MYTH BUSTERS
7 things you (probably) didn’t know about Samuel Pepys
Deborah Swift shares a series of lesser-known tidbits about the man whose diary paints a vivid portrait of life during the Restoration period
1 Samuel Pepys was the victim of a vendetta
In 1679, Pepys was arrested and sent to the Tower of London on charges that included piracy and treason. It was alleged that, as an official in charge of navy stores, he plundered goods from ships captured from the Dutch. As bizarre a notion ‘Pepys the pirate’ might seem, his diary reveals the first charge to be true.
By law, captured enemy goods belonged to the Crown. However, Pepys wrote of how a few goods had indeed found their way into his own coffers – as perks of the job. Luckily for him, there was not enough evidence to convict.
A more damaging rumour was that Pepys had sold state secrets to the French. In order to defend himself against the charge of treason, which was punishable by being hanged, drawn and quartered, he sought to trace the source of the rumour. The search led him back to his time as a Justice of the Peace the previous year, when he had crossed one of the most cunning tricksters of the 17th century, Colonel John Scott.
Scott had been in exile trying to escape the law, having become a suspect in the murder of a London magistrate, Edmund Godfrey. Upon a search of Scott’s lodgings, secret papers were found, some written in Pepys’ own hand, detailing the strength of the English navy. Pepys, suspecting Scott to be a spy, ordered his arrest if he ever again set foot on English soil. Scott never forgave him and began a vendetta against Pepys, which led to his false accusations of treason.
In the wake of his arrest on that charge, Pepys set out to clear his name by establishing a network of investigations into Scott’s background in France, England and Holland. Two manuscript volumes survive detailing his enquiries, which uncovered that Scott’s whole life was a lie. He was one of the most fraudulent rogues of the 17th century. With the chief accuser discredited, the charge had no basis and petered out.
2 For his birthday, he kissed a royal relic
While Pepys never once mentions his wife Elizabeth’s birthday in his diary, he often brings up his own. He was not a man to celebrate with cake and candles, though: on his birthday in 1669, he took Elizabeth and his servants to Westminster Abbey to show them the tombs. The open coffin of Catherine de Valois (queen to King Henry V) was accessible to the public “by particular favour”, and the party was able to view the mummified remains.
Catherine’s body had been languishing since the time of Henry VII, when the Lady Chapel – where she was buried – was demolished. It has been suggested that Henry ordered her memorial to be destroyed in order to distance himself from his ancestry (Henry VII’s father, Edmund, was the eldest son of a possibly illegitimate union between Catherine de Valois and her keeper of the wardrobe, Owen Tudor).
The body’s condition did not deter Pepys, however. He tells us: “I did kiss her mouth, reflecting upon it that I did kiss a Queen, and that this was my birthday, 36 years old, that I did first kiss a Queen.” Although highly disgusting, kissing a relic like this was usually regarded as a sign of reverence in the 17th century. That said, Pepys does seem to have done the act with surprising enthusiasm.
3 He rescued his cheese from the Great Fire of London
It is September 1666, and Pepys is in a panic. He is not the only one: the disaster later known as the Great Fire is consuming London at an alarming rate. Terrified that he might have to abandon his most valuable possessions to the flames, Pepys dashes outside and digs a hole in his garden. There, he inters his precious hoard, which includes not only his gold and his papers, but also a large wheel of Parmesan cheese.
To Pepys, cheese was a worthwhile investment deserving of his rescue efforts since blocks like his, which could weigh up to 90kg, were used as diplomatic gifts. In 1556, Pope Paul IV made gifts of “eight great Parmesan cheeses” to Queen Mary. A rare and expensive import from Italy, Parmesan was used sparingly and increased in value as it aged, so Pepys’ cheese was too valuable to lose.
4 He was given a lion to keep as a pet
When lodging at Derby House in Westminster, Pepys had a feline friend pottering around the Admiralty Office. It was no domesticated cat, but a lion. This king of the jungle had been presented to him in 1674 as a gift by Samuel Martin, the English consul in Algiers, who was married to one of Pepys’ former mistresses, Betty Lane. Pepys wrote to Martin to tell him that the lion was “as tame as you sent him, and as good company”.
