suc. fa. 20 Sept. 1643 (a minor) as 2nd earl of CARNARVON
First sat 1 May 1660; last sat 14 Dec. 1708
b. 25 Oct. 1632, s. and h. of Robert Dormer†, earl of Carnarvon and Anna Sophia, da. of Philip Herbert†, 4th earl of Pembroke. educ. MA Oxf. 1648. m. (1) in or bef. 1653, Elizabeth (1633-78), da. of Arthur Capell†, Bar. Capell of Hadham, and sis. of Arthur Capell, later earl of Essex. 3s. d.v.p., 3da. (1 d.v.p.), (2) in or about Jan. 1679,1 Mary (1655-1709), da. of Montagu Bertie, 2nd earl of Lindsey, s.p.m. d. 29 Nov. 1709; will 30 July 1709, pr. 1710-12.2
Hereditary chief avenor and kpr. of the king’s hawks.3
Associated with: Ascott House, Wing, Bucks.; Eythrope, Bucks.; Tottenham, Mdx. 1666; Lindsey House, Westminster, London.
Likenesses: oil on canvas, by Sir P. Lely, sold at Sotheby’s, 7 June 2006; Oil on canvas by Sir P. Lely, sold at Sotheby’s, 6 June 2007.
Carnarvon was descended from the Catholic Dormers of Wing in Buckinghamshire; his father had benefitted from the sale of peerages in the reign of James I and served as a royalist army officer in the first Civil War.4 In addition to his hereditary position as master of the hawks, a position for which he had to petition the king in 1660, Carnarvon’s patrimony included the Buckinghamshire manors of Ilmer, Buckland and Hughenden.5 Involved in numerous chancery cases over personal estate in Buckinghamshire, including one against his brother-in-law, Essex, in which Carnarvon confessed his earlier lack of experience in managing estates, family finances and indebtedness, he exploited the estate’s natural resources to service his own needs, timber being ‘an excrescence of the earth provided by God for the payment of debts’.6
On 1 May 1660 Carnarvon took his seat in the newly reconstituted House of Lords. He attended 77 per cent of sittings and was named to one select committee, on the bill to raise £420,000. He voted for stiffer penalties on parliamentarians and on 25 Aug. 1660 dissented from the resolution to agree with the Commons in the bill for indemnity and oblivion. Attending until the last day of the session on 29 Dec. 1660, he remained in London at his Covent Garden residence.7
Present for the start of the Cavalier Parliament on 8 May 1661, Carnarvon attended the session for 62 per cent of sittings and was named to three select committees. On 30 May 1661 the House gave him leave to go into the country; he returned on 17 June. On 11 July 1661 he was listed as being in favour of the case for the great chamberlaincy put forward by Aubrey de Vere, 20th earl of Oxford. He did not attend the session for the last five months of 1661 despite being in London with his wife. He returned in mid January 1662, only to absent himself again from 7 Mar. when he was given leave to do so by the House and entered a proxy in favour of John Egerton, 2nd earl of Bridgwater. He returned in April and attended until the prorogation on 19 May 1662.
During the 1663 session he attended 95 per cent of sittings and was named to the sessional committee for petitions and to four select committees. Philip Wharton, 4th Baron Wharton, predicted that he would oppose the attempt by George Digby, 2nd earl of Bristol, to impeach Edward Hyde, earl of Clarendon. On 3 June 1663 the House ordered that a suit between Charles Pittcarne and George Russell could not continue since it breached Carnarvon’s parliamentary privilege.
Carnarvon was present for the start of the following parliamentary session on 16 Mar. 1664 and attended thereafter for 31 per cent of sittings. He was not named to any committees. On 21 Mar. 1664, careful of his own position, Carnarvon refused a request from Lady Bristol, under threat of arrest, to present Bristol’s petition to the Lords.8 On 5 Apr. 1664 he was once again given leave to be absent and on 6 Apr. 1664 registered his proxy in favour of James, duke of York.
