File 164 - Letter from Louisa Milnes to Lord Houghton

Written in answer to Houghton's letter of 29th. Robert Pemberton Milnes hated Mr Shepherd [sic] who was so severe as to be sometimes cruel; his parents were unaware of it at the time and few pupils then would have considered complaining; he was a good classical scholar. Mr Belsham knew nothing and was theologically prejudiced; few gentlemen taught by Belsham except John Cam Hobhouse and sons of Sir Evan Nepean and Sir William Smith. Dissenting background a check to private nature. Robert Pemberton Milnes' private nature. Surprise at his political divergence from the family in famous speech on government of the nation [Apr. 1807]; remembers occasion as it coincided with viewing the corpse of her governess Miss Le Mesurier. Robert Pemberton Milnes was not a Tory by nature but had a personal opposition to Grey and Grenville; he explained his refusal of office on the grounds of unfamiliarity with the task and threat to health, but it must also have arisen from his reservations about the Tory party; her own recollections of his beautiful reading aloud.