This singular transaction has appeared in all the
public papers, but having had an opportunity of collecting the
particulars through a channel of undoubted authority, I consider it an
anecdote of too interesting a nature, as connected with the subject
before me, not to insert it here.
In 1810, our government laid a plan to liberate King Ferdinand VII. of
Spain, similar to the one which had already effected the escape of
the Marquis de la Romana. The person entrusted with this commission,
assumed the name of Baron de Kolly, and besides the necessary credit
and credentials, he was furnished with the original letter, written by
Charles IV. to George III. in 1802, notifying the marriage of his son,
the Prince of the Asturias, and containing a marginal note from the
Marquis W.... in corroboration of his mission. A small squadron was
also sent to cruize off that part of the coast most contiguous to
Valencay, under the orders of Commodore C.... to be in readiness to
receive the royal fugitive. On a sudden the Baron de Kolly was seized,
and the plan frustrated, but the real particulars were never known
until after the events of the campaign of 1815.
In the course of the passage to St. Helena, Admiral C.... (who
had been entrusted with the project) expressed a wish to know of
Buonaparte, by what means de Kolly had been discovered and arrested,
and the true circumstances of the affair so totally unknown in
England, adding, that if no motive of state policy intervened, he was
anxious to hear the whole disclosure.
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