THOMPSON, John (1648-1710)

THOMPSON, John (1648–1710)

cr. 4 May 1696 Bar. HAVERSHAM

First sat 20 Oct. 1696; last sat 16 May 1710

MP Gatton 1685-7, 1689-4 May 1696

bap. 31 Aug. 1648, 2nd but 1st surv. s. of Maurice Thompson, merchant, of Worcester House, Mile End Green, and Bishopsgate Street, London and 2nd w. Dorothy, da. of John Vaux of Pemb. educ. Lee, Kent (Mr. Watkin); L. Inn 1664; Sidney Sussex, Camb. 1664, B.A. 1667; travelled abroad 1670. m. (1) 14 July 1668, Lady Frances (d. 3 Mar. 1705), da. of Arthur Annesley, earl of Anglesey, wid. of John Windham of Felbrigg, Norf., 3s. (2 d.v.p.) 8da. (1 d.v.p.); (2) 10 May 1709, Martha Graham, wid. (d.1724), s.p. suc. fa. 1676; cr. Bt. 12 Dec. 1673. d. 1 Nov. 1710; will 21 Sept., pr. 11 Dec. 1710.1

Commr. for public accounts 1695-6.

Sheriff, Bucks. 1669-70; dep. lt. Surr. Feb.-Oct. 1688.

Ld. of Admiralty 1699-1701.

Associated with: Haversham, Bucks.; Gatton, Surr.; Golden Square, Westminster (1698);2 Great Russell Street, Mdx. (1705)3 and Frith Street, Westminster.

Early Career

Thompson’s family background, despite his pretensions to ancient gentility, was based on commerce. His father and his three paternal uncles Sir William‡, George‡ and Robert Thompson‡, were all prominent and successful merchants during the Commonwealth. His father had widespread business interests that extended to Ireland, the West Indies and the American colonies. He was also a major stockholder in the East India and African Companies. At his death his personal estate was valued at over £17,000.4 Haversham’s estranged nephew, Nicholas Corsellis‡, later suggested that the estate left by Haversham’s father, Maurice, consisted of £3,000 a year from lands in England, £1,000 a year from lands in Ireland, lands and plantations in the West Indies and Virginia worth £30,000, goods and merchandise overseas worth £10,000, mortgages, stock in East India and African Companies and a personal estate worth £100,000.5

The two brief memoirs published shortly after Haversham’s death seem to have included biographical details merely as an introduction to the publication of his speeches. Both have to be treated with extreme caution owing to the inaccuracies they contain, particularly the more substantial, Memoirs, which contain memoranda written in the first person, and include a reference to ‘the loss of a second wife’, who clearly survived him.6 Nevertheless, these biographical sketches correctly indicate that Haversham’s relationship with the Annesley family was central to his rise in society. The Memoirs plausibly suggest that Thompson ‘grew into the esteem’ of Anglesey through their common friendship with Haversham’s Buckinghamshire neighbour, Philip Wharton, 4th Baron Wharton. This would date the beginning of Thompson’s connection with Annesley to about 1664 when Maurice Thompson bought the Haversham estate in Buckinghamshire, although it may have begun much earlier.7 The two families had a great deal in common: both were strongly nonconformist, both were Parliamentarian supporters, both were investing in Irish lands and both had similar trading interests. After John Thompson married Anglesey’s daughter in 1668, there are frequent mentions of him in Anglesey’s diary.8 At the time of Maurice Thompson’s death in 1676, Anglesey owed him some £1,500, and it seems unlikely that this financial connection was a new one.

Thompson appears to have had a genuine admiration for his father-in-law: two of his children, Arthur and Althamia, were named in honour of the Annesleys and he went into print to defend the earl’s memory after the Revolution.9 Nevertheless, it was a relationship that came to hold more than a modicum of self interest. In 1702, by then a peer, he was involved in litigation concerning the controverted will of the 1st earl of Anglesey’s grandson, James Annesley, 3rd earl of Anglesey. As one of the executors of the 3rd earl’s will, he sought to uphold substantial but dubious bequests to the 3rd earl’s teenage brother, Arthur Annesley, the future 5th earl of Anglesey, and his twelve-year-old cousin, also named Arthur Annesley, 4th Baron Altham [I]. The two Arthur Annesleys were rapidly married to Haversham’s daughters.

Thompson owed his baronetcy to the advocacy of his father-in-law, and Anglesey continued to press Charles II for further honours. In June 1681 Anglesey recorded that ‘the king granted now at last on much importunity to let Sir John Thomson have the Scotch viscountship’, but nothing came of this after Anglesey’s disgrace.10 Although Thompson claimed to have been amongst the first to invite William of Orange to come to England, he remained deeply suspicious of the court. As a member of the Commons he spoke out trenchantly against government corruption and a standing army, until his hopes for a peerage brought about a sudden and dramatic conversion. In November 1694 George Stepney remarked that Thompson had ‘a mind to be a lord’.11 His support in the 1695-6 session for supply and for the Association saw the king grant his wish.12

In the Lords under William III, 1696-1702

Haversham took his seat on the first day of the 1696-7 session, 20 Oct., being introduced by Thomas Wentworth, 2nd Baron Raby (later earl of Strafford) and Robert Lucas, 3rd Baron Lucas. He was present on 86 days (75 per cent) of the session and was named to 28 committees. On 18 Dec. Haversham was one of those who managed the debate in favour of a second reading for the attainder bill against Sir John Fenwick‡.13 According to one account, Haversham thought it as dangerous to let a guilty person escape as it was to convict an innocent. He answered the objection of Laurence Hyde, earl of Rochester, to a line in the bill which seemed to imply that the judicature lay in the Commons, saying that this was a case for amending the bill not rejection. Further, rejecting the bill would be an encouragement to assassins who would know they could escape as long as they could avert a trial in the normal courts by preventing the appearance of the requisite number of witnesses.14 On 22 Dec. the manuscript minutes record Haversham being given leave to be absent in the middle of the proceedings against Fenwick.15 He was recorded as present on the following day when the bill was given its third reading, and voted in its favour.

Haversham’s friend, Charles Mordaunt, earl of Monmouth (later 3rd earl of Peterborough), was subsequently accused of tampering with informants in the Fenwick case. Haversham supported him in the debates on 12 and 15 Jan. 1697. He ‘allowed there was a good deal of indiscretion in his [Monmouth’s] conduct in this matter that deserved the censure of the House, but would have it proceed no further’. The House, nevertheless, voted to send Monmouth to the Tower. The vote was taken late at night and when Sidney Godolphin, Baron (later earl of) Godolphin (later 1st Earl of Godolphin), listed those who had voted against Monmouth’s imprisonment, he stated that ‘Lord Haversham would have been of the same mind but was absent.’16 On 26 Mar., in the committee on the state of the navy, Haversham delivered in abstracts of some of the papers presented to the House by Sir George Rooke‡ and which were referred to the committee.17 On 10 Apr. Haversham was named as one of the managers of the conference on the bill to prevent the buying and selling of offices.

Haversham attended the prorogation on 21 Oct. 1697 and was present when the next session met on 3 December. During the session he was present on 112 days (85.5 per cent) and was named to 52 committees. On 10 Jan. 1698 he was named as one of the managers of the conference on the bill against corresponding with King James. On 18 Jan. James Vernon‡ revealed that ‘there are but four taken notice of in the House of Lords, who would be troubling the waters’, namely Charles Powlett, duke of Bolton, John Sheffield, marquess of Normanby (later duke of Buckingham), Thomas Grey, 2nd earl of Stamford and Peterborough (the former Monmouth), adding ‘it is thought Lord Haversham hath left them’.18

On 3 Feb. 1698 John Methuen‡ informed Henri de Ruvigny, earl of Galway [I], that Haversham ‘had matters of great complaint against your Lordship, of which he had some thoughts to acquaint the House of Lords, but I think he is of no credit there.’ On 8 Feb. he added that the king had taken care ‘to prevent my Lord Haversham moving anything in it’. On 12 Feb. Methuen reassured Galway that in the opinion of Edward Russell, earl of Orford ‘nothing of the heat about foreigners will be extendable to Ireland and that even my Lord Haversham will never mention your name to your prejudice.’19 On 5 Mar. Haversham was named to a committee to prepare heads for a conference on the bill of pains and penalties against Sir Charles Duncombe‡, and was subsequently named a manager of the resultant conferences on 7 and 10 March. He voted in favour of the bill’s committal on 15 March. On 15 June, following a conference on the impeachment of John Goudet and others on a charge of smuggling French silks into England, he entered a dissent against the resolution that the House required the Commons’ managers to be placed at the bar. On 16 June Vernon commented that Haversham and Stamford had joined William Cavendish, duke of Devonshire in ‘having some consideration for the House of Commons’.20 On 28 June he was one of the managers of the conference on the impeachments.

Haversham was present on the opening day of the new Parliament, 6 Dec. 1698. He attended on 70 days (86 per cent) of the session and was named to 33 committees. When the disbanding bill was brought up to the Lords on 19 Jan. 1699 and the first reading deferred until the 24th, Vernon noted that Haversham had showed his ‘dislike of the bill’, saying that ‘he did not fear troops, so much as arbitrary judges’.21 When the bill was given a second reading on 27 Jan., John Ellis‡ noted that it had been committed for the following day with very little debate, and that only Haversham, ‘who began first’ and Stamford spoke against it.22 On 29 Mar. Haversham was excused attendance on health grounds from the trial of Charles Mohun, 4th Baron Mohun. On 20 Apr. he was named as a manager of the conferences on bill restoring the cloth market at London’s Blackwell Hall and on 21 Apr. to manage a conference on the bill making Billingsgate a free market. He protested on 27 Apr. against the inclusion in a supply bill of a clause appointing commissioners for forfeited estates in Ireland. On 3 May he was one of the managers of the conference to discuss the Lords’ alterations to the bill for duty on paper. He attended the prorogation on 1 June.

In the ministerial revamp following Orford’s resignation from the admiralty at the end of May 1699, Haversham joined the board ‘with little entreaty’, although there then followed an unseemly row about his precedency in the commission.23 Vernon was clear that the new commission was of the king’s ‘own framing’.24 Haversham’s inclusion may have been contentious. Robert Crawford‡ thought there had been ‘a good deal of interest made to get in’ George Churchill‡ instead of Haversham, and Rooke thought that Haversham would be appointed only if the new commission had seven members.25 Thomas Thynne, Viscount Weymouth, noted in July ‘they tell me Lord Haversham makes such work in the admiralty that few are pleased with the change’.26

Haversham was present when the next session convened on 16 Nov. 1699. He attended on 60 days (nearly 76 per cent of the total) and was named to 14 committees. On 18 Jan. 1700, when the Lords considered the Darien affair, it was reported that the only English peer who ‘roared against our company’ in the Lords was Haversham, ‘who said it was a Jacobitish villainous design from the very beginning’. He is ‘a new made lord, a great crony of Mr Carstares, and these expressions can be made appear to be what Mr Carstares has suggested to him’. Carstares was a nonconformist preacher who was said to have persuaded Haversham ‘that in the event it will ruin the Presbyterians by displeasing the king if they went into it, and that it was necessary for them here to preserve their brethren in Scotland.’27 Haversham was the recipient of papers registering the formal consent of several people to Siderfin’s estate bill read in committee on 22 January.28 On 23 Jan. Haversham entered a dissent to the reversal of the judgment in Williamson v. the Crown. On 23 Feb. he opposed a resolution to adjourn into a committee of the whole in order to discuss amendments to the bill for continuing the East India Company as a corporation. The next day he had to explain to the House that one of his servants, whom he had agreed should give evidence on behalf of Henry Howard, 7th duke of Norfolk, for his divorce bill, had absconded.

On 3 Apr. 1700, when the bill to resume the Irish forfeitures and to impose a two shilling land tax was brought up from the Commons, Haversham ‘fired against it, as a bill fit to be rejected’. When the Lords resumed their debate on the bill on the 4th he continued to advocate its rejection and entered a protest against the second reading.29 He was also named as a manager for all three conferences on the subject on 9-10 Apr. and entered a protest against the subsequent resolution not to insist on the Lords’ amendments (10 April). On 4 Apr. he reported to the House from the admiralty on the number of ships appointed to police the act preventing the export of wool from England and Ireland.

During his time as a commissioner Haversham continually ruffled feathers. He became embroiled in attempts to investigate allegations of corruption and inefficiency at the navy board, particularly against Dennis Lyddell‡ and Charles Sergison‡. After the charges were dismissed in March as ‘maliciously inspired’ relations between the admiralty and the navy board deteriorated to the point that Haversham refused to attend any joint sessions, until ordered to do so by the king.30

Haversham played a role in the controversy surrounding the fate of Captain Kidd.31 In May 1700 he and other members of the admiralty appeared in King’s Bench unsuccessfully as witnesses for Mr Fitch a master-builder, accused by Edmund Dummer, late surveyor of the navy, of defamation.32 Haversham could be assiduous in his administrative duties; on 15 and 20 Jan. 1701 he was one of the admiralty commissioners who met with the navy commissioners at the treasury to solve certain administrative problems.33

Not surprisingly a printed list of Whig lords believed to have been drawn up in the summer of 1700 marked Haversham as a probable Junto supporter. He was present at the prorogation of 23 May 1700. On 25 May Vernon reported that the king had spoken to Haversham, Charles Gerard, 2nd earl of Macclesfield, and John Smith‡ ‘to let them know that he has no other thoughts but of employing the Whigs, which seemed well satisfied’. Haversham had responded that ‘they ought likewise to have their chief reliance’ on the king.34 He was present at the prorogation of 1 August.

Haversham attended the opening day of the 1701 Parliament on 10 Feb., was present on 82 days (78 per cent) of the session and was named to 17 committees. When the king’s speech was debated by the Lords on 12 Feb., he joined Peterborough in demanding a vigorous denunciation of the French, rather than the simple vote of thanks propounded by Rochester and Daniel Finch, 2nd earl of Nottingham.35 The address adopted on the 13th encouraged the king to enter into alliances for the preservation of Europe. He also reported on several matters from the admiralty to the House.

Haversham was still heavily involved with the Annesleys. On 27 Feb. 1701 Haversham was one of four peers nominated by the 3rd earl of Anglesey (his wife’s nephew) and ordered by the Lords to wait on the countess of Anglesey ‘to persuade her to return to her husband’. Rochester reported on their efforts on 3 Mar., whereupon leave was given for a bill of separation on the grounds of cruelty, which in turn prompted a lone protest from Haversham, who was unimpressed by the failure of the attempted reconciliation. He declared that the supposed impossibility of a reconciliation was ‘very precarious’ and that the ‘evangelic law’ did not permit perpetual separation without absolute divorce. Underlying his anxiety were more mundane economic concerns. The countess, one of James II’s illegitimate daughters, had brought a dowry variously valued at between £18,000 and £20,000 into the Annesley family and now demanded substantial alimony as well as a generous settlement on the couple’s infant daughter, Lady Catherine Annesley. According to Haversham the financial cost to Anglesey of a separation would be higher than the cost of an outright divorce. Anglesey was determined to prevent his estranged wife from having custody of their child and appointed Haversham as her guardian after his death in January 1702.36

On 2 and 10 Apr. 1701 Haversham was named to manage a conference on the partition treaties. The subsequent impeachment of former Whig ministers saw his son, Maurice Thompson, the future 2nd Baron Haversham, then a member of the Commons, denounce the partiality of the proceedings and attempt to impeach Edward Villiers, earl of Jersey.37 On 6 and 10 June Haversham was named to manage a conference on the impending impeachments, particularly the appointment of a joint committee to consider methods of proceeding. When a third conference was held on 13 June, Haversham’s conduct provoked a confrontation with the Commons. In response to the Tory Sir Bartholomew Shower‡ ‘inveighing against the manner of the Lords’ judicature’ as ‘abhorrent to justice’, Haversham claimed that some of the remarks of the managers on the Commons’ side amounted to a reflection on ‘the honour and justice’ of the House of Lords and retaliated by accusing the Commons of partiality. Gilbert Burnet, bishop of Salisbury, reported that Haversham ‘speaking to the point of lords being partial in their own cases, and therefore not proper judges’, responded that the Commons ‘had plainly showed their partiality, in impeaching some Lords for facts, in which others were equally concerned with them, who yet were not impeached by them, though they were still in credit and about the king; which showed that they thought neither the one nor the other were guilty’. This, in turn, gave the Commons the quarrel they were looking for. They withdrew and asked that the Lords ‘inflict such punishment upon the said lord, as so high an offence against the House of Commons doth deserve’.38 Haversham’s answer presented to the Lords on 19 June denied any design to reflect upon the Commons and denied using the words specified in the charge. Apart from Jersey, he cited Vernon, Sir Joseph Williamson‡, Sir Edward Seymour‡, Sir Stephen Fox‡ and Thomas Pelham, the future Baron Pelham, as being involved in the actions mentioned in the articles of impeachment, four of whom had voted in the proceedings in the Commons. The answer was then delivered to the Commons. On 21 June the Lords resolved that unless the charge against Haversham was prosecuted by the Commons before the end of the session, they would declare him innocent, and accordingly did so.39 Meanwhile, Haversham voted, as expected, for the acquittal of John Somers, Baron Somers, on 17 June and of Orford on 23 June. On the last day of the session, 24 June, Haversham was one of four peers selected by the Lords to count the ballot for the election of nine of their members to consider a union of England and Scotland.

With the eclipse of the Junto and a new more Tory-inclined set of ministers, the king came under pressure to remove some of the remaining Whigs from office, particularly Haversham. According to James Brydges*, the future duke of Chandos, Vernon was ordered to prepare a warrant for Haversham’s replacement by Henry Paget, later Baron Burton (the future earl of Uxbridge). Out of friendship to Haversham, he delayed it until the king had left the country, knowing that he did not sign such warrants while abroad; ‘by that means Lord Haversham came to be continued all the summer in the commission, to the great disgusting of Sir George Rooke and the other admirals’.40 Haversham clearly felt under pressure, referring to ‘the allowances that are due to a man that has the wind in his face’.41 He resigned, writing to the king on 12 Dec. 1701, that he would have resigned before

had I not thought in time of danger a watchful eye would be of as much service to your majesty as a working head but things looking now with a better appearance I humbly hope your majesty will not deny my request. I am the single person your majesty’s favour in putting into a place of trust has lessened, but the reflection on what I have seen was much more afflicting than anything that has personally happened to me. I shall watch for a proper minute to lay them before your majesty and doubt not from your royal goodness to grant of this humble request.42

His resignation probably pre-empted his dismissal. Anthony Hammond‡ suggested on 19 Dec. 1701, that as Rooke ‘would not sit at the admiralty with my Lord Haversham, so his Lordship has quitted’. He was replaced by Thomas Herbert, 8th earl of Pembroke, as lord high admiral. Haversham was now said to have ‘gone into my Lord Somers part and measures’.43 One newsletter noted that ‘there has been no good harmony between his Lordship and the other commissioners and the commissioners of the navy for some time past’, but also reported that ‘others think that his Lordship has an eye upon the first commissioner’s place of the treasury, which is vacant by the resignation of the Lord Godolphin, or else to be Lord Privy Seal.’44 Haversham’s biographers credited Pembroke’s appointment as having soured Haversham’s temper to such an extent that henceforth he opposed the measures of the court.45

Haversham was present on the second day of the 1701-2 Parliament, 31 Dec., attending on 45 days (45 per cent) of the session, and being named to 15 committees. On 1 Jan. 1702 he signed the address concerning the Pretender being owned by France. On 2 Jan., he and Thomas Wharton, 5th Baron (later marquess of) Wharton, were ordered to bring in a bill for abjuring the Pretender.46 On 8 Mar. Haversham was one of the managers of the conference on the death of William and the accession of Anne, but although he attended the following day he then absented himself from the House until 27 Apr., when he took the abjuration. On 7 May he was named as a manager of the conference on the bill altering the oath of abjuration. On 20 Feb. 1702 Haversham had presented a petition to the Commons relating to the Irish forfeited estates. Although many such petitions were rejected, a motion that the petition be brought up was carried by 102-97 and after it had been read, the standard motion that it should be left to lie on the table until the other petitions were considered was carried 156-123. According to Sir Richard Cocks‡ ‘they remembered my Lord Haversham’s behaviour last sessions more than their own integrity so they made us divide for it’.47 On 30 Apr. the trustees for Irish forfeited estates were heard and a bill ordered. Managed by Samuel Ogle‡ and then Henry Blaake‡ it had an uneventful passage through both Houses passing its third reading in the Lords on 20 May.

Meanwhile, as mentioned above, the death of the 3rd earl of Anglesey in January 1702 saw Haversham involved in litigation concerning his controverted will. Contemporaries pictured a design by Haversham and others to siphon off Anglesey’s wealth; thus ‘Lady Haversham stands by Mr [Arthur] Annesley holding up her apron to receive the money he picks out of my Lord’s pocket’, while Haversham dictated the will to ‘Sloane, the counsellor’.48 Haversham, Arthur Annesley and Mr Justice Coote were put in control of much of Anglesey’s estate, with Haversham being made guardian of the 3rd earl’s daughter, Lady Catherine Annesley, and securing portions for his six as yet unmarried daughters of £1,000 each.49 In the years that followed, a series of marriages took place, after Arthur Annesley ordered payments for all eight of Haversham’s daughters in January 1704.50

Anne’s reign, 1702-10

Despite later assumptions, it is probably more accurate to see Haversham at this stage as a determined ministerial opponent – a maker of mischief – rather than as a convert to the Tories. He still had strong links with the Whigs and in April 1702 the propagandist and publisher, George Ridpath, recommended him to James Hamilton, 4th duke of Hamilton [S], as a suitable intermediary with the English court: Haversham, he wrote,

being a Dissenter, a man of sense and resolution, and perfectly opposite to the Tory party, will be very proper to deal with the ministers here to inform ours in Scotland how things are carried on in this nation. It is true that lord had formerly an ill idea given him of the affair of Caledonia, but I am informed that his notions about it have been corrected since.51

By June Haversham was sufficiently close to Hamilton to send him a commentary on both ministry and ministers.

Haversham missed the first few days of the 1702-3 session, first attending on 31 October. He was present on 56 days (65 per cent of the total) and was named to 24 committees. When the bill against occasional conformity was brought up to the Lords on 2 Dec. 1702 and given a first reading, Haversham was the third peer to speak. He ‘owned himself a Dissenter; but caressed the bishops most highly. He concluded with a motion that it might be read a second time tomorrow’, which was agreed to.52 On 9 Dec. he signed the Lords’ resolution against tacking. On 17 Dec. he was named as one of the managers of the conference on the bill to prevent occasional conformity, as he was again on 9 January. About January 1703 Nottingham thought he would oppose the bill against occasional conformity. On 16 Jan. his opposition to the bill prompted him to check the register of proxies, whereupon he discovered a fresh entry in which Meinhard Schomberg, 3rd duke of Schomberg had given his proxy to Prince George, duke of Cumberland. This led not only to the duke’s hurried arrival in person but to a new standing order regulating the use of proxies.53 Haversham voted on that day to retain the penalty clause in the bill, a wrecking amendment.

On 11 Jan. 1703 Haversham spoke ‘with great warmth, as usual’ in the debate on the clause in the bill enabling the queen to settle a revenue for supporting the dignity of Prince George in case he survived her, and which included a clause specifically allowing him to sit in the Lords, despite the prohibition on foreign born peers in the Act of Succession. Like other leading Whigs, he regarded the clause as a tack, and opposed it ‘because now was the time to affirm our rights ... when the subscription of the late order (against tacks) was fresh in every man’s memory’. Further, he would rather ‘part with an article of his creed’ than with a clause in the Act of Succession. He did, however, favour allowing those foreign-born peers to sit to whom the nation was indebted. On 19 Jan. Haversham again joined those opposing the clause. He also complained on 13 Jan. when Nottingham laid before the House copies rather than the original letters on naval affairs that had been called for. Nottingham satisfied the House by insisting that he had himself compared them to the originals, and Haversham’s attempt to smear Nottingham as ‘too great to observe the commands of this House’ failed miserably.54

In April 1703 Haversham attempted to obtain promotion for a lieutenant Andrew Graham (perhaps a relation of Martha Graham who would become his second wife). He told John Churchill, duke of Marlborough, that his favour ‘calls the more for my acknowledgment as it occasions your grace a repeated trouble’, and ‘’tis the only thing I ever will I think myself obliged in honour to do him the utmost service I can and have the vanity to believe when others have been made colonels that I may pretend to merit enough for to ask of the queen a captain’.55

Haversham first attended the 1703-4 session on 22 November. He was present on 51 days of the session (only nine of them before the turn of the year), 52 per cent of the total, and was named to 16 committees. He was forecast by Charles Spencer, 3rd earl of Sunderland, in November 1703 as likely to oppose the bill against occasional conformity, a view Sunderland confirmed at the end of the month in a second forecast. On 14 Dec. Haversham argued that it was not a proper time to introduce such a bill as it affected ‘such as have always been serviceable to the government, and are some of the best friends to it.’ Having discussed the reasons why the bill was ‘unseasonable’, he then changed tack to outline one further danger to the crown, ‘when all the favour is bestowed upon one or two persons, when all the power by sea and land is either virtually or openly in one hand; when all the offices, like a set of locks, are commanded by one master key; I pray God it may never again prove fatal both to crown and country.’56 He duly voted against the bill. On 15 Jan. 1704 Vernon sent Charles Talbot, duke of Shrewsbury the speech delivered by Haversham on that occasion: ‘how it comes to be printed I know not, but they say he denies having a hand in it, but it agrees exactly with what he spoke. Those who heard him, wished a great deal of it had been unsaid, and like it worse now it is in print’.57

On 9 Dec. 1703 a petition had been read in the Lords relating to abuses in the victualling office, which was referred to a committee. On 22 Dec. the committee met with Haversham in the chair, evidence was considered and John Tutchin ordered to bring witnesses to prove the poor state of the provisions. Haversham was again in the chair for further meetings on the 5th, 9th, 11th, 19th, 23rd, 26th and 29th. On 2 Mar. the committee accepted a report drafted by Haversham, which was presented that day to the House, and agreed to after a division, in which the prince’s council was criticized, not a matter likely to improve his standing with the queen.58

On 3 Feb. 1704 Haversham attended the committee on the estate bill of Joseph Grainge, to inform them that Grainge’s wife, Elizabeth (Haversham’s daughter) consented to the bill, which concerned her jointure rights. The bill failed in the Commons, but it was re-introduced in the following session, and on 29 Jan. 1705 Haversham testified to the committee his own consent to the bill, which then passed both Houses.59 On 13 Feb. 1704 Haversham attended a large gathering at Sunderland’s house in St James’s Square, at which according to Charles Bennet, 2nd Baron Ossuslton (later earl of Tankerville), ‘there tea drunk and our discourse was only about the Scotch Plot which the papers was before the House of Lords’.60 Haversham spoke in the House against the recruitment bill ‘you have just now read’ (so probably at its second reading on 15 Mar.) which he regarded as subjecting commoners to an illegal and arbitrary power. Further, ‘the difficulties of proportioning the numbers each county or district is to find, as well as where to lodge the coercive power, are so many and so great, that they seem to be almost insuperable’.61 On 21 Mar. Haversham signed two of the three protests against the recruiting bill, but, perhaps significantly, he did not sign the protest against the rejection of the rider that no person shall be obliged to serve as a soldier without the consent of the churchwardens and overseers of the poor, possibly an indication of his roots as a Dissenter.

Haversham missed the opening of the 1704-5 session, first attending on 10 November. He was present on 36 days of the session, 36 per cent of the total and was named to 13 committees. On 10 Nov. Haversham had ‘moved that he might be heard as to many things he has to complain of and are amiss and seems very full and hot to bring out something’, but the Whigs ‘got the day assigned him put off, to Thursday seven night [23 Nov.], at which he was very angry’.62 On 19 Nov. Godolphin wrote to Robert Harley, the future earl of Oxford, ‘we have nothing now to fear but Lord Haversham’s bomb.’63 His second attendance on 23 Nov. saw the first of what was to become an annual series of speeches intended to castigate the ministry and to force a debate on the state of the nation. In it Haversham magnified the danger from France, which would exploit the dangerous situation in Scotland, where the Scottish had made a bill of exclusion, although ‘it bears the title of an Act of Security’. To Haversham this had been promoted by the enemies of ‘the English succession’. Led by a brave nobility with a numerous and stout common people, ‘who is that man who can answer what such a multitude, so armed, so disciplined, with such leaders, may do’, especially as ‘there will never be wanting all the promises, and all the assistance, France can give.’ He ended with a quote from Bacon warning against ‘the spark that may set all on fire.’64

Haversham’s speech certainly generated plenty of contemporary comment. According to William Nicolson, bishop of Carlisle, Haversham’s ‘truly eloquent’ speech, praised military success on land and at sea, but then proceeded to reveal that the admiralty’s secrets had been betrayed to the French, the French fleet had been victualled in England or Ireland, trade was suffering and referred to the secret will of the prince which saw the act of security passed in Scotland.65 Narcissus Luttrell‡ observed that Haversham ‘made a speech relating to the Scottish act of security and the French fleet being victualled by some of her majesty’s subjects’,66 while George Cholmondeley†, later 2nd earl of Cholmondley, wrote that ‘Haversham hath let off his speech among the Lords and awakened them into a consideration of the state of the fleet and the state of Scotland’.67 Orford told Lady Granby that ‘Haversham had made a long speech to the House, but accused no particular person, as ‘twas thought he would’. He lauded the ‘land victory’ [Blenheim], as a ‘very great one, but the sea he rather thought an escape than a gain’. For this he ‘laid the blame on the admiralty then complained of the transportation of money, saying that paper credit would not last long, and spoke much on the Scotch succession, that instead on settling of it, they had made it an exclusion’. In reply ‘little was said by any to it, but Wednesday [29 Nov.], appointed to consider of it.’68 Harley told Marlborough on the 24th ‘Haversham opened his budget yesterday, his worthy allies I doubt not but your grace will hear of. Your humble servant had the honour to be amongst the misdoers, tho he robbed the Observator for his accusation’.69 The Observator was edited by John Tutchin, Whig journalist and propagandist, who had petitioned the Commons in an attempt to expose abuses in the administration of the navy in 1697. He had also written to Harley in May 1704 on the subject of an alleged clandestine trade by means of which the French fleet had been victualled from England.70 Godolphin told Harley that Rochester and Nottingham ‘were the only men found to second Lord Haversham upon the mismanagement of naval affairs. One or two more came into the other part of the motion about Scotland’.71 A committee was duly appointed to consider the state of the navy, to which was referred a memorial of Captain Edwards brought in by Haversham.72 Haversham was actively involved in this committee; on 5 Dec. he acquainted the committee that he had received an affidavit from Edwards relating to the clandestine trade between Ireland and France and on 22 Dec. a letter was sent to Haversham containing further information on ships involved in illicit trade.73

In accordance with their order of the 24th, on 29 Nov. 1704 the Lords went into committee of the whole and debated the state of the nation for three hours, with the queen and the duchess of Marlborough in attendance.74 Haversham moved that the question should be put ‘whether the present posture of Scotland, in consequence of this act [of security], was not dangerous to England?’, but the debate was adjourned until 6 December.75 When the House again took into consideration the state of the nation on 6 Dec., Haversham, Rochester and Nottingham ‘pressed the House to pass a judgment on the Scotch Act of Security, that it was of pernicious consequence, tending to defeat the Protestant succession, and to alienate the two kingdoms from one another’.76 Haversham thought the act of security ‘a wound’, which ought to be ‘probed’ before it healed, and ‘inveighed against the new mode of our princes having, in the weightiest matters, a very few councillors; or perhaps but one’.77 The aim of this attack was then to ask who had advised the bill’s passage, but this attack on Godolphin was diverted by the Whigs, who argued for legislation to combat the perceived threat.