Carnarvon failed to attend the autumn 1664 session. On 28 Jan. 1665 he registered his proxy in favour of York and did so again on 11 Oct. for the 1665 Oxford Parliament, on 24 Sept. 1666 for the autumn session of that year and on 21 Feb. 1668 for the remainder of the 1667-9 session. He was excused attendance at calls of the House on 29 Oct. 1667 and 20 Feb. 1668 but the substance of his excuses is unknown. He failed to attend the autumn 1669 or spring 1670 sessions. On 26 Mar. 1670 Carnarvon registered his proxy in favour of York’s friend and ally, Henry Mordaunt, 2nd earl of Peterborough, who almost certainly used it to oppose the divorce bill for Lord Roos, John Manners, later 9th earl of Rutland. The proxy was vacated at the end of the session. He stayed away for the next two sessions, the House noting on 13 Feb. 1673 that his proxy had been registered. There are no details in the proxy book, although we know that the proxy had been offered to York, who turned it down in order to accept that of Theophilus Hastings, 7th earl of Huntingdon.9
On 12 Jan. 1674, after nearly ten years’ absence from the House, Carnarvon resumed his seat. He attended nearly 40 per cent of the six week long session but was not named to any committees. He missed the first four weeks of business for the next (spring 1675) session attending for only 38 per cent of sittings. Again, he was not named to any committees. Danby listed Carnarvon as an opponent of the non-resisting test and it seems that his attendance was specifically linked to the need to oppose it. On 30 Apr. 1675, during a debate on the bill in a committee of the whole he ‘stuck very fast to the country party, and spoke many excellent things against it’.10
Carnarvon did not attend the autumn 1675 session. During 1676 and early 1677 he exchanged familiar letters with Lady Grey of Ruthin, confiding his fears for his daughter’s physical and mental health. He also commiserated with Lady Hatton on her husband’s illness, explaining that he too suffered from ‘giddiness in the head’ and that he had been ill for a long time ‘and not able to mind anything’.11
Carnarvon did not resume his seat until 11 months after the start of the contentious session that had opened in February 1677. He attended 48 per cent of sittings and was named to four select committees, being listed as ‘worthy’ by Anthony Ashley Cooper, earl of Shaftesbury. His country party sympathies sit oddly against his choice of proxy recipients. On 23 Feb. 1678 he registered his proxy, this time in favour of another courtier, the former royalist soldier and close friend of Charles II, John Granville, earl of Bath. It was vacated on 12 Mar. 1678 with Carnarvon’s attendance, although a marginal note in the proxy book suggests that it was recalled.
It was almost certainly on 15 Mar. 1678 that Carnarvon made one of his rare speeches to the Lords. According to Sir Ralph Verney‡, he spoke at some length in a committee of the whole on the proposed Commons’ address to the king to declare war on France. Carnarvon’s speech included, ‘many very good things pertinent to the business, even beyond all expectation, and concluded to join with the Commons. But in this speech there was a strange mixture which might better have been left out’. Carnarvon was nevertheless complimented for speaking ‘so well for joining with the Commons’ address ... how to prevent arbitrary government is a point very necessary and worthy of consideration and undertaking’.12 On 4 Apr. Carnarvon voted Philip Herbert, 7th earl of Pembroke, guilty of manslaughter. On 1 May he received the proxy of his son-in-law Philip Stanhope, 2nd earl of Chesterfield, (vacated at the end of the session). He dissented from the resolution not to agree with the proviso offered by the Commons in the supply bill on 25 June 1678.
