The Disappearing Duke: The Improbable Tale of an Eccentric English Family

When, in the early 19th century, the fourth duke of Portland informed his sons that owing to "the strain of madness" in the family, "the normal life of married bliss cannot be for you," Lord John, the future fifth duke, came up with a unique and eventually problematic solution: he lived a double-or perhaps even triple-life. Calling himself Thomas Druce, he wooed and married a 16-year-old village girl and fathered three children. Then he abandoned her, eventually bringing the children to London, where he had fathered the first of three children with another woman whom he refused to marry until his first wife was dead. Confused yet? There's more: Druce also joined the army, ran a successful London department store and might have checked himself into an insane asylum for a time under the name of Dr. Harmer. As the duke of Portland at mid-century, he had underground tunnels built both at his country house and, rumor had it, his London mansion, the better to keep his many secrets. How he managed to juggle his multiple identities is a mystery that British authors Freeman-Keel (From Auschwitz to Alderney) and Crofts (coauthor of Sold) never do solve, but they recreate a fantastic tale of deception, intrigue and madness. Still, though this is an entertaining read, those expecting a strict historical reconstruction of events will be less than satisfied; the authors provide little in the way of sourcing for this "dramatization of a true story in which the truth is tantalizingly elusive."
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

The authors play historical detectives in order to unravel a suitably twisted tale of debauchery and treachery in Victorian England. At the heart of the tale is the Cavendish-Bentinck clan, one of the wealthiest and most influential aristocratic families in mid-nineteenth-century Britain. After the seemingly suspicious death of his older brother in 1854, Lord John became the marquess of Titchfield, the fifth duke of Portland, and immediately began constructing elaborate underground passages and chambers beneath the family estate. Even stranger were the veiled rumors that he led a mysterious double life in London. Eventually the rumors were brought to light in one of the most bizarre and sensational court cases in British history. Murder, lunacy, and paternity were but a few of the lurid issues raised, as accusations were bandied back and forth during a trial that rocked the peerage to its hypocritical core. Margaret Flanagan
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved