What Happened to the Boy with ‘red rose-leaf lips’?

By Philip Morgan

‘Bosie, you must not make scenes with me. They kill me, they wreck the loveliness of life.’ From Wilde’s cross-examination, 3 April 1895 (Libel case vs. Queensberry: a letter read out in evidence.)

‘Lord Alfred Douglas was one of the most beautiful creatures I have ever seen – the face of a young Apollo the arrogance of youth in every gesture.’ (Frank Harris – Oscar Wilde: his life and Confessions-1916)

‘A young scoundrel’ (Henry Labouchere -1913.)

Lord Alfred Douglas - Bosie was born on 22 October 1870 at Ham Hill House, the country estate of the Douglas family whose main residence was Kinmount House, Dumfries and Galloway.

In 1927 at the age of fifty-seven Bosie moved in with his mother at 35 Fourth Avenue, Hove. In 1935 when she went into a nursing home, he went into a two-bedroom ground floor flat at St Annes Court in Nizell’s Avenue. In July 1944 effectively destitute he became a lodger at 16 Silverdale Avenue, Hove.

He was the third son of John Sholto Douglas 9th Marquess of Queensbury 1844 - 1900

And Sibyl Lady Queensbury 1840-1935

He was his mother’s favourite. She gave him the nickname of ‘Bosie’ a shortening of Boysie which was to stick with him throughout his life and beyond.

Bosie’s grandfather Archibald William Douglas the 8th Marquess died in August 1858 at the age of forty officially from the explosion of gun in the grounds of Kinmount House. It was accepted as a suicide given that he was suffering from paranoia and depression and the fatal wound was beneath his chin.

Bosie’s father John was now the 9th Marquess at the age of 14.

John’s younger brother Francis William Douglas, Bosie’s uncle was in the first party to scale the Matterhorn in 1865. On the descent a rope broke and he fell to his death. His body was never recovered.

James Edward Douglas another uncle of Bosie’s slid into alcoholism and chronic depression and cut his throat in a Euston hotel on 5th May 1891 at the age of 36.

Bosie first met Wilde that summer. Wilde at 36 was an established figure in literary London. To all appearances he was a happily married straight man with two children and a member of the Aesthetic Movement that believed in ‘art for art’s sake.’ It is also accepted that Wilde had had a probably brief sexual relationship with his literary agent Robert Ross around 1886 who remained a loyal friend until his death. Bosie was at the age of 21 an aristocrat, exceptionally beautiful, a poet, a playboy and an actively if necessarily discreet promiscuous gay man who was reputed to have had affairs with Oxford undergraduates and stable boys and to be a member of a loose circle of homosexual men. He also came from a family shot through with depression, violence and suicide. They met at tea in Chelsea at a mutual friend’s house where Bosie claimed to have read The Picture of Dorian Gray nine times. In 1892 they began a passionate affair that lasted until 1895. Bosie became dependent on and indulged by a besotted Wilde and Wilde experienced a period of exceptional creativity writing five plays including The Importance of Being Earnest. Bosie’s father was unhappy about the liaison and wrote to him threatening to remove his allowance. Bosie sent a telegram back saying ‘You funny little man.’ John responded that he had divorced Bosie’s mother in order not to ‘run the risk of bringing more creatures like you into the world.’

In 1893 Francis Archibald Douglas Bosie’s eldest brother was reputed to be having an affair with the prime minister Lord Roseberry. In October 1894 Francis killed himself possibly in order to protect Roseberry from further scandal.

In 1894 the affair between Wilde and Bosie was in full flow and dangerously public at a time when ’gross indecency with male persons’ could land you in prison. There were reports of paid sexual encounters with ‘the working class’ and homosexual orgies at the Savoy Hotel. Bosie’s father having just lost one son decided to try and put a stop to it. On February 18th 1895 he left a card at Wilde’s club.

Wilde’s friends told him to forget about it but an out-of-control Bosie forced Wilde to sue for libel. Private detectives employed by Bosie’s father produced evidence that Wilde was guilty of ‘gross indecency with male persons.’ So that he not only lost the libel case but was arrested on the same day and sentenced to two years hard labour which broke him mentally and physically. He could have escaped but stayed quietly waiting for his arrest in the Cadogan hotel. Bosie reputedly having urged him to stay saying ’You must stay and fight. They dare not touch you – you are too famous.’ Bosie left for Paris where homosexuality was legal just before Wilde’s arrest and didn’t return to England until 1897. While Oscar was in prison Bosie drifted through France and Italy and didn’t communicate with him in any way. On Oscar’s release they had a few months together in Naples but in 1897 separated for good. Bosie came back to England. Wilde stayed in France living under an assumed name until he died broke and, apart from Robert Ross, alone in Paris in 1900.

In the 1910’s pursued by poverty, guilt, a sense of injustice and unpaid debts Bosie moved many times and became increasingly erratic. In 1902 he married Olive Custance a bisexual heiress and poet whose father disapproved of the marriage and cut her off. They then survived on their joint precarious earnings from publishing and the generosity of friends remaining together until 1913 and keeping in supportive contact until her death in 1944.

In 1911 perhaps looking for some sort of structure in his life he converted to the Catholic church and became increasingly litigious, anti-Semitic and homophobic presenting himself as some sort of martyr who had been corrupted by Wilde. As a witness in 1918 in a libel trial he described Wilde as ’the greatest force for evil that has appeared in Europe during the last three hundred years.’

In 1920 he became editor and public face of Plain English an anti-Semitic and ultra-conservative magazine funded by extreme right wingers. It folded in 1922 due to its combination of libellous content and extremism. Bosie himself was imprisoned for six months in 1924 for an article he printed accusing Churchill of being part of a Zionist conspiracy to game the stock exchange in return for ‘a house full of furniture.’ Bosie emerged from prison in 1924 bankrupt and with a shattered reputation. He effectively sofa-surfed until 1927 when he moved in with his mother in Hove.

He characterised his life in Hove as one of penitence and piety. He became a devout catholic sometimes claiming that his financial, social and physical suffering was a form of divine purification. He wrote steadily but with little success. He published poems and essays, two memoirs and two books about his relationship with Wilde. Over time his attitude to Wilde and homosexuality softened.

‘Devoted as I still am and always will be to the memory of this brilliant and wonderful man and conscious as I am and always shall be about my own failings...Wilde was the author of what I consider to be, apart from Shakespeare, the finest comedy in the English language.’ (Letter to Norman Marshall 1935)

‘Sometimes a sin is also a crime (for example, a murder or theft), but this is not the case with homosexuality, any more than with adultery.’ (Oscar Wilde a Summing Up - 1940.) He died destitute in 1945 No members of his family showed up at his funeral. He was buried beside his mother and shares her tombstone.