Carnarvon missed the first two months of the autumn 1678 session, arriving at Westminster on 19 Dec. 1678. He attended only 15 per cent of sittings and was not named to any committees. On 7 Nov. 1678 he registered his proxy in favour of Bridgwater, who was active in the test bill in committee. It was vacated with Carnarvon’s resumption of his seat in December when he was almost certainly motivated to attend by the attempted impeachment of Danby. On 23 Dec. 1678 in the debate on the articles of impeachment against Danby, Carnarvon spoke at length after ‘having been heated with wine’ and egged on ‘to display his abilities by the duke of Buckingham’ who hoped that Carnarvon would pour ridicule on the proceedings.13 Carnarvon spoke at length of the mischief of the impeachment, embarking on a comic rehearsal of English history:
My Lords, I understand but little of Latin, but a good deal of English, and not a little of the English history, from which I have learnt the mischiefs of such kind of prosecutions as these, and the ill fate of the prosecutors. I could bring many instances, and those very ancient; but my lords, I shall go no farther back than the latter end of Queen Elizabeth’s reign: at which time the earl of Essex was run down by Sir Walter Raleigh. My Lord Bacon, he ran down Sir Walter Raleigh, and your lordships know what became of my Lord Bacon. The duke of Buckingham, he ran down my Lord Bacon, and your lordships know what happened to the duke of Buckingham. Sir Thomas Wentworth, afterwards earl of Strafford, ran down the duke of Buckingham, and you all know what became of him. Sir Harry Vane, he ran down the earl of Strafford, and your lordships know what became of Sir Harry Vane. Chancellor Hyde, he ran down Sir Harry Vane, and your lordships know what became of the chancellor. Sir Thomas Osborne, now earl of Danby, ran down Chancellor Hyde; but what will become of the earl of Danby, your lordships best can tell. But let me see that man that dare run the earl of Danby down, and we shall soon see what will become of him.14
A delighted Buckingham exclaimed that Carnarvon was inspired and that ‘claret has done the business’.15 On 26 Dec. 1678, in debates on the supply bill, Carnarvon voted against insisting on the Lords’ amendment relating to the payment of money into the exchequer and registered his dissent from the resolution. The following day, he voted against Danby’s committal and was present at the prorogation on 30 Dec. which put an end to the impeachment. His conduct was probably influenced less by ideology than kinship. At or about this time he married Lady Danby’s sister. At the start of March, Danby calculated that Carnarvon would again support him in the approaching session of Parliament. Further calculations on 2 and 3 Mar. 1679 confirmed that Carnarvon would indeed support the lord treasurer.
Carnarvon attended every sitting of the first abortive week of the first Exclusion Parliament in March 1679 and was again in the House on 15 Mar. 1679 for the start of the substantive session. He attended thereafter for 95 per cent of sittings and was named to just one select committee. On 1 Apr. 1679 he voted against the early stages of the bill to attaint Danby; three days later he voted against the passage of the bill. On 14 Apr. he opposed the Commons’ amendment, dissenting from the resolution to agree with the lower House on Danby’s banishment. He attended the House until the last day of the session on 27 May 1679, on which day he probably voted for the right of the bishops to stay in the House during capital cases.
Towards the end of August 1679 Danby, from his imprisonment in the Tower, wrote in friendly terms to Carnarvon of his continuing gratitude for the latter’s support and of his fears about the king’s latest illness and the prospect of the kingdom’s ‘distraction’ if the king succumbed.16 The following March, Danby wrote again from prison with enquiries after the family and complaining that there was little in London to tempt Carnarvon to visit unless he wanted to know more about ‘the new plots’ about which there was endless speculation.17
Carnarvon ventured to London for the start of the second Exclusion Parliament on 21 Oct. 1680, attending thereafter for 88 per cent of sittings. He was again not named to any committees. Two days after the start of the session, Carnarvon and Thomas Windsor, 7th Baron Windsor, took the oaths for a second time, their oaths of the previous day considered void as having been sworn outside the prescribed hours for oath-taking. On 15 Nov. 1680 Carnarvon voted to reject the exclusion bill on its first reading. Eight days later he voted to appoint a committee to consider, in conjunction with the Commons, the state of the kingdom. On 7 Dec. 1680 he voted that William Howard, Viscount Stafford, was not guilty of treason. One month later he dissented from the resolution not to put the question on the committal of the lord chief justice, William Scroggs, although his name did not appear in the Journal.18 During the recess, Danby noted that Carnarvon was one of those who would post his bail.19 Carnarvon travelled to Oxford and attended every sitting of the brief Parliament in March 1681, but does not seem to have been particularly active and his role, if any, during the subsequent period of Tory reaction is unclear.
