On 10 July, 1663 in the House of Lords, Bristol accused Clarendon of high treason. The charges included taking money from the Dutch to make peace, and from the Portuguese to secure the marriage of Catherine of Braganza to Charles II, of selling offices, and tricking York into marrying his daughter, Anne Hyde. The Lords ordered a copy of Bristol’s accusations be delivered to Clarendon and Charles II, and that the judges be asked to report ‘whether the said charge hath been brought in regularly and legally? and whether it may be proceeded in? and how? and whether there be any treason in it, or no?’
On 13 July, 1663 the judges declared it was not regular or legal for one peer to bring charges of treason against another in the House of Lords and that, even if Clarendon were guilty of all the charges brought by Bristol, they did not amount to high treason. The king’s attitude was made abundantly clear in his message of thanks to the House in which he could not but ‘take notice of the many scandalous reflections in that paper upon himself and his relations’ and which he considered as a ‘libel against his person and government’. On 14 July the House voted unanimously to concur with the judges.
Bristol’s accusations bewildered many of his peers. Many of the Lords concluded the affair had no other foundation than the ‘spleen of an enraged and disappointed enemy’. Pepys was not the only one to be puzzled that the accusations against Clarendon included helping Catholics. Ormonde sarcastically remarked that, ‘My lord of Bristol’s care of the protestant religion, and against the pope’s ecclesiastical jurisdiction in England is very admirable and deserves commendation if it be the motive of his zeal against my lord chancellor.’
The potential for exacerbating strife at court worried Roger Pepys who wrote ‘What this will come to God only knows. The one hath great friends the other a great and high spirit.’
The public airing that the affair gave to the weaknesses at the center of government appalled even French observers who noted Bristol’s accusations had ‘caused a great commotion here, and will do so no less abroad, where they will be astonished that a minister of state can be accused of things which the king declares to be for the most part false’.
With the recess imminent the court wanted the matter over, but Clarendon, ‘full of confidence’ and perhaps feeling obliged to make a show of magnanimity, advised the House to give Bristol until the first week of the next session to produce witnesses to substantiate his lesser charges, particularly Ormonde and Secretary of State for Scotland, John Maitland, 2nd Earl of Lauderdale. He even told Bristol ‘that notwithstanding he had been more injured than ever any man was by a private subject, yet he would be ready to do him all the service in the world.’ Whether he meant these public protestations to be taken seriously is a matter for conjecture; he later indicated the opposite.
On 20 June the Commons formally demanded the name of the 'person of quality' who had acted as go-between. On 21 June Bristol was banned from court; he was also barred from Lady Castlemaine’s. Then Sunderland broke off his engagement to Bristol’s daughter on the eve of the wedding. On 22 June, judging by the heavily altered surviving draft, Bristol went to great lengths composing a letter to Charles II agreeing his name be revealed, and that he was ready to vindicate his actions to the Commons.
According to Gilbert Burnet, later bishop of Salisbury, the king tried to dissuade Bristol from addressing the Commons.
In the meantime, either convinced he could retrieve his situation or desperate to do so, Bristol continued his search for information with which to discredit Clarendon. His speech to the Commons on 1 July was a magnificent performance, in which he stressed his own loyalty and service to the crown contrasting it with pointed references, easily interpreted as allusions to Clarendon, to those who negotiated for cardinals’ caps, and who amassed and sold offices for their own profit. Bristol won over Members of the Commons who, impressed by Bristol’s eloquence, cleared Temple from all charges. Members of the Lords were upset at his decision to address the Commons without the leave of the House, although they were forced to accept that there was a precedent for his conduct. The king, to whom Bristol repeated his speech, was furious. Ruvigny, Louis XIV’s envoy, told his master that Charles II considered it, "... the most seditious speech there could be in an assembly, that he now thought that everything he had been told about his ambition, that being Catholic and being unable to enter offices because of his religion, he had resolved to turn everything upside down so as to find a place in the disorder and confusion. The earl of Bristol’s reply was bold; his master told him quite mildly that he would be a poor king if he could not manage an earl of Bristol. God preserve your majesty from such subjects and so little power." Ruvigny went on to report that Bristol had asked the king for permission to accuse Clarendon in Parliament and although the king had specifically forbidden this, Bristol was ‘in the depth of despair’ and intent on revenging himself on king and chancellor. Comminges, the French ambassador, concluded that, "The earl, full of vanity and feeling triumphant at the victory that he imagined he had carried off in the lower chamber, and thinking that he had a fair wind, he could undertake anything, and that the fall of the chancellor hung only on his pressing his point, misinterpreted the king’s kindness and flattered himself at the mildness of his behaviour."
