An innkeeper at The Fish Hotel, Buttermere had a beautiful young daughter called Mary Robinson who was about fifteen years old when she came to the attention of Joseph Palmer who stayed at the inn in 1792.
He wrote of her beauty in one of the first guide books, ‘A Fortnight’s Ramble to the Lakes in Westmorland, Lancaster and Cumberland’, describing her as having hair that was thick and long, of a dark brown and unadorned with ringlets. Her face was a fine oval, with full eyes and lips as red as vermilion.
Publication of this guide did wonders for trade at The Fish as visitors flocked to see this paragon of beauty, and Mary was mentioned in travellers’ diaries of the time and also in the writings of the “Lake Poets” – including Wordsworth’s “The Prelude”.
In 1802, unmarried, Mary came to the attention of a gentleman passing himself off as ‘Colonel Alexander Hope’, member for Linlithgow and brother to the Earl of Hopetoun, who was staying at The Fish.
Buttermere Beauty
He very quickly courted the affections of Mary and won the approval of her parents; so much so that on 2nd October 1802 they married in Lorton Church, the groom concealing the fact that he already had a wife and two children in Tiverton, Devon.
This event made its way into some of the London press through Samuel Taylor Coleridge, their Keswick correspondent. A vigilant reporter discovered that the real ‘Colonel Hope’ was abroad at the time and that Mary’s impostor husband was also married. His real name was John Hatfield, a dashing rogue and undischarged bankrupt who left a trail of unpaid bills and fraudulent transactions wherever he went.
The game was up for Hatfield. Despite fleeing from Cumberland using borrowed money, he was arrested in Swansea by the Bow Street Runners and taken to London where magistrates sent him to Carlisle to be tried. His trial lasted for eight hours and he was sentenced to death for forgery. He expected a reprieve, but despite much public sympathy, it was not forthcoming.
John Hatfield was publicly hanged at the Sands, Carlisle on September 3rd 1803.
Mary went on to marry Richard Harrison, son of a well-established farming family from Caldbeck, in 1808. She had seven children and lived happily until her death in 1853.
Tasting Notes
A golden pilsner style 4.8% Abv real ale made from lager malt, Saaz hops and lager yeast fermented at cool temperature.