In April 1807, Bannister Flight, Benjamin Flower's long-time friend, while walking near his house in Shore Place, Hackney, met John Clayton, Jr. He asked Clayton if he had seen Flower’s new periodical, the Political Review and Monthly Register.  Clayton replied that he did not read Flower’s publications because he believed his uncle to be a forger, and he could prove it (Statement xxxviii).   Flight kept the comments to himself.  In February 1808, the Revd Samuel Palmer, minister of the Independent congregation at Mare Street, Hackney, during a discussion with Flight concerning Flower’s edition of The Miscellaneous Works of Robert Robinson (1807), repeated allegations he had heard the Claytons make against Flower, primarily that Flower had made his mother trace her own writing over his in an attempt to cover up his fraud (Statement xxxix).  Palmer was convinced that young Clayton, an Independent minister like his father, would not lie about such a matter. Flight, who had known Flower for nearly thirty years, decided to call on young Clayton himself.   Clayton told him that his father had documents that would prove Flower’s guilt in this matter (Statement xli).  After Clayton talked with his father about the documents, he retracted his claims about Flower being guilty of forgery and perjury, as well as the claim that the Claytons possessed a letter from Richard Flower, in which the latter admitted to his brother’s guilt.  Clayton, Jr., nevertheless insisted that Flower had indeed stolen his mother’s money and lost it.  When this was told to Flower, he could only say that it was “painful to discover so much subtile malignity in the heart of a youth of nineteen!” (Statement xli). Instead of apologizing to Flight and Palmer for his mistaken accusations against Flower, Clayton simply asked them to keep the matter quiet.

  Flower told Flight to tell young Clayton that he wished for a retraction in the presence of himself, Flight, and Palmer, but Clayton wanted only to meet privately with Flower.  Writing from Hackney on 5 March 1808, Clayton told Flower he was always willing “to cast the mantle of love over the characters of my fellow creatures, instead of pointing against them the arrows of invective and reproach,” comments which Flower interpreted as “an effusion of refined hypocrisy” (Statement xlvii).  He responded on 21 March, informing Clayton that he would not meet with him alone, for Clayton had cal­umniated him publicly, and he would have to retract the charges publicly. “You have, with respect to my character,” Flower writes to Clayton, “acted the part of a base, unprincipled assassin, and I will not therefore trust myself with you alone.”  He adds,

The “mantle” cast over my character by your father, your brother William, and yourself, has been a texture formed by falsehood, malignity, and the worst passions which disgrace human nature in its most depraved state ... For these four and twenty years past, I have borne such treatment from your family as I believe is unparalleled in domestic history; even my wife has not escaped the libels of some of them.  During the whole of this long period, my conscience bears me witness, I have watched the opening of the door of reconciliation which, by your father, was so peremptorily shut against me. I had indulged the hope, that with respect to the younger branches of the family, I should never have had any other feelings than those of respect and friendship.  I have frequently given them the sincerest invitation to my house; but it seems to be permitted, that sentiments of hostility and malignity should be carefully treasured up by the father, transmitted by him to his children, and be deemed by them a valuable inheritance. (Statement xlix, l-li)

  Irritated by Flower’s accusations, Clayton responded on 30 March 1808, informing Flower that he had mentioned these matters to no more than five persons, three of whom said they would not repeat them.  This was not satisfactory to Flower, who for years had met people who believed him to be a forger, without even knowing him or inquiring into the truth of the accusations. His patience had finally expired in this matter. Taking legal action against the Claytons had always been a last resort to him, for he had a marked aversion to law suits.  “No man has had more atrocious libels aimed at his character on account of his public principles than myself; and I have, in more than one instance, been advised to prosecute the libellers; but my ideas of that inestimable privilege of Britons—the freedom of the press, has ever prevented me from seeking legal redress against any attacks, however base, on my public character.” He says the worst of these have, unfortunately, come from men of the “sacred order,” and he has satisfied himself with “a little mild, wholesome castigation” (Statement lxiii).  Even Eliza Flower encouraged him to sue the Claytons: “Can you bear the thought, that, should Providence remove you, I should be subject to the perpetual reproach, that my husband was a criminal who held his life by sufferance?  Can you bear to reflect, that after we are both in our grave, our children should be perpetually subject to the same reproach, and that they should be told that their father, during the greater part of his life, had been charged with such criminal conduct, and took no effectual method to repel the charge?” (Statement lxiv). 