Bristol seems to have been confident of his position and on 14 Feb. had renewed his request for payment of the arrears of his salary as secretary of state.
Bristol attended the 1663 session for 63 per cent of sitting days and was named to 13 committees. The early weeks of the session were dominated by controversies over the declaration and opposition to the bill that it had spawned. By mid-March the bill was dead but factional discord at court continued. ‘They are so bent on destroying themselves that the sky might fall without them noticing’, wrote the French ambassador in April 1663, ‘the king could not occupy himself with anything of greater importance than reconciling them … [but] to achieve this would require more resolve, firmness, involvement and even authority than he has’. The Ambassador was not the only observer to believe that Bristol would win out in the end. Bristol, Ashley and Robartes, together with the two secretaries of state, often (or so it was said) transacted business in which Clarendon played ‘only a small part’, whilst in the Commons Bristol’s allies including Sir Richard Temple led an oblique attack on Clarendon by seeking an enquiry into the sale of public offices.
That Bristol remained in favour was demonstrated in May by the king’s decision to order payment of £10,000 for his arrears as secretary of state. Bristol and his allies, wrote Pepys, ‘have cast my lord chancellor upon his back, past ever getting up again; there now being little for him to do, and waits at court attending to speak to the king as others do’.
Yet more attempts to promote a reconciliation with Clarendon followed but Bristol now began to overplay his hand. On 12 June, 1663 Bristol’s Commons ally Sir Richard Temple opposed the court on a vital supply motion. Clarendon’s ally Henry Coventry then created a furore in the Commons when he delivered a message from the king denouncing Temple as an ‘undertaker’ who had offered, via a ‘person of quality’, to manage the Commons in order to secure supply. Bennet deserted to the chancellor and Bristol was left dangerously exposed, his situation made all the worse by a temporary deterioration in the king’s relationship with Lady Castlemaine resulting from his infatuation with Frances Stuart and her alleged affair with Henry Jermyn, Baron Jermyn.
By 15 June, 1663 Charles II had formed an inner group of advisers from which Bristol and his allies were pointedly excluded. The king even avoided meeting Bristol socially. Bristol made matters worse by threatening to ruin the king’s business unless Ashley and Robartes were made part of the new group of advisors.
One of Bristol’s identifiable allies at this time was another member of the committee of 8 Apr. 1662, the moderate episcopalian John Gauden, Bishop of Exeter, who wrote in glowing terms of Bristol who ‘takes nothing upon trust, but brings all to the test of reason and religion, justice and honour.’
Over the next few months Gauden corresponded with Bristol, sought his ‘potent interception’ with Charles II on behalf of one of his clients and stayed at his house in Wimbledon. Yet he seems to have had no inkling of the news that would astonish the political world early in June: that Bristol had turned Protestant. In July Gauden wrote again to Bristol asking for more information about his decision to change ecclesiastical communion. Sir Henry Yelverton (who had always believed Bristol to be ‘too learned for a papist’) concluded that the conversion reflected a belief that rewards were more easily available to Protestants than to Catholics and, much as he deplored the possibility of Bristol’s advancement, he was glad to learn that ‘interest runs against popery’.
Late in July 1662 it was reported that the rift between Clarendon and Bristol had been repaired and ‘that the king is the master and the chancellor has all the credit’.
It did not last.
In Aug. the ejection of nonconformist ministers on ‘Black Bartholomew’s day’ brought about an alliance between Bristol and Anthony Ashley Cooper, Baron Ashley, and John Robartes, 2nd Baron Robartes in favour of toleration; then in Oct., Sir Edward Nicholas was replaced as secretary of state by Bennet at the behest of Bristol and other members of the anti-Clarendon faction at court.
