a 
= 
121 
Tragical Adventure of the Viscount du Barri at Bath. 
(Communicated by Ropert Biaas, March 18th, 1874.) 
The following paper was found among those which came into 
my hands, three or four years since, as Executor to the late Mr. 
Charles Meyler, formerly proprietor of the Bath Herald. It 
appears to have been sent to him for publication at a time when 
some allusion to, or account of, the transaction had been recently 
published. It does not appear from the inquiries I have made 
that he ever printed it (probably from its occupying too much 
space in a weekly paper), and as it carries with it an air of 
vraisemblance I thought it might be worth the notice of the 
Club. 
Rambles about Bath. 
TO THE EDITOR OF THE BATH HERALD. 
Str,—Observing there have been in the Bath Journal different 
accounts of the duel between Viscount du Barri and Count de 
Rice, I forward you the only true version of the affair, and, which 
never having appeared in any of the Bath Annals, I hope you will 
find sufficiently interesting to insert. 
The author was chaplain to the late Duke of Nor tena’ 
and an intimate friend of both the duellists, and it will be seen 
from his version of the affair that he was the only person likely to 
give a correct detail. In those days the Duke was in the habit of 
wintering in Bath, and was one of its ereat supporters. From 
him “ Northumberland Buildings” took its name, and the late 
proprietor of Marchant’s Court changed its name to “ Northum- 
 berland Place,” as a token of his gratitude to him: 
I observe in the Bath Jowrnal a statement as to a grandfather 
telling his son about its locality. There is better evidence ; I 
know a gentleman whose father was, in 1778, living at Combe 
Down, and was present and saw by the directions of his father 
2 
