Berkeley John Talbot Levett

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Baccarat bacchanalia: A Royal Scandal

Capt. Berkeley John Talbot Levett (1863 - ), Scots Guards, was a witness in the Royal Baccarat Scandal in which the future King Edward VII was drawn into a gambling dispute which painted him in an unflattering light.

Levett was the son of Col. Theophilus John Levett of Wychnor Park, Member of Parliament for Lichfield.^[1] Berkeley Levett served as one of the Gentlemen Ushers for the Royal Household. Capt. Levett, an Aide-de-camp to William Mansfield, 1st Viscount Sandhurst in India, married Sibell Lucia Bass, daughter of Hamar Alfred Bass, a British brewer and Member of Parliament, on June 2, 1900.

At the time of the Royal Baccarat Scandal, Levett was a soldier and bon vivant said to be the best-dressed man in London. Unsurprisingly, the night of September 8, 1890, found Levett in the company of royalty and socialites.^[2] Like other young aristocrats of the age, Levett enjoyed playing cards and, from all accounts, fancied himself a dashing figure in society circles.

Levett was drawn into the scandal after a night in which a fellow officer from the Scots Guards was accused of cheating at Baccarat, a card game. Levett testified later that he had witnessed the cheating. In a scene worthy of high-society hijinks painted by Evelyn Waugh, Sir William Gordon-Cumming, 4th Baronet had, when confronted, signed a statement conceding he had cheated and pledging never to play cards again. The assembled players, fearing the worst if the scandal leaked, made a pact to hush up the affair. For four months afterwards, Sir William split his time between his Scottish estates, his Scots Guards regiment, his wealthy American fiancee and his Paris club, hoping his signed confession would squelch the potential scandal.

The secret pact didn't hold. An anonymous letter from Paris informed Sir William that gossips on the Continent were chattering about the tawdry events of that evening -- and about Gordon-Cumming's alleged cheating. Enraged, Sir William brought suit against those present, including Berkeley Levett, charging slander. When the suit came to court in June 1891, it was a stylish affair: only those observers sporting a note from the Lord Chief Justice were admitted. The cream of society, dressed to the nines, turned out as though for Royal Ascot.^[3]

King Edward VII

Levett was forced to testify under oath, and although the jury ultimately ruled for him and the rest of the defendants, the damage had been done. Sir William was drummed out of his regiment and forced to resign from his clubs. The future King, also forced to testify, and thus reveal his penchant for card-playing, was suitably outraged. "Thank God," said the future King, "the army and society are now well rid of such a damned blackguard."^[4]

But the royal reputation had been called into question.^[5] Newspapers and public opinion sided squarely with Sir William. Word in the street largely blamed the the future King.^[6] In circles like Berkeley Levett's, consensus was the King was to blame, but for a different reason: the contentious card game had transpired at the estate of a newly-rich shipping millionaire.

The jury took 13 minutes to find all the defendants not guilty and award them their legal costs. It was not a popular decision. The crowd hissed and booed the jurors, and tried to attack the defendants as they left the courtroom.

Ultimately, Berkeley Levett survived the scandal, went on to marry well, sell his share of the family's Staffordshire estates, and after serving in India for Lord Sandhurst, kept a decidedly lower profile, living quietly in Lancaster Gate, London, and Cap Ferrat, France, the latter the home of W. Somerset Maugham, a writer who might have penned this tale of well-born shenanigans. Later promoted to the rank of Major, Levett had two sons, one of whom was killed in World War I.

Berkeley Levett continued to turn up for society cotillions, but his zest for the high life seemed diminished.^[7]^[8] Navigating the waters of scandal alongside a Royal had been tricky business.