The Express.
London, England, 1850-01-01 00:00:00

CALUMNIES AGAINST KOSSUTH

The following letter, we are informed, was lately
forwarded to the editor of the news :
MlL—There appeared in your paper of the 26th, a
calumnious statement, affecting the character of a
public man and of a gentlewoman of spotless reputa-
tion. Many weeks must necessarily elapse, ere M.
Kossuth, or Countess Dembinski's husband, or the
Hungarian emigration, can bear of or Wats that
accusation. I have reason to know the utter
utter falsity of the unmanly charge; I em, perhaps,
the only person at the present moment in this ens-
try who can speak from personal knowledge as the
subject, and should therefore think myself ieglestrel
of en actual duty if I allowed the reptitadss et is
innocent lady and of an illustations patriut, M semis
even temporarily under the slanderous aspossien.
You, Mr. Editor, as a journalist, I doubt not, will
see sufficiently the
"Prieof deferring to the spirit
of fair play, andfeel sufficiently anxious to maks
reparation for the calumny which has crept into your
columns by giving insertion to its refutation.
refutation I shall endeavour to effect by a simple
statement of what I personally ascertained and wit
nessed, without comment, beyond the remark that I
distinctly charge the author or authors of the UMW
tion with utter, wilful, and malignant hleehood. Ike
conduct of your Vienna correspondent, who has sp .
cificelly chosen to accept the responsibility of these
defamatory lies, for which he vouches, would be
difficult to characterise by expressions less offensive.
I need hardly recall more of the substance at
this pretended correspondence from Saunas,
which overtly accuses Madame Dembinski of
an improper intimacy with the late Presi-
dent Governor of Hungary, alleging that she
travelled with him under a false name, in man's
attire; that Kossuth had lost, in consequence,
the command of the emigrants, which had been g:ves
to Perczel ; that Perezel represented the. democratic,
Bstthyani the aristocratic party; that they were
both at variance with Kossuth, and that the cores-'
spondent recognised a female in the disguise of mili-
tary rank and uniform.
I have the honour of the acquaintance of M. Kos-
suth, of Madame Dembinski and her husband, of
Count Bathyani, and of General Perczel. I spent
(with the exception of occasional absences) two
months with the Hungarian emigration at Widdin,
and accompanied it part of the way on its march to
Shumla. During the chief part of that time I w4i
lodged in the house of Kossuth. There were at
Widdin, besides myself, three Englishmen, to whom
I can appeal for the strict accuracy of my statements,
that is to say, General Guyon, the correspondent of
the Daily News, and your own correspondent, re-
specting whom you will perhaps appreciate my
silence if I am not here more explicit.
In the first place, there did not exist in the emigra-
tion any. 'names' ic or democratic party. The refugees,
like the bulk of the Hungarians, occupied themselves
ro more with such questions than the English in the
lime of Queen Elizabeth, when menaced by the
Armada. M. Kossuth, Count Batthyani, and General
Perczel, always on a friendly footing, had recently
contracted the closest intimacy. On the night of my
departure I heard them pledge themselves to the
most perfect moat during the whole continuance of
their exile, and agree, as far as possible, never to
allow themselves to be separated from each other.
The last accounts that I (and I believe any one in this
smutty) have received from Spur's, indicate rather
an increase than any diminution of this good under-
standing. With regard to the deprivation of Kee-
seth's command over the emigration, the ex-
president governor never attempted to assume
any civil or military control or other pre-eminence
whatever over the emigrants beyond the spontaneous
deference conceded to his late supremacy, antecedents,
and renown. General Guyon had the military com-
mand of the emigration. On his departure for Con-
siantinop:e it was assumed by Mourad Pacha (Gee.
Beni). And Mound Pacha having quitted Widdin,
in an armed steamer, before the emigration com-
menced its march, the command of the Hungarians
devolved naturally on General PercseL
Besides a few canteen women there were but two
females—the Countesses Batthyani and Dembinski—
accompanying the emigration. The story of the lady
in uniform is a sheer fabrication.
I come now to Madame, or more properly, the
Countess Dembinski, and if obliged to enter into
seemingly indelicate details, must plead as my apology
both to that lady and to the public the grossness of
the outrage to which she is victim.
Madame Dembinski is the daughter of a merchant
of Arad, end the wife of Count Dembinski, a Gal-
Helen nobleman, and relative of the general of that
name. Madame Dembineki, who has been some
months married, may be eighteen, her husband about
five-and-twenty years of age. adame Dembineki
was married before she ever saw Kossuth. She fol-
, lowed her husband to the camp ; and I have heard
both him and herself relate that, excepting
during tree continuance of an engagement,
they had never since their marriage been
even for a day separated from each other.
Madame Dembinski is of an almost infantine simpli-
city, and has never attempted any interference in
politics. Count Dembinski, being attached to the
person of Kossuth, spends his whole time under Ku-
suth's roof, and (since the late President Governor has
kept a table) the Countess Dembineki presides over
it. Both Count and Countess Dembinski are in ill-
health and still suffering from intermittent fever,
caught during their retreat from Hungary. Kossuth,
who is old enough to be their father, seems to take a
paternal interest in this young couple.
Kossuth, during the first part of his sojourn at
Widdin, inhabited the house of the chief of the
pike, in which he occupied a single room, together
with an aide-camp and his interpreter. Here, heins
without convenience for the preparation of any
reviler repast, I found him eating his solitary meal
set of rude earthenware with an iron spoon.
During the last month of his stew, in consequence I
et plesseptory orders f.om Constantinople, the best
ha em is Widdin was placed at his disposal ; but, as
he would not dispossess the owner, whose harem
filled the upper story, only the four ground-floor
apartments were occupied by him, and served to
lodge some dozen persons of his suite, besides servants.
The room which he day and night inhabited was,
in both houses, acoording. to the Turkish fashion,
always open to allow free ingress to all comers, and
could only be closed by a curtain drawn across the
doorway. Kossuth, during the whole of his stay in
Widdin, may therefore be said to have lived in a eau
house, and, amidst the empty honours finally paid
him, had constant reason to complain of the want of
privacy. The Count and Counter Dembinski did not
lodge in the same house with Kossuth, except
en two exceedingly cold nights, when in
consequence of their state of hull a room was ceded
to them, its former occupants being quartered for the
time upon Kossuth. For the same reason, the late
president-governor, to whom a comfortable travelling
carriage had been presented, gave a seat in it to the
Dembinski'', whose earflap had no springs. The
last day that I accompanied the march I saw Kossuth
on horseback, with Count Batthyani on one band and
General Perezel on the other, and Count Dembinski
with his lady following in the carriage. Is it noose-
Nary that I should seriously add that to the beat of my
belief end knowledge Madame Dembinski, who is dis-
tinguished by graces essentially feminine, never ar-
rayed herself in male attire in her life P
In conclusion I can frame but one conjecture as to
the motive of this unfounded and scurrilloaa attack on
a suffering, inoffensive, expatriated woman, and on a
husband and father so notoriously devoted as M. Kos-
lath to his own elfe and children.
That conjecture, Mr. Editor, (and I conceive your
stassequent dread of any participation in such a
INENIse, however involuntary) will, if the menus