On 15 Dec. 1704 the bill against occasional conformity was brought up by the Commons, and rejected on the motion for a second reading. Haversham had moved the second reading, ‘declaring his resolutions to be (as they had ever been) to vote for throwing it out at last’. On 20 Dec. Haversham opposed the third reading of the bill appointing commissioners to negotiate a Union with Scotland, saying that ‘the settling of the succession this last summer was hindered by putting that matter upon the foot of a treaty; and now it was to be hindered on by the same method’.78 On 27 Feb. 1705 he was named to a committee to consider heads for a conference on the case of the Aylesbury men, Godolphin writing on that day that Haversham ‘was for conferences’, which would be asked for the following day.79

In about April 1705 on a list relating to the succession, Haversham was listed as a supporter of the Hanoverians, but there were signs that he was no longer regarded as a Whig. In April 1705 Haversham met with John Ward‡ at the home of Thomas Tufton, 6th earl of Thanet.80 In 1704 Haversham had sold his property in Gatton to Paul Docminique‡, who was returned in May 1705, the election, as Halifax informed the duchess of Marlborough, ‘depending in a manor which honest Lord Haversham has sold to a Tory’.81 Perhaps it is significant, too, that his Memoirs also date his adherence to the ‘Church’ party to 1705, as they do Haversham’s rejection of an approach from Devonshire to make his peace with the court in return for office, on the grounds that there was a need for ‘a thorough change, not a removal of three or four, before I could venture into the service.’82 However, despite his alliance with high church Tories, such as Nottingham and Rochester, he remained closely associated with Tutchin. In October 1706 Marlborough and Henry St. John, the future Viscount Bolingbroke, exasperated by Tutchin’s attacks and the inadequacies of their legal remedies against him, both complained to Harley of Tutchin’s ‘barbarous usage’ of them and both identified Haversham as Tutchin’s patron.83

Haversham was absent when the 1705 Parliament met on 25 October. He first attended on 6 Nov., being present on 21 days, some 22 per cent of the total, and being named to five committees. Haversham was one of those peers identified in October 1705 as in favour of inviting Electress Sophia of Hanover to reside in England.84 On 13 Nov. he proposed that the House consider the state of the nation, with a committee of the whole being ordered for the 15th. When the committee met, in the presence of the queen, Haversham ‘made a long speech touching the war, trade, the succession, and sending for the Princess Sophia’, which ended with a motion for an address to the queen asking her to issue such an invitation, arguing that ‘nothing can be more for the security of any throne, than to have a number of successors round about it, whose interest is always to defend the possessor from any danger’.85 Haversham’s motion, an attempt to discomfort the ministry, backfired as Godolphin had made preparations to spike Haversham’s ‘great guns’ and proposed a counter resolution.86 Haversham’s Tory allies gave in as gracefully as possible but Haversham felt unable to join them, entering a protest at the failure of the resolution on the previous question. He also arranged for the publication of his speech, which appeared on 28 December. Godolphin’s expedient led to the regency bill. On 19 Nov. when the House considered the heads of the bill, Haversham suggested that the ‘great officers’ might be members of the regency commission. On 23 Nov. in the debate on the papers presented to the House on Scotland, Haversham ‘opened the debate’, concluding with a motion for ‘repealing the clause declaring the Scots aliens’.87 On 30 Nov. he protested against the resolution that no further instructions be given to the committee of the whole House on the regency bill. On 3 Dec. he entered four protests on the regency bill, three against the rejection of riders limiting the powers of the regents and one against the passage of the bill itself. On 6 Dec. he entered a protest against the resolution that the Church was in no danger. On 31 Jan. 1706 he entered three protests on the amendments to the regency bill, his penultimate day in the House that session.

Haversham was absent when the 1706-7 session opened on 3 Dec., first attending on 14 December. He was present on 28 days of the session, a little under 33 per cent of the total, and was named to 16 committees. On 14 Jan. 1707 Haversham backed Nottingham’s motions to have all the papers relating to the proposed union with Scotland laid on the table and for Parliament to provide statutory safeguards for the Church of England before passing the Act of Union, but the matter was dropped when the ministry argued that the articles were nearly complete and would then be laid before Parliament.88 On 3 Feb. he protested against the rejection of the instruction to the committee of the whole House on the bill for securing the Church of England that would have made the Test Act of 1673 perpetual and unalterable. On 15 Feb., when the House debated the articles of Union, Haversham was ‘for amendments’.89 He also opposed the Union itself, as ‘two nations independent in their sovereignties, that have their distinct laws and interests, and what I cannot forget, their different forms of worship, church government and order’ was ‘so many mismatched pieces, of such jarring, incongruous ingredients’ which would need ‘a standing power and force, to keep us from falling asunder’. Admitting to occasional conformity, he suggested that the bishops were being asked to approve of Presbyterianism in Scotland as a true religion and in so doing ‘they give up that which has been contended for between them and the Presbyterians these 30 years.’ Thus, articles 20 and 21 reserving heritable offices and Presbyterian church government ‘seem to me like those little clouds in a warm, calm summer’s day, that are generally the seeds and attractives of approaching tempests and thunder.’ In conclusion, the succession could be guaranteed without Union, but ‘an incorporating Union [was] one of the most dangerous experiments to both nations’ and once accomplished ‘the error is irretrievable’. The speech also contained reference to the unreasonableness of ‘ten times the application and address’ being made to a ‘she-favourite’ rather than to the sovereign, ‘which is a kind of state idolatry’, presumably a dig at the duchess of Marlborough.90

On 21 Feb., in the committee of the whole on the Union, Haversham acted as a teller against agreeing to the 18th article, his concerns relating to how it affected the habeas corpus act.91 On 24 Feb., when the threat to the Church of England from the Scottish peers was mentioned, Wharton reminded them that being a Scottish Presbyterian did not preclude defence of the Church of England, ‘since there were even some sitting amongst their lordships who would venture their lives for the Church of England, and yet openly declared themselves to be at the same time occasional conformists’. Haversham rose to the bait, offering his own explanation of occasional conformity, which somewhat perplexed his audience as he ‘made a long encomium on the episcopal order’, and then ‘no less commendation to all the Protestant Churches abroad, and to the Kirk of Scotland itself, in particular’.92 Bishop Nicolson, writing about the debate, commented on Haversham, ‘always a churchman’.93 On 27 Feb. Haversham entered his dissent to all 25 articles of the Union.

He attended on the last two days of the short nine-day session of April 1707. Haversham’s Memoirs refer to him in 1707 making a ‘resolution with myself to be a constant communicant of the Church established by law’, but this part of the book is too unreliable for much weight to be placed upon it, and an earlier passage asserts that he also attended at dissenting meetings.94

Haversham was absent when the 1707-8 session convened on 23 Oct., but was present at the second sitting on the 30th. He was present on 52 days (49 per cent of the total), and was named to 18 committees. When the Lords considered the queen’s speech on 12 Nov. 1707, Wharton moved to consider of the state of the nation, in relation to the fleet and trade. Haversham was not then in the House, but when the committee of the whole on the state of the nation sat on the 19th, he was primed and ready on the ‘very low and desperate’ condition of Britain. The ‘root of all our misfortunes’ was the ministry, so the only effectual remedy was a change.95 James Calthorp reported that Wharton and Haversham ‘were the chief speakers and pretty warm, as to miscarriages in the ministry’.96 As a result a committee was appointed to consider the petition of merchants on cruisers and convoys. Haversham’s speech was printed and widely distributed, but Daniel Defoe reassured Harley that it was ‘laughed at by everybody’. Nevertheless, he prepared a counterblast.97

On 15 Dec. 1707 Haversham, Rochester and Nottingham spoke in favour of Peterborough in the committee of the whole on the state of the nation, in relation to the fleet, trade and the state of the war in Spain, and the expedition to Toulon.98 When the House debated the resolutions from this committee on 19 Dec., Haversham defended Peterborough’s conduct in Spain, while criticizing Galway, against the condemnation of the Junto Whigs.99 Apparently, Haversham ‘had the queen’s speech in his hand’ during the debate, ‘and said he hoped he stood very fair for her majesty’s favour and encouragement hinting at a part in the speech which your lordship will see in this days Gazette. This they say made the queen and most of the House laugh.’100

On 9 Jan. 1708, when the Lords returned to inquiring into the state of the war in Spain, Haversham, Nottingham, Rochester and Buckingham ‘managed’ a debate on the revelation that the battle of Almanza was ‘fought by positive orders’.101 Haversham successfully proposed that Abel Boyer be sent for to divulge his source for writing in the Post Boy that Galway had positive orders to fight at Almanza.102 On 31 Mar. Haversham entered a protest against the decision of the House to accept the resolution of the committee for privileges that the committal of Marmaduke Langdale, 3rd Baron Langdale, as a suspected papist was no breach of privilege. He last attended on the penultimate day, 31 Mar. 1708. Perhaps not surprisingly in view of the company he was now keeping, annotations to a printed list of the members of the first Parliament of Great Britain identified him as a Tory.