In his day, exotic pets were a status symbol. Pepys reports an incident in 1661 in which he was summoned to Sir William Batten’s house to view a “baboon”, which he thought “so much like a man… I do believe it already understands much English; and I am of the mind that it might be tought (sic) to speak or make signs”.
Animals from around the world were also housed at the Tower of London, arguably England’s first city zoo. By 1622, the royal menagerie was home to eagles, pumas, a tiger, a jackal and leopards, as well as lions. Perhaps when it grew too large for his office, Pepys’ pet ended up there.
5 Pepys hated Shakespeare, but adored Macbeth
Pepys may have been an avid theatre-goer, but he was markedly unimpressed by the talents of William Shakespeare, who had died around half a century earlier. Pepys was quick to dismiss one of the great playwright’s most enduringly popular works, writing in his diary: “Saw Midsummer Night’s Dream which I have never seen before, nor shall ever again, for it is the most insipid, ridiculous play that I ever saw in my life.”
That was not his only criticism of the Bard. He described Twelfth Night as a “silly play and not relating at all to the name or day,” and said of Henry VIII: “Though I went with resolution to like it, is so simple a thing made up of a great many patches… there is nothing in the world good or well done.”
The only one of Shakespeare’s plays that Pepys seems to have enjoyed was Macbeth. He called it “a most excellent play in all respects, especially divertissement”. Pepys loved it so much he saw it nine times and wrote: “It is one of the best plays for a stage, and variety of dancing and musique, that ever I saw.”
6 His diary contains the first record of drinking an English cup of tea
As well as an indispensable record of the Restoration period, Pepys’ diary contains the earliest-known written reference to someone in England drinking a cup of tea. A 1644 bill refers to “bottles of china drink”, but Pepys got in there first when talking of tea as a social beverage, rather than a medicinal brew as in that bill.
The social occasion in question was a high-level meeting in 1660 with naval experts, including Sir William Batten, Colonel Slingsby and Sir Richard Ford. “Sir R. Ford talked like a man of great reason and experience,” wrote Pepys, “And afterwards did send for a Cupp of Tee (a China drink) of which I never had drank before.”
In the 17th century, tea was imported via Holland and was prohibitively expensive, meaning that ale remained the national beverage in Pepys’ day. But that changed when Catherine of Braganza, future wife of Charles II, arrived in Portsmouth on 14 May 1662. One of the first things she asked for was a cup of tea, something that was easily obtainable and popular in her native country. A chest of leaves was given as part of her dowry from her father John IV of Portugal, and although Catherine soon adopted English ways she always kept the taste for tea.
A love of tea spread from the royal court to aristocratic circles, the moneyed classes and beyond. Unlike Catherine, however, it seems that Pepys did not take to the drink himself. He made no further mention of it in his diary until seven years later, when his wife was prescribed it as a cure for a cold.
7 Despite his dozens of mistresses, Pepys had no children
Pepys was infamous for his roving eye and his many affairs, with his servants and with the wives, daughters and even mothers of his colleagues. His most enduring affair was with one Mrs Bess Bagwell, who was the wife of a ship’s carpenter named William Bagwell, of Deptford dockyard. It appears that Bess’ husband was complicit in the affair: utilising Pepys’ interest in his wife to improve his career prospects by trading her favours for better positions in the navy.
Despite marrying Elizabeth de Saint Michel (pictured above) in 1655, Pepys thought nothing of listing in his diary dozens of mistresses, including Mrs Lane, Mrs Tooker, Mrs Burrows, Mrs Martin, Mrs Pennington, Betty Mitchell and the actress Elizabeth Knepp. One of his most passionate and poignant liaisons was with Deb Willet, a lady’s maid to his wife. The romance could not last and Deb was dismissed in disgrace.
Yet considering Pepys’ many affairs, it is surprising and perhaps sad that he ended up with no heir. A possible explanation is that during an operation in 1658 to remove a kidney stone – done at great risk and without anaesthetic – something went wrong that prevented Pepys from ever fathering a child.
DEBORAH SWIFT is a historical novelist. Her works include Entertaining Mr Pepys (Accent Press, 2019) and The Poison Keeper (Quire Books, 2021)
LISTEN
Historian Rebecca Rideal discusses the Great Fire of London, a key event in Pepys’ diary, on the HistoryExtra podcast: historyextra.com/period/stuart/great-fire-london-history-podcast