  Flower made good with his threat, filing a libel suit against the three Claytons He hired John Gurney as his counsel, Serjeant Shepherd his solicitor, and John Wilks of Hoxton Square his attorney (Statement lxv).  As the trial approached, Samuel Palmer grew anxious about being drawn into a trial against his fellow Independent minister, and he believed Flower was wrong to file such a suit. Flower countered that he was not taking a fellow “saint” to court, but a “notorious sinner” (lxxi).  John Gurney also had reservations as the trial commenced, especially concerning Mr. Clayton’s evidence and the amount of Mrs. Flower’s funds that Flower had lost in the early 1780s. They both sought an out-of-court settlement, but Clayton, Sr., refused.  In a letter to Wilks, the elder Clayton implied the affair had taken on political overtones, not wishing now to miss an opportunity to distance himself from Flower’s radical past and his Unitarian religion: “The affair has gone too far, and is not well understood.  It is not so much a contest between Mr. Flower and my son, as between democracy and heresy on the one side, and loyalty and orthodoxy on the other” (lxxv).  Flower rejected such fallacious reasoning, arguing that there was no connection between his own politics and religion and Clayton’s vicious calumnies.  In defense of his “heresies,” Flower writes: “I acknowledge the bible, and the bible only to be the test of sound doctrine; and that Jesus Christ is the only governor of the religion of his disciples.—I abhor that mystery of iniquity in the church, priestcraft, and more especially sectarian, or dissenting priestcraft.—I daily sigh for the restoration of primitive christianity, when religion shall no longer be a matter of trade, of authority, of dress, of titles, and in short, of profession without practice.  These are the only heresies with which Mr. Clayton, or any one else, can charge me” (lxxvi). 

  Flower’s attorneys made one final attempt to settle out of court with Clayton, Sr., but he refused, and the trial was conducted on 25 July 1808 before Sir James Mansfield in the Court of Common Pleas.  Flower sued for damages from defamation to the amount of £2000, but because of the “apathy” of his counselor, the equivocation in the testimony of Rev. Palmer, the effective defense of Clayton by Clayton’s counselor, and the antipathy of the judge to family quarrels, Flower was awarded a mere forty shillings for his trouble.  He was especially disturbed at how Palmer’s court testimony differed from what had passed between himself and Bannister Flight in their conversation. Flower believed that, during the trial, Palmer went out of his way to protect the Clayton’s, even though he was a witness for Flower (Statement 63).  Palmer also omitted the assertion by young Clayton that Richard Flower had stated in a letter that Flower was indeed guilty of forgery, a lie that Flower knew he could easily have refuted (Statement 64).  Palmer’s testimony, though favorable to the Claytons, nevertheless cost him his friendship with John Clayton, Sr.  (Statement 65).  “Happy would it have been for Mr. P’s reputation,” Flower noted, “and his own peace of mind, if instead of wishing to remain the silent depository of Mr. C’s. falsehoods; if instead of traducing my character; if instead of having the temerity to censure Mr. Flight for his conduct throughout this affair, which it is well known he has done repeatedly, he had possessed sufficient courage and fortitude to have followed my friend’s example, and thus to have acted up to the principles of justice, friendship, and christianity. He would it is true, in that case, have irrecoverably lost the approbation of the Claytons, but he would have secured the approbation of his friends, of his conscience, and his God” (Statement 66).

