England's Mistress_ The Infamous Life of Emma Hamilton - Kate Williams [120]
Ferdinand and Maria Carolina declared that they needed all their treasure, china and glass, pictures, clothes, jewels, and hunting paraphernalia, and much of their furniture. When they declared they did not trust their own navy to take them, they offended their remaining loyalists and upset the British, who had expected to travel on Nelson's ship. Terrified of a last-minute crush, Maria Carolina made an invitation card for those she wished to accompany her, which she designated a ticket of admission to Nelson's boat.10 She wrote to Emma on the seventeenth that she was sending her "all our Spanish money, both the King's and my own." Sixty thousand gold ducats and the diamonds were to follow. Emma inscribed on the back "My adorable unfortunate Queen!" Maria Carolina declared she was drowning in tears, and worried whether it was all right to send so much. Emma spent six nights waiting for contraband deliveries of the "Jewells, money & effects of the Royall familly" and giving them to British sailors to transport to the ships. Carriages bumped up into her courtyard, packed with jumbles of clothes, jewels, linen, sculpture, and toys. Emma packed them up in boxes, disguising most of them as "Stores for Nelson." She told Greville of her "many such strategems" for hiding her work from foreign spies and the angry mob, hoping he would mention her to those influential in government. She explained how "I got those treasures em-bark'd and this point gain'd, the king's resolution of coming off was strengthened; the queen I was sure of." Sir William judged their stash worth the incredible sum of £2.5 million. Emma had helped to smuggle out the contemporary equivalent of nearly $240 million in gold, plus millions of dollars' worth of jewels.
The Neapolitans spotted the ships waiting in the bay and convoys of goods heading to the Palazzo Sessa. Many cheered, while others became riotous, crowding around the palace and begging the king not to leave. "I am overwhelmed with misery and confusion," the queen wrote desperately to Emma. "I've lost my head tonight, I'm sending some more trunks… believe me the saddest of mothers and queens but your sincere friend, Charlotte." Emma scrawled on the back of the letter, "God protect us this night."11 The queen sent her a final passenger list, adamant that Emma keep a hawk's eye out for anyone of a lower station trying to sneak on.
Emma and Sir William, Mrs. Cadogan, and their servants slipped away from the Palazzo Sessa on December 21 and walked to the shore, where they boarded a boat to travel to the Vanguard. The ship was anchored safely out of range of the forts, and, thanks to the rough weather, the journey there took more than two hours. Meanwhile, the king and queen, convulsed by panic about leaving, threatened to stay put. Nelson took matters into his own hands and, as Emma described to Greville, traveled to the palace by armed boat, "got up the dark staircase that goes in to the Queen's room & with a dark lantern, cutlasses, pistol, etc, etc, brought off every soul, ten in number to the Vanguard." The lesser servants, including priests and the king's surgeon, arrived a few hours later, and the minor courtiers were taken to a ship captained by the Neapolitan admiral Francesco Caracciolo. Everybody else bundled onto twenty transport ships. It was a ridiculously cumbersome operation: hundreds of travelers from England and elsewhere, perhaps a thousand aristocrats, the extensive entourages of two French princesses, and the massive Neapolitan royal family plus all their loot and servants were piled onto warships. All Naples knew they were leaving, but the loyalists who wished them to stay were far outnumbered by those who welcomed their flight.
At the moment of embarkation, Ferdinand demanded that his servants bring over yet more gold and treasures from the palace. The boat was groaning with the court treasures, and there was no room for the