In the Buckinghamshire election in April 1685 the sitting Member Thomas Wharton, successively 5th Baron, earl and marquess of Wharton, campaigned strongly against the court candidates. Yet Danby appears to have asked Carnarvon to support Wharton, who was his kinsman.20 Carnarvon attended for the opening of James II’s first Parliament on 19 May 1685. With John Manners, 9th earl of Rutland, he introduced his brother-in-law, James Bertie, earl of Abingdon. According to a somewhat unreliable list compiled c.1691 by William Richard George Stanley, 9th earl of Derby, in May 1685 Carnarvon voted in favour of his bill for the restoration of estates lost in the Civil Wars.21 Carnarvon attended the session for 83 per cent of sittings and was named to three select committees, on Bangor Cathedral, reviving acts, and tillage. On 18 June 1685 he received Abingdon’s proxy (vacated on 9 November). He attended the session regularly until the abrupt prorogation on 20 Nov. 1685.
In a curious episode in October 1686, it was rumoured that Carnarvon had been ‘whipped’ in his own house at Ethrop by Robert Leke, 3rd earl of Scarsdale, Charles Spencer, later 3rd earl of Sunderland, and Thomas Wharton who also ‘did some other pecadillos of that kind in his castle’. Captain Bertie was sent to ‘relieve’ the castle but the ‘bravos’ had already made their escape.22
By 1687 Carnarvon was said to be opposed to the repeal of the Test Acts and to the king’s policies in general. Nevertheless, his behaviour during the Orange revolution in 1688 suggests a studied neutrality. He absented himself from the deliberations of the provisional government during December 1688, but he was present on the first day of the Convention in January 1689 and attended thereafter for 98 per cent of sittings. Despite his far more regular attendance after the Revolution, and the emergence of the practice of nominating all those present in the chamber to committees, he was named to only 90 select committees between 1689 and the end of his parliamentary career in 1708, a figure that suggests that he did not remain in the Lords’ chamber for the full day’s business.
On 31 Jan. 1689 Carnarvon voted against the words that would declare the prince and princess of Orange king and queen and on 4 Feb. 1689 he voted against agreeing with the Commons in the use of the word ‘abdicated’. On the 4th and 5th he was one of the conference managers on the dispute between the Houses on the abdication question but the parliamentary list for the vote on the use of the word abdicated on 6 Feb. is somewhat confusing since it marks him both as ‘content’ and as have abstained (‘went off’). On 31 May 1689 he voted against the reversal of judgments of perjury against Titus Oates and on 30 July 1689 voted to adhere to the Lords’ amendments in the case of judgments against Oates. Meanwhile, on 10 June 1689, he had again received Abingdon’s proxy (vacated with Abingdon’s attendance on 21 Oct.). Carnarvon did not attend the session after the third week of August 1689, missing the last two months of business.
Carnarvon arrived for the next session on 30 Oct. 1689 and attended thereafter for 77 per cent of sittings. On 19 Nov. 1689 he protested against the passage of the ultimately unsuccessful bill to prevent clandestine marriages. He again received Abingdon’s proxy on 20 Dec. (vacated at the end of the session) and attended until the last day of the session on 27 Jan. 1690.
Before the opening of the new Parliament in 1690, Carnarvon was reckoned as a loyal court lord although his subsequent parliamentary behavior reveals a pragmatic loyalty to Carmarthen (as Danby had become) rather than any ideological commitment. He was present at the opening of Parliament on 20 Mar. 1690 and attended for 91 per cent of sittings. On 29 Apr. 1690 the House heard that Carnarvon had been assaulted by Henry Washington, a gunner on The Defiance, who impressed the waterman then rowing Carnarvon, breaching Carnarvon’s parliamentary privilege as well as causing an ‘indignity’ to his person. The case was referred to the committee for privileges and on 3 May 1690, in Carnarvon’s presence, Washington begged pardon of the House and was discharged on payment of his fees.
On 2 Oct. 1690 he attended the House for the new session at which he was present for some three-quarters of all sittings. On 6 Oct. he voted in favour of release of Peterborough and of James Cecil, 4th earl of Salisbury, from the Tower. On 31 Oct. he again received Abingdon’s proxy (vacated at the end of the session). He attended the session until 29 Dec. 1690, one week before the adjournment.
