Gustavus Guydickens

Major-General Gustavus Guydickens (1732 – March 1802) was a British Army officer and courtier who resigned his positions amidst accusations of homosexuality in 1793.

An officer in the 3rd Foot Guards, Guydickens served in the Seven Years' War as aide de camp to Duke Ferdinand of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel.

Having briefly served in North America during the American Revolutionary War, Guydickens was promoted to major-general in 1790 and assumed command of his regiment in the following year.

He was the second son of Lieutenant-Colonel Melchior Guy Dickens, a diplomat who served as ambassador to Russia, and Hannah née Handcock.

[1] Guydickens transferred to the 3rd Foot Guards as a lieutenant and captain[Note 1] while in Germany on 1 May 1761, serving as aide de camp to Duke Ferdinand of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel.

[9] He also embarked on a career as a courtier, being appointed a Gentleman Usher Daily Waiter to the royal household of George III in 1765, and continued with his Germany secondment until 1768.

In May the same year Guydickens served on the court martial of Lieutenant-Colonel James Cockburn, who had been in command of Sint Eustatius when the island was captured by the French on 26 November 1781.

[16] While in Hyde Park in the evening of 16 August 1792 Guydickens was caught by Thomas Cannon and William Haywood, two Coldstream Guards privates, undertaking homosexual acts with John Scott, an 18-year-old lawyers' clerk.

[8] Guydickens' trial at the Court of King's Bench was repeatedly postponed, with many of the military witnesses having left to serve in the Flanders campaign, the French Revolutionary Wars having begun.

[3] Colonel William Grinfield replaced Guydickens in command of the 3rd Foot Guards and led the regiment on service in the Flanders campaign.

He was found to have actively solicited homosexual men, bringing them back to his home where he sometimes had sex with them before beginning blackmail, and two years later was transported to Australia.