On 21 July 1708 Haversham waited on both the queen and Abigail Masham. On the following day the queen wrote to Marlborough with an account of his visit,

which you may easily imagine could not be agreeable to me. ... After having made me a great many compliments, he told me his business was to let me know there was certainly a design laying between the Whigs and some great men to have an address made in the next sessions of Parliament for inviting the electoral prince over to settle here, and that he would certainly come to make a visit as soon as the campaign was over, and that there was nothing for me to do to prevent my being forced to do this (as I certainly would) but my showing myself to be queen, and making it my own act. I told him I was sensible this was a thing talked of to asperse your reputation, that I was very sure neither you nor any other of my servants were in engaged in anything of this kind, and what others did I could not help, but if this matter should be brought into Parliament, whoever proposed it, whether Whig or Tory, I "should look upon neither of them as my friends, nor would never make any invitation neither to the young man, nor his father, nor grandmother". To this he answered he did not think you had anything to do in this design, but that it was certain the Whigs were laying it.

The queen asked Marlborough to find out if there is any design for a visit and to find a way to put it off, so that she did not have to refuse him leave.103

On 30 July 1708 Godolphin wrote to Marlborough of Haversham’s ‘extraordinary’ visit to the queen, on 21 July, of which he told the queen ‘that it was not hard to make a judgment of what was like to happen next winter, when people of his behaviour could meet with encouragement to come to court.’ Marlborough made essentially the same point to the queen on 28 Aug., by entertaining Haversham, she was signalling support for the Tories, after she herself had heard him make ‘the most disrespectful and injurious proposals that could be to your majesty, and heard him utter all the scandals imaginable upon those who had the honour to serve you and at that time to be in your trust’.104 To the duchess of Marlborough, this meant that Haversham was an ‘undertaker’ for Harley, who had been received by the queen, despite having so often criticized the ministry in the Lords, even with the queen present. Indeed, in her ‘heads of a conversation’ with the queen on 9 Sept., the duchess referred to a distinction between the Whigs ‘who did her such real and acceptable service in the Union with Scotland, and in the matter of the invitation’ and Lord Haversham,

who upon both those actions and many others talked so insolently and scandalously of her administration, in her own hearing, and yet that man was admitted to her presence with an air of a friend, tho he is plainly in another interest and can never serve her, and the others are kept at the greatest distance contrary to the advice and opinion of all her servants, whom she has most reason to trust.105

On 11 Nov. 1708 Haversham and Rochester were reported by William Bromley‡ to be of those peers disappointed that Nottingham was unwilling to come to London to concert matters before the session began.106 Haversham attended on the third day of the 1708-9 session, 19 November. He was present on 25 days (27 per cent of the total), and was named to six committees. On 24 Dec. 1708 James Johnston‡ wrote to Sir William Trumbull‡ that ‘all is referred to the Holy-days and to hasten conclusions then it’s moved to have the Scotch expedition &c laid before the House. The Whigs did this amongst us designedly, but why Lord Haversham [on 23 Dec.], did it in the other House I know not, he seemed to do it accidentally’.107 Heneage Finch, Baron Guernsey (later earl of Aylesford), told Nottingham that Haversham had ‘moved for a day to consider of the late invasion in Scotland, which is appointed [12 Jan. 1709]’.108 Also on 24 Dec. Bromley wrote to Harley, ‘Lord Haversham desires you will give him and me leave to wait upon you together, and some time on Monday [27th]; but if that day is not agreeable, that you will be pleased to appoint some other.’ Bromley and some unnamed peer, perhaps Haversham, arranged to meet Harley on 8 Jan. 1709.109

On 21 Jan. 1709, in a division that arose out of the dispute over the right of James Douglas, 2nd duke of Queensberry, to vote in the election of Scottish representative peers, Haversham voted in favour of the duke, despite his acquisition of a British peerage as duke of Dover, after the Act of Union. Meanwhile, on 12 Jan. 1709, when the House resolved itself into a committee of the whole on the state of the nation to discuss the attempted invasion of Scotland the previous March, Haversham delivered another of his set-piece speeches, attacking the ministry and especially its leaders.110 The result was an address for the relevant papers to be laid before the House. When the House discussed the papers on 25 Feb., Haversham followed up his attack by speaking at considerable length on the inadequacies of the ministry’s preparations.111 As Edmund Gibson†, the future bishop of London, put it, ‘the design was, to enter into the state it was in at the time of the descent, which ’tis thought would have born hard upon the ministry, the country being much unprovided for a defence’. However, Godolphin’s allies pointed out that ‘the descent being over, that enquiry could have no other end but to perplex and lose time; and therefore the debate was then fixed to the present state of North Britain; of which, I suppose, the ministry will be able to give a better account’.112 After that setback Haversham ceased to attend the debates on the matter. Indeed, after 25 Feb. he only attended twice, on 31 Mar. and 1 April. Such was Haversham’s reputation that when the Commons returned a proposed address on 2 Mar. 1709 with the addition of an amendment about securing the destruction of Dunkirk, Johnston explained it as emanating ‘from a design not to be outrun by Rochester and Haversham’.113

In May 1709 Haversham married for a second time. His relationship with his new wife, the widowed Martha Graham, appears to have created a considerable stir. Sarah Cowper recorded that he had installed his ‘tantarabus’ in May 1703, throwing his wife of 35 years out of the house despite her desperate attempts to ‘appear young and amiable in her Lord’s eyes’.114 Martha Graham was Haversham’s housekeeper, being the widow of an officer who had died in France. Boyer claimed that the Presbyterian ministers were so scandalized that they refused Haversham the sacraments, thus driving him into the Church of England.115 Haversham’s choice of Rochester and James Grahme‡ as trustees for his marriage settlement confirm his attachment to the Tories.116 Grahme’s involvement in the settlement is also suggestive of kinship to Martha Graham, which might help explain Haverham’s drift towards the Tories.

In September 1709 Haversham’s correspondence with Harley contained allusions to those ‘who are too great for subjects and can never be sovereigns ... without the subversion of a constitution’, although Haversham professed himself ‘contented after so long being in Parliament to come there very little’. However, he looked forward to waiting on Harley to see ‘how far men are changed from a private nonchalance to a positive concern for the public spirit’.117 Haversham’s criticisms of men in power may have been shaped by some sort of financial difficulty, for in September Rev. Ralph Bridges noted that Haversham’s gardener was available for other work having ‘left his service very lately by reason of my Lord’s insolvency, or at least not paying him in due time’.118 Similarly, Arthur Maynwaring‡ reported, possibly in November 1709, an idea emanating from Somers that ‘£1000 a year would be well laid out secretly upon Lord Haversham, who he was sure might be had for that’. Maynwaring thought that ‘everybody that could do the least good or harm should now be tried to be fetched in, that called himself a Whig, let him be ever so ill a man. And this admiralty affair would give them a pretence for returning to the party, and they might now talk very finely of matters being upon a right bottom, without many people’s knowing that they were paid for what they spoke’.119

Sacheverell and Tory revival

Haversham was absent when the 1709-10 session began on 15 November. He first attended on 5 Dec. and was present on 30 days, just over 32 per cent of the total. On 12 Dec. 1709 Johnston wrote that Haversham ‘is much courted both by the ministry and Junto, but tho he has given up with the Church party because they will not act, he has refused hitherto to meet with the ministry but is willing to unite with the Junto provided they convince him he says that they are against the Pretender, whom he suspects some of his Church friends are for.’120

After John Dolben‡ had impeached Sacheverell on 15 Dec. 1709 at the bar of the Lords, Thomas Bateman reported that Haversham had told him that although he was concerned that Dolben ‘should impeach a clergyman, yet he believed it might be for the Dr’s honour, as it had happened to others, who then sat in that House, and had been impeached, and that he hoped one time or other to see the Dr sit upon the bishops’ bench there.’121 After the impeachment had been brought up to the Lords, Haversham ‘made a speech desiring the House would take into consideration the state of the nation, for that he had several things to offer’, and it was ordered to consider the matter after Christmas.122 Rochester duly seconded the motion.123

Unfortunately, Haversham was too ill to attend on 9 Jan. 1710, John Bridges reporting on the 10th that ‘the town have been much disappointed of the speech which the Lord Haversham promised’ for the day after the recess. It fell to Rochester to acquaint the House that Haversham ‘had been taken during the recess with a fit of spitting blood and had been in a very dangerous condition and therefore desired there might be an adjournment of the committee till another day’. This motion was seconded by Richard Lumley, earl of Scarbrough, ‘and the lord chancellor took notice of it to the House, but no day was appointed, so that motion, and the state of the nation is at present dropped.’124 Haversham first attended after the Christmas recess on 23 Jan. 1710. On 16 Feb. he protested against the decision not to send for James Greenshields and the magistrates of Edinburgh. He then protested against the decision of the House not to adjourn, which was the precursor of an address for Marlborough’s immediate departure to Holland.