On 12 Mar. 1691 it was reported that Carnarvon, Carmarthen and John Egerton, 3rd earl of Bridgwater, were supporting the interest of Carmarthen’s son-in-law, James Herbert, in the subsequently controverted Aylesbury by-election.23 The extended Dormer family was divided by the polarizing campaign, but Carnarvon’s allegiances remained firmly behind Carmarthen. Even so, Herbert lost the election.
On 22 Oct. 1691 Carnarvon attended the House for the start of the new session and attended for 84 per cent of sittings. He resumed his seat six days after the start of the November 1692 session and again attended for 84 per cent of sittings. On 31 Dec. 1692 he voted to commit the place bill, voting in favour of the measure on 3 Jan. 1693 and protesting against its rejection, one of the rare occasions on which he differed from Carmarthen. On 4 Feb. 1693 he voted Charles Mohun, 4th Baron Mohun, not guilty of murder.
On 14 Nov. 1693, one week after the start of the next session, it was noted at a call of the House that he was excused attendance. He arrived three days later and subsequently attended 86 per cent of sittings. On 17 Feb. 1694 he voted against a reversal of Chancery’s dismission in the cause Montagu v. Bath. He resumed his seat at Westminster for the next session on 20 Nov. 1694, attending thereafter for 82 per cent of sittings. On 23 Jan. 1695 he dissented from the resolution to accept an amendment in the bill to regulate treason trials. Although he lost his daughter Anne to smallpox over the weekend of 2 Feb. 1695, he was back in the House the following Monday.24 He received Abingdon’s proxy on 10 Apr. 1695 (vacated with Abingdon’s attendance on 1 May) and attended until the prorogation of 3 May 1695.
Following the dissolution in October, Carnarvon, Abingdon and Leeds (as Carmarthen had become) again backed James Herbert’s candidature for Aylesbury, this time with success but only after Carmarthen applied pressure on the returning constables and the committee for elections had dismissed petitions from the defeated candidate. Carnarvon attended the Lords for the opening of Parliament on 22 Nov. 1695 and attended for 77 per cent of sittings. A by-election for the Buckinghamshire county seat in February 1696 followed Wharton’s succession to the peerage. Carnarvon joined with Whig lord lieutenant Bridgwater to support the successful candidature of William Cheyne‡.25
In the aftermath of the discovery of the Assassination Plot, Carnarvon signed the Association on 28 Feb. 1696 and attended sporadically until the prorogation at the end of April. Resuming his seat on 12 Nov. 1696, three weeks after the start of the next session, he attended two-thirds of all sittings. Another by-election in Buckinghamshire at the end of December brought Carnarvon into the fray on behalf of the Tory Sir John Verney‡ (later Viscount Fermanagh [I]) against Wharton’s candidate, Henry Neale‡. Neale topped the poll.
Back in the House on 18 Dec. 1696, Carnarvon opposed the second reading of the bill to attaint Sir John Fenwick‡ and three days later voted against the third reading. He attended until the prorogation of 16 Apr. 1697 and resumed his seat at the start of the December 1697 session. He attended 70 per cent of sittings, during which time he voted against committal of the bill to punish the Tory Charles Duncombe‡ on 15 Mar. 1698. He received the proxy of William Fermor, Baron Leominster, on 17 June 1698 (vacated at the end of the session). On 22 June 1698 he again received Abingdon’s proxy (vacated at the end of the session), attending until three days before the prorogation in July.
The 1698 general election for Buckinghamshire again involved Carnarvon in support of William Cheyne‡. After repeated prorogations, Carnarvon resumed his seat at Westminster on 16 Dec. 1698, after which he attended 71 per cent of sittings. On 8 Feb. 1699 he voted against agreeing with the committee resolution which offered to assist the king in retaining the Dutch guards, dissenting from the resolution. After the prorogation in May Carnarvon next attended the House on 29 Nov. 1699, 13 days after the start of the session. He attended two- thirds of all sittings and on 1 Feb. 1700 was forecast as being in favour of the bill to continue the East India Company as a corporation. On 8 Feb. he dissented from the resolution to put the question as to whether the Scottish colony of Darien was consistent with the good of the English plantation trade. On 23 Feb. 1700 he voted to adjourn the House during pleasure, a measure which would prevent the House from resolving into a committee of the whole to discuss two amendments to the East India bill. He attended the House until the penultimate day of the session in mid April.
