The Duel: Castlereagh, Canning and Deadly Cabinet Rivalry (review)

On 21 September 1809, Foreign Secretary George Canning and Lord Castlereagh, Secretary of State for War and the Colonies, fought a duel. On the surface, this might not seem extraordinary; the infamous and deadly duel between Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr had taken place only five years earlier. But Britain was at war with Napoleon and in the middle of economic chaos. Whatever would possess two members of the government to engage in such cavalier behavior? Answering this question is the purpose of Giles Hunt's biographical and ideological study in political ambition and contrasting success in the age of high politics and war.

Organizing the book in chapters that contrast their early lives, education, and political careers, Hunt argues that Canning and Castlereagh came to serve His Majesty's government from two very different paths. On the one hand, Canning's father had been disowned for his choice in marriage, leaving the family bankrupt when he died during Canning's infancy. While his grandfather held estates in Northern Ireland, the young Canning relied upon his uncle and only upon his grandfather's death was his grandmother able to pay for his formal schooling at Eton. Robert Steward, later Lord Castlereagh, on the other hand, descended from an Ulster Scots plantation fortune and the commercial wealth of an Indian nabob. He was born into privilege and grew up at his grandfather's estate, Mount Stewart, experiencing the social and education expectations of his rank.

Canning landed a place at Christ Church at Oxford with the assistance of a family friend. Brought up as a Foxite Whig, he became "Pittized" (33); the new alliance brought him to the House of Commons for Newton, nominated by the Prime Minister, and soon allowed him to join the Foreign Office under William Grenville. Castlereagh also rejected family political connections to the Whigs. He went to Cambridge rather than Trinity College, Dublin, under the influence of his step-grandfather, Lord Camden. He launched his political career with the calculated choice to govern Ireland "by force" rather than "by reason" (32), openly opposing Henry Grattan and the Irish Parliament. By 1794, Castlereagh severed himself from Irish politics and embarked upon a political future in Westminster.

The drama, Hunt shows, started to manifest itself as early as 1801 when William Pitt resigned and was replaced by Henry Addington over the failure of Catholic Emancipation. When war resumed with France merely a year after the Peace of Amiens, an attempt to bring Pitt back into power divided political loyalties and Canning and Castlereagh assumed leadership roles in the cabinet. When Pitt died in January 1806 his government fell and both men were now in opposition to the Ministry of all the Talents. They should have found common ground, particularly after King George III dismissed the coalition government and asked the aging Duke of Portland to form a government. But others' ambitions were stirring up policy differences, generating criticism, and otherwise undermining one by evoking the name of the other. In the end, Canning was forced to resign and a humiliated Castlereagh challenged him to a gentlemen's duel.

Meeting at Putney Heath at five o'clock in the morning on 21 September, the standard gentlemen's resolution could have ended the conflict. Canning, however, did not fire in the air on the first shot, putting Castlereagh in the awkward position of restoring his damaged political reputation by showing "superiority not by trying to kill him, but by shooting him, literally and metaphorically, in the foot" (137). When Canning aimed for a second shot, Castlereagh shot Canning in the thigh, nearly hitting his femoral artery.

What did this all mean? Hunt argues that the duel impacted public opinion, personal reputation, and political legacies, even more so than the political backbiting and squabbling going on behind the scenes. Criticism of the two cabinet ministers dueling during a foreign war was nearly universal. Castlereagh panicked about Canning's...