Thomas Moore - Duel and Marriage

Duel and Marriage

It was after this trip that he published his book, Epistles, Odes, and Other Poems, which featured a paean to the historic Cohoes Falls called Lines Written at the Cohos, or Falls of the Mohawk River, among other famous verses. A repeated theme in his writing on the United States were his observations of the institution of slavery. Moore's mocking criticisms of the United States provoked outrage in America and led to a number of rebuttals. In Britain, a critical review of the work led to Moore challenging Francis Jeffrey, an editor, to a duel. They met at Chalk Farm but the duel was interrupted by the arrival of the authorities and they were arrested. Reports that Moore's opponent had been given an empty pistol, continued to dog Moore and led to persistent mockery of him.

Lord Byron derisively referred to Moore's "leadless pistol" and wrote "on examination, the balls of the pistols, like the courage of the combatants, were found to have evaporated". Moore was angered by this and sent a letter to Byron that hinted that unless the remarks were clarified Moore was prepared to fight Byron. However, Byron had left Britain to travel abroad and the letter did not reach him. When the two men eventually met each other the dispute was settled and they soon became very close friends.

Between 1808 and 1810 Moore appeared each year with the Kilkenny Players in a charitable series of performances in Kilkenny staged by a mixture of the Irish elite and professional actors. Moore appeared frequently in comic roles in plays like Sheridan's The Rivals and O'Keeffe's The Castle of Andalusia.

Moore married an actress, Elizabeth "Bessy" Dyke, younger sister of tragedienne-to-be Mary Ann Duff, in 1811, whom he had met with the Kilkenny players where she was working with her sisters. She was the daughter of an East India Company official, but was raised with her two sisters by her mother. Moore did not initially tell his parents of his marriage, possibly because his wife was an English Protestant, but more probably because his marriage to a woman without a dowry would not help his financial prospects. Moore had expensive tastes, and, despite the large sums he was earning from his writing, soon got into debt, a situation which was exacerbated by the embezzlement of money by the man he had employed to deputise for him in Bermuda. Moore became liable for the £6000 which had been illegally appropriated by his agent in Bermuda, and lost an Admiralty ruling against this.