Charles II was still trying to ensure a permanent reconciliation between his warring courtiers. In order to do so he promoted the possibility of a marriage between Bristol’s daughter, Anne, and Clarendon’s heir, Henry Hyde, then styled Lord Cornbury. It is unlikely the alliance was taken seriously for only a few months later arrangements were being made for the marriage of Anne Digby to Robert Spencer, 2nd earl of Sunderland.
In December 1662, whilst Clarendon was incapacitated by illness, Charles II agreed to a declaration of indulgence. Although Bristol’s involvement was obvious, he was, according to the French ambassador, ‘very prudently’ holding himself at a distance from it. The declaration, published on 26 Dec. 1662, promised to seek an act of Parliament to enshrine the king’s claim to a dispensing power in matters of religion, but to Clarendon’s horror the draft bill that emerged for presentation to Parliament when it met again on 18 Feb. 1663 was much more radical. Its chances of success, like the possibility of a reconciliation of factions at court, were not improved by news that Bristol had returned to the Catholic church.
On the first day of the debate, 18 Mar., Clarendon proposed a proviso which he claimed to be at Charles II’s instigation which granted the king a power of dispensation over the wearing of the surplice and making the sign of the cross. Bristol declared a proviso proposed by the king amounted to a breach of privilege, that it was improper, and he knew that the king opposed it. He drew some support from John Cosin of Durham, who denied that the king had any power of dispensation in such matters. The next day Bristol spoke at length against it, then interrupted Clarendon’s response, claiming that Clarendon’s references to Cosin’s speech amounted to a transgression of the rules of the House as well as a denial of free speech. At the end of the debate, which lasted several hours, Bristol put in his own proviso –- to enable the king to give liberty to all. Clarendon, appalled, pointed out that this would admit popery, insisted on a division and threatened to enter a protest. Bristol’s proviso was rejected. Clarendon’s was accepted, but perhaps ominously for Clarendon, on the following day (20 Mar.), Bristol was added to the committee for the bill. On 8 Apr. he was named to the committee to draw up a different kind of proviso, one that would enable the king to offer some form of compensation to those clergymen who would be deprived under the Act of Uniformity.
Bristol remained an active and powerful member of the House. On 25 Apr. 1662 he was named to the committee for the bill for loyal and indigent officers. On 10 May when the bill was returned by message from Commons with further amendments, the House decided that the proper method of proceeding would have been for the Commons to have requested a conference rather than simply return the bill. Bristol was named to a small committee to draw up an appropriate response. That day he was also named as one of the managers of the first conference on the militia bill (settling the forces). On 13 and 16 May he was named as a manager for the second and third conferences on the bill. Despite the setbacks over the Act of Uniformity, Bristol was still a significant political figure at a court beset by faction and in command, so it was said, of ‘a powerful cabal’.
In July, Samuel Pepys noted that Bristol and Buckingham endeavoured to undermine Clarendon at court. In the same month the French ambassador told Louis XIV that Clarendon had openly declared that Bristol was his enemy and that Clarendon had opposed concessions to Catholics solely in pursuit of his feud with Bristol. He later went on to suggest that Clarendon had been organizing opposition to Catholic demands by underhand methods.
Charles II’s known sympathy to some form of toleration for Catholics coupled with his open humiliation of the chancellor in Aug. 1661 when he gave the post of keeper of the privy purse to Bristol’s ally Henry Bennet (the future earl of Arlington) encouraged Clarendon’s ‘enemies and enviers’ to believe that the time was right for an attack. Emboldened, Bristol and Bennet spoke openly to Charles II, only to find that he ‘took it very ill that they should conspire to decry the conduct of a man who served him well’. Bristol and Clarendon were summoned before the king who ‘told both of them to forget the past and in future to live in harmony together’.
Perhaps it was this attempt at reconciliation that prompted a grant that month to Bristol of the Broyle and Ashdown Forest in Sussex, for which he had petitioned the crown in Dec. 1660. Clarendon may have thought this went a long way towards fulfilling his promise but the grant proved to be a source of litigation and little profit. It also soured relations with Richard Sackville, 5th earl of Dorset, who had previously received a grant of the same properties for his own and his son’s lives.