On 1 Mar. 1710, when the managers for the Commons’ impeachment were expounding on the third article of impeachment against Sacheverell, Haversham reacted to Dolben’s reference to ‘false brethren’ at the bar by moving for an adjournment; and then in the House he demanded that as Dolben had ‘dropped an expression reflecting upon the counsel, who were assigned by them’, he should be asked to explain himself. A two-hour debate ensued, during which Wharton attempted to excuse Dolben’s slip of the tongue, pointing out that Haversham had done the same in referring to the managers ‘against’ the impeachment, to which Haversham replied that it was no slip as to him most of the managers appeared to be trying to make the impeachment fail. Dolben was called in and explained that he meant only Sacheverell.125 On 9 Mar., after the Commons’ managers had begun their summing up, Godolphin moved an adjournment. Haversham objected to any delay as the judges were waiting to go on their circuits and their opinions might be needed. Having won the point, it was resolved that the judges attend until the conclusion of the trial.126 On 11 Mar., when the House debated the articles against Sacheverell, Haversham spoke in support of Nottingham’s manoeuvre to have the charges thrown out; one source detailed his contribution as ‘if law no rule, [the]n n[o] one secure of innocence and Sacheverell has had no trial’.127 On 14 Mar. he protested twice: against adjourning, and then against the resolution that by the law and usage of Parliament the particular words supposed to be criminal were not necessary to be expressly specified in impeachments for high crimes and misdemeanours. On 16 Mar. Haversham spoke at length against the resolution that the Commons had made good the first article of impeachment, again entering two protests. On the next day Haversham spoke against the resolution that the Commons had made good the fourth article, suggesting that ‘no man on earth has authority to interpret the scripture’, and repeated his request to the bishops to tell the House how Sacheverell ‘could be charged with wresting the scripture’, duly protesting against the resolution that the Commons had made good the second, third and fourth articles. On 18 Mar. he spoke in favour of voting on each article separately, even suggesting that he be heard by counsel as to whether the failure to do so took away his right of voting.128 He then protested against the form of the question to be put to peers on Sacheverell’s guilt. He voted Sacheverell not guilty on 20 Mar. 1710.

Haversham last attended on 5 May 1710 and he also attended the prorogation on 16 May. On 4 Aug. he expressed a desire to wait on Harley, having received a message from Anglesey, before waiting on the queen.129 With a ministerial change in the offing, Haversham was seen as a candidate for office in a reconstructed administration. Bromley, was probably referring to Haversham when he wrote on 13 Aug. that ‘I hear of nothing yet for our Richmond friend, who I think has deserved extremely well and should not be slighted’.130 On 17 Aug. Ralph Bridges noted news of a new admiralty board, consisting of Peterborough, Haversham, Sir John Leake‡, Richard Hill and George Clarke‡.131 Similar rumours reached the ears of Anne Clavering and Bromley, but by 11 Sept. Bromley was writing that ‘some overtures have been made to our Richmond friend, but not such as he liked’.132 As part of his calculations on the reconstruction of the ministry, on 12 Sept. Harley had included Haversham on his list of peers to be provided for.133 At about the same time Haversham’s son-in-law, Arthur Annesley, who had recently succeeded as 5th earl of Anglesey, became joint vice treasurer and paymaster of Ireland.134 On 3 Oct. Harley listed Haversham as a supporter, but Shrewsbury named Haversham on 20 Oct. as one of those leading peers who ‘will be dissatisfied’ unless shown some sign of favour.135 With the Tories triumphant at the polls Haversham was reported to have said that any attempt at opposition would be ‘as vain as to attempt to stop the stream at London Bridge with one’s thumb.’136 On 26 Oct. he wrote to Harley, ‘I have always had an ambitious desire of being in your favour and friendship, but my weak endeavours could never make me yet so happy’.137 Just what part he would have played in the new ministry, if any, will never be known. He died on 1 Nov. 1710 before the session began, some said ‘of a broken heart for he found they did not intend to do for him as he expected.’138 The pall-bearers for his funeral on 13 Nov. were Rochester, his son, Henry Hyde, styled Lord Hyde, the future 2nd earl of Rochester, James Butler, 2nd duke of Ormond, William Cheyne‡, Viscount Cheyne [S], Mohun and ‘Lord Howard’ (who might be several different people).139

At his death Haversham had houses at Richmond, Surrey and in Frith Street, Soho. He was owed over £3,300 at his death, including over £2,000 in maintenance payments for Lady Catherine Annesley.140 Haversham’s personal estate was valued at over £30,000 at his death. He also left substantial real estate to his only surviving son, Maurice Thompson, 2nd Baron Haversham, on the condition that he did not challenge the jointure arrangements for his stepmother. Three of his daughters were cut off without the proverbial shilling: Catherine, who had married an attorney, Edmund White, without his permission; Helena, married to Rev. Thomas Gregory, who had also incurred his displeasure by some misbehaviour; and Elizabeth, married to Joseph Grainge.141 Extensive litigation, both about the dowager Lady Haversham’s jointure and about the portions of the remaining four daughters, tied up settlement of the estate for several years.

Hearne summed up Haversham on his death: ‘he has been famous for several remarkable speeches, but he was a man of an unsteady life’.142 As a political leader Haversham was a minor figure, but he was responsible, through his annual speeches on the state of the nation, for a remarkably successful new parliamentary tactic. The speeches themselves were extremely effective in their day, reaching an audience far beyond Parliament and proving the existence of a considerable market eager for news of parliamentary affairs. Copies were even cried about the streets and hawkers who could not get hold of the latest speech sometimes satisfied the public demand by selling off stocks of old ones.143 Although much of Haversham’s activities were clearly driven by spite, he does seem to have had genuine concerns about abuses in naval administration (not unrelated to a desire to vindicate his own record in the matter). One particularly successful political parable, probably penned in response to his speech in 1705, likened him to a rebellious little dog who needed but a stroke from the cook to transform him into a useful working animal.144

R.P./S.N.H.