Carnarvon was again active in the general election campaign of January 1701 on behalf of the Tory interest in Buckinghamshire, supporting Cheyne (now Viscount Newhaven [S]) and Sir John Verney against the Whigs, Goodwin Wharton‡ and Robert Dormer‡.26 Wharton topped the poll but Cheyne retained the second seat. Carnarvon attended the new Parliament on 14 Feb. 1701, eight days after it opened and attended two-thirds of all sittings. On 20 Mar. 1701 he protested against the resolution not to send to the Commons the address relating to the Partition Treaty; on 16 Apr. 1701 he protested against the resolution to appoint a committee to draw up an address against the punishment of the four impeached lords (and against resolutions to expunge the reasons for this protest) and on 9 June 1701 he protested against the resolution not to appoint a committee to meet with the Commons’ committee regarding the impeachment. Five days later he again protested against the message to the Commons asking for a conference and against the resolution to insist on the appointment of a committee of both Houses on the impeachment. On 17 June 1701 he dissented from the decision to move into Westminster Hall and proceed with the impeachment of John Somers, Baron Somers, and again from the resolution to put the question of guilt in the court; in Westminster Hall, he voted with the minority against Somers’ acquittal. He attended for the prorogation on 24 June 1701. In the second general election of 1701, Carnarvon does not seem to have been active and Cheyne lost his seat to the Whig Robert Dormer.
Carnarvon attended the new Parliament on 9 Jan. 1702 and attended the session for 54 per cent of sittings, acting as one of the conference managers on the accession of Queen Anne on 8 Mar. 1702. Carnarvon was in no hurry to attend the queen’s first Parliament in October 1702 and missed the first six weeks of business, arriving on 30 Nov. 1702. He attended 45 per cent of sittings. He attended the House on 3 Dec. 1702 when the House voted on Somers’ wrecking amendment to the occasional conformity bill, a bill which, according to Daniel Finch, 2nd earl of Nottingham, Carnarvon supported. On 16 Jan. 1703 he voted against the next wrecking amendment to the penalty clause. He attended the House on 30 Jan. 1703 for prayers before processing with eight bishops to the abbey for the traditional martyrdom sermon.27 On 22 Feb. 1703 he protested against the resolution not to commit the bill to establish a landed qualification for Members of the Commons.
By the time of the autumn session, Carnarvon was still reckoned to be a supporter of a new attempt to pass the occasional conformity bill. He attended the session for the first time on 26 Nov. 1703 and attended half of all sittings. On 14 Dec. 1703 he again voted in favour of the bill, dissenting from its rejection by the Lords. On 1 Mar. 1704, in debates on the Scotch Plot, Carnarvon dissented from the inclusion of a phrase in the address to the Crown concerning the convicted Jacobite James Boucher that would prevent the granting of a pardon without a full confession. Then on 3 Mar. he protested at the resolution that the key to the Gibberish Letters be made known only to the queen and those members of the Lords’ committee examining the plot. On 25 Mar. 1704 he dissented from the resolution to put the question whether the failure to censure the plotter Ferguson encouraged the enemies of the crown. Still taking the Tory line, on 16 Mar. 1704 he dissented from the resolution to agree with the committee of the whole House and remove the name of high Church Tory Robert Byerley‡ from the list of commissioners for public accounts.
Missing the first month of the October 1704 session, Carnarvon attended for only 27 per cent of sittings. His arrival on 24 Nov. was almost certainly timed to support the reintroduction of the occasional conformity bill. On 15 Dec. 1704 he dissented from the resolution against a second reading of the bill and to its rejection.