  Flower was most disappointed in his counsel’s failure to challenge the Claytons’ claim that his mother had been stopped by Clayton, Sr., on her way to the bank and informed that her funds were depleted, at which time she became totally distracted. According to Clayton, she had now been reduced to “beggary.”  Flower countered in his Statement that his mother had been informed of her losses in her parlor at a meeting of the family, and that she never became distracted in the least nor reduced to beggary. Unfortunately, he was denied the opportunity by his attorney to rebut these accusations during his trial: “my counsel, being dumb, and as one might almost imagine, nailed to their seats, on an occasion which called for the warm expression of every honourable feeling for the character of their client, can it excite surprise, if unfavourable impressions should be excited in the mind of the judge, the jury, and the audience? Had not my deafness prevented me from distinctly hearing, I should, probably, in spite of legal forms, have claimed the protection of the court, and offered the most positive contradiction to the falsehoods” (Statement 74).  Flower was also disappointed with the absence of John Gurney at the trial, for “from the consideration of his excellent character, as a professional gentleman, a sincere christian, a member of a most respectable dissenting community, and his partiality for me, I felt confident that he would, on every prepossession, which he might have imbibed from any mis-information conveyed to him from some quarter or other, and have exerted himself in defence of the character of his client, and friend.  Had he been in court, this would, I doubt not, have been the case, which makes me, even at the present moment, feelingly regret his absence at a time when he could so essentially have served me” (Statement 74).

  Though Flower won the suit, the fact that the Claytons were able to leave upon the minds of the jury (and have placed within the official court record of the trial) the damaging impression that he had indeed swindled his mother and reduced her to beggary caused him considerable pain. To Flower, the Claytons were “a standing scandal to their profession, and a disgrace to the christian name” (Statement 89).   He never forgot the letter he received from Clayton years earlier, when he barred him from his home, telling him he would still pray that God would deliver him “from hardness of heart, contempt of his word and commandments, and grant [him] repentance.” Clayton promised that he would remove this “prohibition” when he was convinced Flower had become a “changed man” (90).  More than twenty years later, Flower, with righteous indignation, passionately defended his character:

From my youth up, I have lived a life of chastity and sobriety. I appeal in vindication of my moral character, to the different classes of society with which I have associated; I have been honoured with the acquaintance, and have received peculiar tokens of respect, from some of the most illustrious, and independent members of both houses of the legislature. I can class amongst my friends, some of the most respectable members of the different ranks of the established church, those termed evangelical, as well as others: there is scarcely a sect amongst the different denominations of dissenters, or methodists, where I cannot point to persons whom I highly esteem, and where I have not reason to believe that esteem is mutual. I further appeal to the pastors of those christian societies with which I have held communion for these three and twenty years past:—Mr. Follett of Tiverton, Messrs. Worthington and Robert Winter of Salter’s-Hall, Mr. Hall of Cambridge, and Mr. Chaplin of Bishop Stortford.  I have had the pleasure of not only the acquaintance, of these most respectable ministers, but the friendship of most of them.  With one of them, Mr. Hall, it is pretty well known, I have had some differences; but so far as they may have been of a personal nature, they have, I doubt not, been mutually forgiven, if not forgotten; and although our opinions on certain subjects may vary, that gentleman will, I am persuaded, at all times do justice to my moral character.  I appeal to the neighbourhoods in which I have lived; to that in which I now reside; to the different classes of persons, the rich and the poor: let the result of these appeals determine, whether I am a character ‘so base,’ as to be undeserving the respect of the virtuous, and honourable part of society?  (Statement 93-94)

To Flower, all ministers should take the following vow upon ordination: “I believe—That as the vices of slander, falsehood, malignity, and hypocrisy incapacitate a man from entering into the kingdom of heaven, they most peculiarly incapacitate him for the office of the christian ministry” (Statement 99). Enduring the accusations and contempt of the Claytons had been the most difficult trial of his life, for they had attacked his character, the one thing most dear to Flower and most indicative of his religious faith. He writes in closing: “Had Mr. Clayton and his sons, John and William, plunged a dagger in my bosom, it would have required, even whilst my life’s blood was pouring forth, a less effort of christianity to have pronounced their forgiveness, than for their reiterated attempts to assassinate my character; thus making me suffer, if I may be allowed the expression, a living death” (Statement 101).

Primary Source: Benjamin Flower, A Statement of Facts, Relative to the Conduct of the Reverend John Clayton, Senior, the Reverend John Clayton, Junior, and the Reverend William Clayton; the Proceedings on the Trial of an Action brought by Benjamin Flower against the Reverend John Clayton, Junior, for Defamation, with Remarks (Harlow: B. Flower, 1808).