  • 1 TNA, PROB 11/518.
  • 2 N. and Q. ser. 3, xi. 109.
  • 3 London Top. Rec. xxix. 57.
  • 4 Ibid. 5/1026.
  • 5 TNA, C6/339/45.
  • 6 Mems. of Late Right Hon. John Lord Haversham from the Year 1640 to 1710 (1711); Life, Birth and Character of John Lord Haversham with his Last Speech in Defence of Dr Sacheverall in Parliament (1710).
  • 7 VCH Bucks. iv. 369.
  • 8 Add. 40860; Add. 18730.
  • 9 The Earl of Anglesey’s State of the Govt. and Kingdom (1694).
  • 10 Add. 18730, f. 83.
  • 11 Lexington Pprs. 15.
  • 12 Horwitz, Parl. Pol. 179.
  • 13 Vernon-Shrewsbury Letters, i. 134.
  • 14 WSHC, mss 2667/25/7; Leics. RO, Finch mss DG 7 box 4959 P.P. 114.
  • 15 HMC Lords, n.s. ii. 284.
  • 16 Vernon-Shrewsbury Letters, i. 170; HMC Buccleuch, ii. 439-40.
  • 17 HMC Lords, n.s. ii. 310.
  • 18 Northants. RO, Montagu (Boughton) mss 46/181.
  • 19 Add. 61653, ff. 41-46.
  • 20 Vernon-Shrewsbury Letters, ii. 106-7.
  • 21 Northants. RO, Montagu (Boughton) mss 47/135.
  • 22 CSP Dom. 1699-1700, p. 34.
  • 23 Vernon-Shrewsbury Letters, ii. 291, 294, 296.
  • 24 Horwitz, Parl. Pol. 258; Add. 75369, Crawford to Halifax, 30 May 1699; Add. 40774, f. 206.
  • 25 Add. 75369, Crawford to Halifax, 25 May 1699; Rooke to same, 23 May 1699.
  • 26 Bagot mss at Levens Hall, Weymouth to J. Grahme, 16 July 1699.
  • 27 NAS, GD406/1/4673.
  • 28 HMC Lords, n.s. iv. 13-14.
  • 29 Vernon-Shrewsbury Letters, iii. 4-5.
  • 30 HP Commons, 1690-1715, iv. 715-16; v. 401-3.
  • 31 Vernon-Shrewsbury Letters, iii. 11, 28-31.
  • 32 Luttrell, Brief Relation, iv. 645.
  • 33 CTB, 1700-1. pp. 32-33, 35-36.
  • 34 Vernon-Shrewsbury Letters, iii. 62.
  • 35 Horwitz, Parl. Pol. 281.
  • 36 PROB 11/465.
  • 37 HP Commons, 1690-1715, v. 628.
  • 38 Somers Tracts, xi. 335-6; Burnet, History, iv. 515-16; Luttrell, Brief Relation, v. 60-61.
  • 39 Somers Tracts, xi. 337-9.
  • 40 HMC Cowper, ii. 438-9.
  • 41 Locke Corresp. vii. 486.
  • 42 Add. 40775, ff. 347-8.
  • 43 HMC Cowper, ii. 443-4.
  • 44 Add. 70075, newsletter, 18 Dec. 1701.
  • 45 Haversham Mems. p. iii; Life, Birth and Character of John Lord Haversham, 3-4.
  • 46 Horwitz, Parl. Pol. 301.
  • 47 Cocks Diary, 221.
  • 48 HMC Rutland, ii. 170.
  • 49 PROB 11/465.
  • 50 Lancs. RO, DDO 1/35, 11 Jan. 1703/4.
  • 51 NAS, GD406/1/4867, 4927.
  • 52 Nicolson, London Diaries 137.
  • 53 Ibid. 175; HMC Lords, n.s. x. 22.
  • 54 Nicolson, London Diaries, 165, 169, 177.
  • 55 Add. 61288, f. 113.
  • 56 Timberland, ii. 64-66.
  • 57 Vernon-Shrewsbury Letters, iii. 245.
  • 58 HMC Lords, n.s. v. 269-73.
  • 59 Ibid. v. 311; vi. 247-8.
  • 60 TNA, C104/116, pt. 1, 13 Feb. 1704.
  • 61 Haversham Mems. pp. v-ix.
  • 62 Add. 61458, ff. 25-6; Nicolson, London Diaries, 223.
  • 63 Longleat, Bath mss, Portland misc. ff. 199-200.
  • 64 TNA, SP 24/8/87.
  • 65 Nicolson, London Diaries, 233-4; Cobbett, vi. 369-72.
  • 66 Luttrell, Brief Relation, v. 490.
  • 67 HMC Ormonde, viii. 120.
  • 68 Belvoir mss, Letters xxi. Granby to [Rutland], 23 Nov. [1704].
  • 69 Add. 61123, f. 108.
  • 70 HMC Portland, iv. 86.
  • 71 Portland misc. ff. 188-9.
  • 72 Add. 70021, f. 337.
  • 73 HMC Lords, n.s. vi. 113-15, 195, 221.
  • 74 Luttrell, Brief Relation, v. 492.
  • 75 Nicolson, London Diaries, 240; baillie Corresp. 15.
  • 76 Vernon-Shrewsbury Letters, iii. 279.
  • 77 Nicolson, London Diaries, 245-6.
  • 78 Ibid. 253, 256; Baillie Corresp. 26.
  • 79 Marlborough-Godolphin Corresp. 411.
  • 80 Bagot mss, Ward to J. Grahme, 12 Apr. 1705.
  • 81 W.A. Speck, Tory and Whig, 104.
  • 82 Haversham Mems. pp. iii-iv, xxiii.
  • 83 HMC Bath, i. 105; HMC Portland, iv. 338.
  • 84 LPL, ms 930/223.
  • 85 Luttrell, Brief Relation, v. 612; Nicolson, London Diaries, 303-4; Timberland, ii. 147-51.
  • 86 HMC Portland, ii. 191.
  • 87 Nicolson, London Diaries, 306, 309, 339.
  • 88 Luttrell, Brief Relation, vi. 127; Horwitz, Rev. Pols. 208.
  • 89 Nicolson, London Diaries, 418.
  • 90 Timberland, ii. 169-72.
  • 91 HMC Lords, n.s. vii. 20.
  • 92 Timberland, ii. 175.
  • 93 Nicolson, London Diaries, 420.
  • 94 Haversham Mems. pp. xxiii, iv.
  • 95 Timberland, ii. 180-3.
  • 96 HMC 11th Rep. VII, p. 115.
  • 97 HMC Portland, iv. 461.
  • 98 Vernon-Shrewsbury Letters, iii. 297.
  • 99 Timberland, ii. 184.
  • 100 Addison Letters, 85-86.
  • 101 Vernon-Shrewsbury Letters, iii. 303.
  • 102 Nicolson, London Diaries, 440.
  • 103 Add. 61101, ff. 129-31.
  • 104 Marlborough-Godolphin Corresp. 1056, 1065.
  • 105 Add. 61417, ff. 141-3, 170-1.
  • 106 Leics. RO, DG7, box 4950, bdle 23, f. 65.
  • 107 Add. 72488, ff. 40-41.
  • 108 Leics. RO, DG 7 box 4950 bdle 23 Letter A44.
  • 109 Add. 70287, Bromley to Harley, 24 Dec. 1708 and 7 Jan. 1709.
  • 110 Timberland, ii. 247-51.
  • 111 Ibid., ii. 252-60; Nicolson, London Diaries, 480-1.
  • 112 NLW, Plas-yn-Cefn, 2741.
  • 113 Add. 72488, ff. 52-53.
  • 114 CBS, Sarah Cowper’s diary, vol. 2, 5 May 1703.
  • 115 Wentworth Pprs. 70n; Boyer, Pol. State, i. 25.
  • 116 PROB 11/518.
  • 117 HMC Portland, iv. 524-6.
  • 118 Add. 72494, ff. 131-2.
  • 119 Add. 61460, ff. 106-8.
  • 120 Add. 72488, ff. 66-67.
  • 121 Add. 72499, f. 100.
  • 122 Luttrell, Brief Relation, vi. 524.
  • 123 Add. 61460, f. 128.
  • 124 Add. 72491, ff. 2-3.
  • 125 Cowan, 54-5.
  • 126 Ibid. 65.
  • 127 Wentworth Pprs. 114-15; Cowan, 247.
  • 128 Cowan, 73-74, 91.
  • 129 Add. 70283, Haversham to Harley, 4 Aug. 1710.
  • 130 Bagot mss, Bromley to Grahme, 13 Aug. 1710.
  • 131 Add. 72495, ff. 15-16.
  • 132 Clavering Corresp. ed. Dickinson (Surtees Soc. clxxviii), 92; Wentworth Pprs. 137; Bagot mss, Bromley to Grahme, 1, 11 Sept. 1710.
  • 133 Add. 70333, memo. 12 Sept. 1710.
  • 134 Luttrell, Brief Relation, vi. 635.
  • 135 HMC Bath, i. 199.
  • 136 Wentworth Pprs. 149-50.
  • 137 Add. 70283, Haversham to Harley, 26 Oct. 1710.
  • 138 Wentworth Pprs. 154.
  • 139 Haversham Mems. p. iv.
  • 140 PROB 5/4200.
  • 141 PROB 11/518; C9/378/10.
  • 142 Hearne, Remarks and Collections, iii. 76.
  • 143 Wentworth Pprs. 70-71.
  • 144 Dog in the Wheel a Satyr (1705), 9.