Having been noted as excused attendance at a call of the House on 12 Nov. 1705, Carnarvon attended the new Parliament four weeks after its opening and attended 21 per cent of sittings. On 3 Dec. 1705 he protested three times against resolutions relating to the bill for securing the queen’s person and the protestant succession, including resolutions on the rider to prevent the lords justices giving the royal assent to any repeal or alteration of the Test Acts. He attended the House on 6 Dec. for the Church in danger debate, entering a protest when the House resolved to agree with the committee that the Church was not in danger. In the new year of 1706 he received the proxy of Montagu Bertie, 2nd earl of Abingdon, for the remainder of the session. On 11 Mar. 1706 he was twice named as a manager of conferences relating to the privilege of both Houses.28
Carnarvon attended the start of the December 1706 session and thereafter attended 40 per cent of sittings. On 8 Feb. and 10 Mar. 1707 (almost certainly for divisions on the Union) he again received the proxy of Abingdon (vacated at the end of the session), attending until six days before the prorogation in early April. He did not attend the ten-day session later that month, nor did he attend the opening of the first Parliament of Great Britain in October 1707. He finally arrived at Westminster on 1 Dec. 1707 and attended 34 per cent of sittings up to the prorogation on 1 Apr. 1708. He attended the new Parliament on one day only, 14 Dec. 1708, to take the oaths. This proved to be his final ever attendance at the House. On 29 Nov. 1709, five months after the death of his wife, he died at Ascott House, aged 77.
Carnarvon’s three sons all predeceased him. His daughters Elizabeth and Isabella were married respectively to the 2nd earl of Chesterfield, and to Charles Coote, 3rd earl of Mountrath [I], who both became involved in a law suit over the disposition of the estate.29 The earldom was extinguished at Carnarvon’s death but his cousin, the Roman Catholic Rowland Dormer, succeeded as 4th Baron Dormer.
B.A.- 1 Verney ms mic. M636/32, Sir R. to E. Verney, 6 Jan. 1679.
- 2 TNA, PROB 20/781; DEL 10/81.
- 3 Eg. 3350, f. 9.
- 4 HP Commons 1558-1603, ii. 49-50; JMH, xxix. 22.
- 5 CSP Dom. 1660-1, p. 49, 76; Eg. 3350, ff. 9-10; Bodl. Clarendon 72, f. 85; VCH Bucks. ii. 329, iii. 60, iv. 62.
- 6 TNA, C6/83/76, C6/83/51, C6/285/33, C6/401/61, C6/308/51. C6/402/9, C6/405/55, C6/377/1; Eg. 3357, f. 32b; Pepys Diary, viii. 201.
- 7 Verney ms mic. M636/17, T. Stafford to Sir R. Verney, 13 May 1661.
- 8 Ibid. M636/19, Sir N. Hobart to Sir R. Verney, n.d.
- 9 Bodl. Carte 77, ff. 536-7.
- 10 Timberland, i. 158.
- 11 Add. 29557, ff. 429, 431, 435.
- 12 Verney ms mic. M636/31, E. to Sir R. Verney, 18 and 21 Mar. 1678.
- 13 Timberland, i. 225-31.
- 14 Ibid. 230.
- 15 Ibid. 230.
- 16 Add. 38849, f. 165.
- 17 Add. 63650 L, ff. 25-26.
- 18 Bodl. Carte 81, f. 656.
- 19 Add. 28042, f. 83.
- 20 Browning, Danby, i. 368n.
- 21 Lancs. RO, DDK 1615/9.
- 22 Verney ms mic. M636/41, E. to J. Verney, 4 and 11 Oct. 1686.
- 23 Ibid. M636/45, J. to Sir R. Verney, 12 Mar. 1691.
- 24 Add. 70121, A. Pelham to Sir E. Harley, n.d.; Add. 72525, f. 163.
- 25 Verney ms mic. M636/49, C. Stewkeley to Sir R. Verney, 2 Feb. 1696.
- 26 Ibid. M636/51, C. Gardiner to Sir J. Verney, 23 Nov. 1700; Sir J. Verney to Cheyne, 10 Dec. 1700.
- 27 Nicolson, London Diaries, 119.
- 28 Ibid. 384.
- 29 TNA, PROB 18/31/117, 121 and 133.