England's Mistress_ The Infamous Life of Emma Hamilton - Kate Williams [119]
"Baron Crocodile" was yearning for another fix of glory. He could see a chance to lead the war against Napoleon by taking a key role in an offensive against the French planned by John Acton and the Neapolitan court and endorsed by Sir William, with Emma as a passionate devotee. It was necessary: Nelson's arrival in Naples trailing the battered French ships captured at Aboukir contravened Ferdinand's treaty with France and made a French invasion almost inevitable. Ferdinand would send thirty thousand Neapolitan soldiers to capture Rome, and Nelson was to support them by delivering four thousand soldiers (the Neapolitan navy carried another six thousand) to take Leghorn back from France. Emma, convinced that Nelson was invincible, enthused about the plan. Nelson's commander did not intervene, even though his mission in Naples should have been purely defensive. Almost as infatuated with the queen as he was with Emma, Nelson went to rouse the land troops before they set off, with Emma as his interpreter and Maria Carolina at his side.
On November 29, Ferdinand entered Rome, accompanied by his soldiers. Within a week, the French had beaten him and taken ten thousand prisoners. The king's failure forced Nelson to abandon the attack on Leghorn. "Viscount Pyramid" was furious, declaring that the Neapolitan officers ran the first thirty miles out of Rome. The king fled back to his palace, and by December 15, the French troops were closing in on Naples from the north. Emboldened by the approach of the French, pro-republican Jacobins began to demonstrate more virulently against the king. The royalist mob was equally violent, incensed by rumors that the king and queen intended to flee. When a royal messenger was murdered right under Ferdinand's windows, the queen began telling anybody who would listen that the Neapolitan Jacobins would soon storm the palace.9 Emma declared she would go to the block with the queen, but Maria Carolina was not planning to be seized from her home like her sister. She and the king decided to flee to their palace in Sicily, although the stormy December weather made it the worst time to travel. Many of the courtiers were elderly, and the hereditary princess had recently given birth, but the departure of the entire court with their belongings and retinues had to be organized in under a week. Emma took charge. It was her most daunting challenge to date.
Royalist mobs roamed the streets in search of Jacobins to attack, and there were pitched battles between the two sides. Passions were running so high that no one, not even a stranger, was safe in the streets. Afraid of capture, Sir William and Nelson refused to visit the king and queen. They sent Emma in their place, consoling themselves that the mob was used to seeing her go to the palace every day and would think that, as a woman, she was irrelevant to politics. Emma prided herself on never being afraid, especially now she was trying to impress Nelson, and she was eager to take on the role of messenger.
Sir William's task was to evacuate the British citizens in Naples, and he arranged three transports from Nelson for those who wished to leave. He was even more preoccupied in ensuring that his pictures and vases were packed and sent to England. Nelson was concerned with military matters and readying the ships to take their royal cargo. With the male duo of the tria iuncta in uno preoccupied, Emma had to take care of the logistical nightmare of preparing the royal family to leave. Maria Carolina dwelt obsessively on her sister's botched flight from Paris, and Emma tried to allay her fears. The entire royal family and court had never moved en masse, and there