris: Josse), read online in French or English
 * 1730 Histoire de Fleur d'Epine [Thornflower Story] (Paris: Josse), read online in French or English
 * 1730 Les quatre Facardins [The Four Facardins] (Paris: Josse), read online in French or English
 * 1731 in Œuvres mêlées en prose et en vers [Miscellaneous works in prose and verse] (Paris: Josse):
 * De l'usage de la vie dans la vieillesse [On the Use of Life in Old Age], p. 63 of Poésies [Poems], read online
 * Sur l'agonie du feu roi d'Angleterre [On the Agony of the Late King of England], p. 66 of Poésies [Poems], read online
 * Epistle à monsieur le comte de Grammont [Epistle to Count Gramont], p. 1 of Epitres et lettres, read online in French or English
 * Zénéyde, read online in French or English
 * 1776 L'Enchanteur Faustus [The Enchanter Faustus], read online in French or English

Gramont's memoirs
The Mémoires de la vie du comte de Grammont were originally planned to cover Gramont's entire life but were cut short so that they end with his marriage. Hamilton pretended the memoirs were dictated to him by Gramont. He started work in 1704 and completed them in 1710. For Gramont's life up to his arrival in London, Gramont was Hamilton's only source. He may have jotted this part down more or less how Gramont told it. The second, "English", part seems to be Hamilton's work. The subtitle of the first edition "L'histore amoureuse de la cour d'Angleterre" (lovelife of the English court) pertains to this part, for which Hamilton had Gramont, who died in 1707, and Elizabeth, who died in 1708, as witnesses. Hamilton's brothers James and George, important characters of the second part, had died in 1673 and 1676 respectively.



The book was a bestseller and remains a classic of French literature. It is still admired for its graceful and elegant language. The memoirs were written to amuse and entertain and sometimes depart from the correct chronological order. The book situates itself at the cross-roads between memoirs, biography, and fiction.

The memoirs were first circulated in manuscript and then published anonymously in 1713, without the author's consent. The imprint says: Cologne by Pierre Marteau, a pseudonym often used for disreputable books. It might have been published in Holland, or at Rouen. In 1817 the Catholic Church inscribed the book on the Index Librorum Prohibitorum. Early French editions often deformed the English names. Horace Walpole, a great admirer, corrected them in his Strawberry Hill edition of 1772.

The first English translation, by Abel Boyer, had followed in hot pursuit in 1714. Boyer, fearing an uproar, hid the persons' identities behind their initials. Many new or amended translations were published in due course. W. Maddison published one in 1793. Walter Scott amended an English translation in 1809 and again in 1811. Henry Vizetelly published another revised translation in 1889. Peter Quennell retranslated the memoirs in 1930 (read online).

Tales
Hamilton's tales (contes) were inspired by the fairy tales that became popular in France in the 1690s and by the Arabian Nights, published between 1704 and 1708 by Antoine Galland. Hamilton's tales are their parodies or fan fiction. The characters' adventures are often extravagant. Hamilton likes to use multiple narrators, who may tell the same events from different points of view.

His tales influenced Voltaire and Crébillon the younger in the 18th century. The tale Fleur d'Epine has been praised by La Harpe for its charming truths and its moral. Montégut called it "the most beautiful fairy tale written in France". George Saintsbury maintains that Hamilton's tales have more literary merit than his fanous memoirs.

Zénéyde (read online), written about 1696, starts as a letter to "Madame de P.", in which Hamilton criticises James II's exile court and then escapes into fiction by meeting a nymph at the Seine. The nymph, called Zénéyde, tells her life. Her father was the Roman emperor Maximus and her mother a daughter of the Frankish king Clodio. She was to marry Childeric but was caught by Genserich at Aquileia. At that point the nymph is overcome by emotion and a beautiful brunette takes over as story teller. The text stops here as Hamilton left Zénéyde incomplete.

Le Bélier (read online), written in 1705, gives an etymology for "Pontalie", the name his sister Elizabeth invented for Les Moulineaux, her house at Versailles. The story starts in verse and then continues in prose. A giant called Moulineaux has an ingenious ram. His neighbour, a druide, has a beautiful daughter called Alie. The giant wants to marry Alie, but she is in love with the prince of Noisy. Her father protects her by surrounding his castle with water. The ram builds a bridge across it. This is Alie's bridge, or Pont-Alie. After many detours full of comical and absurd inventions the ram, who is really the prince of Noisy, marries Alie. Voltaire praised the introduction in verse, and mentioned in 1729 that Josse was printing the Bélier. It was the first of Hamilton's tales to be published and must have been a success as Josse went on to publish two more of them and the first collection of his works, Œuvres mêlées en prose et en vers.

Fleur d'Épine (read online) shares the frame of Arabian Nights and starts with a dialogue between Scheherazade and her sister Dinarzade. Dinarzade tells the sultan a story with the condition that he must spare Scheherazade's life should he interrupt that story. The sultan agrees and Fleur d'epine is this story.



The story starts with the eyes of Luisante, the daughter of the caliph of Kashmir, that kill men and blind women. A prince calling himself "Tarare" contacts the sorceress Serena, who agrees to help but demands that he must free Fleur d'Epine, held by the witch Dentue. Tarare travels to Dentue's house. He meets Fleur d'Epine posing as a shepherd. He frees her from Dentue and they return to Kashmir. On the way he tells her how he and his brother Phenix went to seek adventures. Serena gives Tarare the remedy that cures Luisante's eyes. The caliph wants him to marry Luisante and fill his palace with baby Tarares. At the mention of "baby Tarares" the sultan interrupts Dinarzade and Scheherazade's life is safe. Dinarzade continues her story: Tarare marries Fleur d'Epine, whereas Phenix marries Luisante. Phenix then tells his adventures which overlap with those of his brother.

Les quatre Facardins (read online) tells the adventures of three men, all called Facardin: Facardin of Trebizond, the handsome Facardin, and the tall Facardin. Hamilton left the story incomplete and never mentions the fourth Facardin. Saintsbury considers it the best of Hamilton's tales. Facardin of Trebizond tells the story. He meets the handsome Facardin who tells his adventures on the Lions' Island and on Mount Atlas. He seeks adventures to become worthy of Mousseline. Facardin of Trebizond then meets Cristalline who is the lady of the rings from Arabian nights. She tells her life in which she was married to a genie but loved the tall Facardin. Facardin of Trebizond delivers Cristalline from the genie and they meet the tall Facardin. The story breaks off at that point.

L'Enchanteur Faustus (read online) tells how Faust conjures up Helen of Troy, Cleopatra, Fair Rosamond, and other beauties to appear before Queen Elizabeth of England. Contrary to Hamilton's other tales, this one is linear and easy to follow. Hamilton dedicated it to his niece Margaret, his brother John's daughter.

Hamilton's tales were circulated privately as manuscripts during his lifetime. The first three were published individually in Paris in 1730, ten years after the author's death. A collection of his works, Œuvres mêlées en prose et en vers, published in 1731, contains the unfinished Zénéyde. L'Enchanteur Faustus was published belatedly in 1776 but might have been written much earlier, probably even before the memoirs.

Other works
Hamilton also wrote songs and exchanged amusing verses with the Duke of Berwick. He helped his niece Claude Charlotte, Gramont's daughter, who had married Henry Stafford-Howard, 1st Earl of Stafford, in 1694, to carry on a witty correspondence with Lady Mary Wortley Montagu.