Note 115 — Chapter VI
Reading edition
Walpole’s suspicions of Lord Barrington’s motives are probably correct. The King (as the editor has reason to believe) always felt great unwillingness to trust the command of the army to any officer taking a prominent part in politics. His notion was that the army ought to be entirely in the hands of the Crown. This must have been the ground of his objection to the appointment of Conway. Lord Barrington’s declaration was certainly most injudicious, but it was provoked, not so much by his zeal to please the King, as by the taunts of Colonel Barré. The debate is reported by Cavendish, vol. ii. p. 37. The Government seem to have had the best of the argument.—E.