Edward Hyde, Lord Cornbury (1661-1723)

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"that peculiar but detestable magot"

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Lewis Morris, a bitter political foe of Edward Hyde, Lord Cornbury, governor of New York and New Jersey (1701-1708), wrote to New York's secretary of state. Morris noted that Governor Cornbury had acquired the habit of dressing in women's clothes, and testified to the good character of a suggested replacement.[1]


Interpretation

Morris, significantly, made no mention of sodomy or any other sexual practice in his accusation against Cornbury. There is no known document suggesting that American colonists associated cross-dressing, effeminacy, and male-male sodomy, though in some English cities at the time such a link was beginning to be made.Citation Needed Since Cornbury was one of the most corrupt and hated English colonial officials it would seem that, given his cross-dressing, a hint of sodomy would have soon clouded his name-if such an association had occurred to his many American enemies.


Evidence

On February 9, 1707, Lewis Morris wrote of Cornbury's suggested replacement:

He is an honest man and the reverse of my Lord Cornbury; of whom I must

say something which perhaps nobody will think worth their while to tell, and that is, his dressing publicly in woman's clothes every day, and putting a stop to all public business while he is pleasing himself with that peculiar but

detestable magot [caprice].

New York Historical Society. Portrait said to be Lord Cornbury in female dress, but almost nothing is known about the origins or subject of the picture.


Nineteenth century historian George Bancroft said that Cornbury illustrated the worst form of the English aristocracy's "arrogance, joined to intellectual imbecility". Citation Needed


Later historians characterize him as a "degenerate and pervert who is said to have spent half of his time dressed in women's clothes", a "fop and a wastrel". Citation Needed


He is said to have delivered a "flowery panegyric on his wife's ears" after which he invited every gentleman present to feel precisely how shell-like they were; to have misappropriated £1500 meant for the defense of New York Harbor, and, scandalously, to have dressed in women's clothing and lurked "behind trees to pounce, shrieking with laughter, on his victims".[2]


Cornbury is reported to have opened the 1702 New York Assembly clad in a hooped gown and an elaborate headdress and carrying a fan, imitative of the style of Queen Anne. When his choice of clothing was questioned, he replied, "You are all very stupid people not to see the propriety of it all. In this place and occasion, I represent a woman (the Queen), and in all respects I ought to represent her as faithfully as I can." Citation Needed


It is also said that in August, 1707, when his wife Lady Cornbury died, His High Mightiness (as he preferred to be called) attended the funeral again dressed as a woman. It was shortly after this that mounting complaints from colonists prompted the Queen to remove Cornbury from office.[3]


In 2000, Patricia U. Bonomi re-examined the assertions about Cornbury's cross-dressing, and found them to be based on very little evidence. Three colonials, all members of a faction opposed to Cornbury, wrote four letters between 1707 and 1709 discussing a rumor that Lord Cornbury wore women's clothes. There are also some early documents that might be cited to support charges of having taken bribes or misappropriated government funds, but there the contemporary evidence ends.[4]


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References

  1. ↑ Jonathan Ned Katz, Gay/Lesbian Almanac (NY: Harper & Row, 1983), p. 125-27, citing Edmund B. O'Callaghan, ed., Documents Relative to the Colonial History of the State of New York (Albany: Weed, Parsons, 1855), vol. 5, pp. 38; Jonathan Ned Katz, Gay American History: Lesbians and Gay Men in the U.S.A. (NY: Crowell, 1976), p. 570 n.23. Since Katz's two works were published more research has been published about Cornbury. See, principally: Bonomi, Patricia U. Lord Cornbury Scandal: The Politics of Reputation in British America (Durham, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2000) ISBN-10: 0807848697. Also see: Ross, Shelley, Fall From Grace (NY: Random House, 1988). ISBN-10: 0517198304. A biography of Lord Cornbury appears on Wikipedia: Edward Hyde, 3rd Earl of Clarendo, Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Hyde,_3rd_Earl_of_Clarendon#Reputation
  2. ↑ Shelley, Ross, Fall From Grace (NY: Random House, 1988), p.4. What is the original evidence for all the quotes? Let's quote that on OutHistory. Citation Needed
  3. ↑ Ross, p.4-7. Evidence? Citation Needed
  4. ↑ Patricia U. Bonomi, Lord Cornbury Scandal: The Politics of Reputation in British America (Durham, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2000). Let's quote all four references between 1707 and 1709. Citation Needed
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