£4,000 for Nelson’s ‘menage a trois’ offer to lover’s husband
A LETTER Admiral Lord Nelson sent to the husband of his mistress “rejoicing” in the news that the three of them were going to be living together is expected to sell for £4,000 at auction today.
The future victor of Trafalgar tells Sir William Hamilton he will do everything in his power to make his love rival and his wife Lady Emma happy at Merton Place, in Surrey, which the Naval hero had paid for.
Ten months earlier, Emma had given birth to Nelson’s lovechild, Horatia, yet her husband was untroubled by her infidelity and was prepared to live in a menage a trois.
Nelson, himself already married, paid £9,000 for Merton Place, in countryside which is now part of south-west London, after Lady Emma chose it without him seeing it.
The two-page letter was penned by the Admiral while on board HMS Amazon in October 14, 1801, saying how pleased he was that Sir William and Emma were taking the house on his behalf.
He writes to Sir William: “I am quite rejoiced to hear that you have got possession and I assure you every study of mine shall be to make you happy in it.”
Nelson had plans for their new home, which had a moat, saying he will “buy fish out of the Thames to stock the water”.
He suggests they invite his Naval friends around for dinner since “well-informed sea officers” were better company than “county squires and lords”.
One guest was the future ViceAdmiral Thomas Hardy, in whose arms Nelson died four years later during the battle of Trafalgar on October 21, 1805.
The letter, in which Nelson also complains that the Admiralty “will not let me escape” into retirement, is being sold by International Autograph Auctions of Nottingham.