Captain Mostyn is killed in a duel – 13 February 1784

Amongst the hundreds of officers who made it to post captain rank in the Georgian Navy were a handful of hotheads whose impulsive and injudicious characters propelled them onto the so-called ‘field of honour’ and an early grave. Included in this band, joining the likes of Lord Camelford, Hassard Stackpoole, Hon. John Tollemache, and Viscount Falkland, was Captain Robert Mostyn.

In the autumn of 1783, Mostyn had returned to England from the West Indies with the rank of post captain, having brought home the French prize Solitaire 64, which had been captured on the previous 6 December by the Ruby 64, Captain John Collins. A young man, believed to be about twenty-five years of age, Mostyn had been posted captain in November 1782, prior to going out to the West Indies. Whilst commissioning the Solitaire at Antigua, his ‘impetuous manners’ had been the cause of several incidents, and by all accounts, he was a troublesome character.

On Friday 6 February 1784, he arranged to dine with half a dozen friends and his brother at the New Exchange Coffee House in London, where he was not only a regular, but had occasionally taken up residence. Also present that day was a lone diner, Captain John Montague Clarke of the Africa Independent Regiment, who like Mostyn was an occasional resident; however, although he was known to the young naval officer, he did not keep his company. Clarke was waiting patiently for his dinner at a large table, known to the patrons as ‘the long table’, but in order to accommodate Mostyn’s party, the mistress of the house, Mrs. Townsend, requested that he remove to a smaller table, known as ‘the square table’. This he did with what would later be described as ‘great complacency’.

Not long after they had sat down at the long table, the atmosphere amongst Mostyn’s party began to deviate from the harmonious, for the captain’s brother had yet to appear, and although Mostyn had sent a waiter to find him, his wish that the meal be delayed was rejected by his friends. Jumping to his feet in what modern parlance might be termed a ‘hissy fit’, he then brusquely took a seat at the square table opposite Clarke. Shortly afterwards, another friend turned up with Mostyn’s brother, and the three of them were subsequently served their supper at the square table. Once he had finished dining, Mostyn sprung to his feet again and turned his residual ire upon the barmaid, castigating her as a ‘bitch’ amongst other offensive terms for having allowed ‘a fellow of whom he knew nothing’, namely Captain Clarke, ‘to intrude upon him and his company’. As an unwilling party to this outburst, the Army officer appeared hurt, but he refrained from taking the matter further.

Come the next evening, both Mostyn and Clarke were in the house when the former engaged a gentleman described in the Press as ‘a Jew’ and seller of satirical prints, to perform his renowned impressions of the public figures of the age, including the famous Whig politician and darling of the mob, Charles James Fox. Not everyone who was present approved of the fellow’s act however, some even declared it to be offensive, and the resulting commotion disturbed one of the patrons who was ill in bed. Her patience tested, Mrs Townsend asked Mostyn to dismiss the satirist, but the captain refused in objectionable terms, embellishing his tirade with an accusation that those who paid the establishment on time were not treated as well as those who were often in arrears.

Upon hearing this denunciation, Clarke, who had recently been in arrears but was now up to date with his obligations, took off his hat and asked whether he was the offender inferred. When Mostyn asserted that he was, the army officer patiently attempted to explain his situation, but the other was having none of it, and with violent language and a fusillade of swear words he accused Clarke of being a rogue, a rascal, a scoundrel, and a coward. Seizing Clarke by the collar, he threatened to throw him into the fire, but fortunately one of the company, by all accounts a more powerful gentleman, restrained him. At this Mostyn retired to bed, but if Clarke thought it was the end of the abuse he was mistaken, for Mostyn’s brother then repeated the same insults and followed his slurs up by issuing a challenge.

To date, Captain Clarke, described by a later witness as a worthy, honest, and inoffensive man, had behaved with great temperance, but such were the contemptible slanders he had suffered that his honour demanded satisfaction. With tears coursing down his cheeks in agitation, he accepted the offer of a challenge but declared that it was proper that he face Captain Mostyn, who had initiated the dispute. Shortly afterwards a letter was duly delivered to Mostyn, who by then was at Woolwich, demanding either an apology or a meeting. Unsurprisingly choosing the latter option, the naval officer returned to London.

The duel took place in a field near Lochée’s Royal Military Academy, Little Chelsea, on Friday 13 February at 3 p.m., with a Captain Hay acting as Mostyn’s second and a Captain Lysaght of the Africa Corps supporting Clarke. A small group of witnesses also attended, but a surgeon was not amongst them. Agreeing to the traditional ten paces distance after Mostyn had complained that twelve yards, as first stipulated, was too long, it was Clarke who was granted the first shot, only for his pistol to misfire. Mostyn asked him to prime again but Clarke refused, stating that honour dictated Mostyn should now fire. When the naval captain declined to do so, Clarke offered him the opportunity of apologising for his ill behaviour. Mostyn rejected the proposal and so he did decide to fire. Providentially, his ball struck Clarke’s purse in a thigh pocket where a key and coins absorbed the shock. The Army officer then fired his pistol and the ball pierced Mostyn’s heart. For a brief second, the young captain stepped forward before falling to the ground, dead.

Following the fatal encounter, all parties agreed that Clarke had done his best to avoid the confrontation, but that Mostyn had insisted upon it. Even so, the army officer and his seconds immediately fled to the continent to avoid prosecution. At 6 p.m. on the Monday following the duel, a jury was convened at the Albemarle Arms in Albemarle Street off Piccadilly to investigate the affair. After hearing testimonies from the master of the coffee house, Mr Townsend, and his principal waiter and barmaid, during which evidence Mostyn was described as ‘overbearing, turbulent and quarrelsome, the members deliberated for the next ten hours before recording a verdict of manslaughter against Captain Clarke.