Last month I alluded to two new “Bonking Biogs” and human nature being what it is, read the shorter of the two first: Gimcrack, A Rake’s Progress by Tony Scotland.
The word gimcrack means something showy but cheap so when the 1st Earl of Grosvenor came to name a puny stallion sired by Cripple he had low expectations and named him Gimcrack. In spite of his small stature he won twenty-seven of his thirty-six races and with Stubbs’ help is one of the most famous thoroughbreds of all time. The nickname Gimcrack therefore was not as insulting as it might first seem and Kenneth Mackenzie, Viscount Fortrose and the last Earl of Seaforth earned it by being small and fast.
Without realising it I had seen Gimcrack often when at my club. He is third from the left in a plum coloured coat, holding up a ring in his right hand and gripping a decanter in his left. Tony Scotland gives a flavour of his subject.
“Dandy, swordsman and madcap, musician, connoisseur and lady’s man, the ‘Irish’ Earl of Seaforth was Chief of the Clan Mackenzie, M.P. for Caithness and Colonel of his Highland regiment. Educated on the Grand Tour, and taken up by libertines and gamblers who gave him the nickname Gimcrack – because he was short and fast, like the winning stallion immortalised by Stubbs – he climbed volcanoes with William Hamilton, entertained the boy Mozart at home in Naples, took part in a bizarre scientific experiment with Joseph Banks, and became a Fellow of the Royal Society. In hot pursuit of the freer pleasures of the age, he frequented the brothels of Covent Garden, caroused with the Dilettanti, and secretly married a fashionable courtesan made famous by Joshua Reynolds. But finding no firm purpose in life he declined into drink and debt – and a tragic death at sea.“
Not a role model but, my, did he pack a lot into his short life. A curious part of the story is that he was created Earl of Seaforth in the Irish Peerage and then raised the Seaforth Highlanders in Scotland. I enjoyed this glimpse into 18th century debauchery although it is hard to feel much affection for a talented character with considerable advantages in life who squandered them so recklessly. Why did Tony Scotland choose him for a biography? It comes to light in the book.