Further evidence of some sort of reconciliation at court was provided in September when a Privy Seal passed for the payment of £6,000 to Bristol in consideration of his father’s pension on the court of wards; of this £2,000 was paid the following Feb.
Bristol continued to be an important member of the Lords. On 7 Dec. 1661 he was deputed to be one of the managers of the conference concerning the swearing of witnesses to be examined in the Commons regarding Sir Edward Powell’s fines, on 14 Dec. of that concerning legislation to confirm private acts and on 4 Feb. 1662 on the bill for the execution of attainted persons. On 6 Feb. 1662 he protested against the bill to restore the estates of Charles Stanley, 8th earl of Derby.
One doubts that Bristol’s reconciliation with Clarendon was genuine; but it was short-lived. In Mar. 1662 a furious row broke out between the 2 during the debates over the bill of uniformity.
Early in Feb. 1661 it was reported Bristol was to visit to Flanders and Germany. The purpose was variously given as personal business relating to his daughter’s marriage, or to the ‘unhandsome disbanding of British regiments’ by the king of Spain, but it was widely suspected to relate to the choice of a bride for the king, particularly the need to provide convincing proof that serious consideration had been given to finding a suitable Protestant bride. According to the French ambassador there was another reason: Clarendon’s desire to get Bristol out of the way so he could increase his influence over the king. Despite his earlier protestations of support for the French, Bristol, who was born and brought up in Spain, advocated a Spanish match for the king. Clarendon and Ormonde had initially agreed, but by the time Bristol returned to England (early May, 1661) Clarendon had switched his support to an alliance with Portugal, a policy that Bristol vehemently opposed.
Differences between Clarendon and Bristol also reflected larger rivalries at court. Bristol enjoyed the friendship of the king’s mistress, Barbara Villiers, Lady Palmer, as well as Queen Mother Henrietta Maria, who were both against Clarendon.
Bristol again took his seat in the House on 10 May, 1661, 2 days after the opening of the new session. He was present on 75 per cent of sitting days and was named to many committees, which included some on the most significant issues of the day: the reversal of the attainder of Thomas Wentworth, earl of Strafford, on 14 May, the security of the king’s person and government on 24 May, the regulation of corporations on 18 July and the restoration of ecclesiastical jurisdiction on 19 July. In July it was thought Bristol would support the attempt of Aubrey de Vere, 20th earl of Oxford, to secure the great chamberlaincy.
Differences with Clarendon were becoming more obvious. In June 1661 the House debated Catholic demands for inclusion in the benefits of the Declaration of Breda, a modification of the oath of allegiance and the removal of the penal laws. Such demands faced considerable opposition especially as it was widely believed that Catholics did not consider themselves bound by oaths that conflicted with their obedience to the pope. As Bristol admitted during the debates, ‘there is little hopes for us to obtain any ease from penalties till your lordships be satisfied what security we will give by oath of our duty and allegiance to his majesty.’ The debates did produce a committee to draft a bill to repeal the sanguinary laws against Catholics on 28 June to which Bristol was named. The resultant proposals would have reduced rather than abolish the various restrictions on Catholics but were never introduced. Just who was responsible for the failure remains unclear. Clarendon blamed divisions amongst the Catholics. The Catholics, including Bristol, blamed Clarendon.
He is known to have been present at at least one gathering of Catholic nobility and gentry, in Nov. 1660; this may have been the meeting called to discuss a general toleration described by William Howard, Viscount Stafford, in his ‘confession’ of Dec. 1680, although the presence of Ormonde suggests that Irish interests rather than purely Catholic ones may have been the focus of the meeting. On 6 Dec. he sought further direction from the House for the benefit of the committee considering the bill to vacate Sir Edward Powell’s fines and reported the bill itself as fit to pass on 8 Dec. On 12 Dec. after a debate in a committee of the whole he was named to the subcommittee to consider provisos to the bill against the regicides.
Given that the most substantial part of Bristol’s claims related to his father’s unpaid pension and the wardship of Lord Brooke, he was naturally extremely concerned about the prospect of the formal abolition of the court of wards. The Commons passed a bill to this effect in Dec. 1660 and backdated it to the last sitting of the court in Feb, 1646. Bristol prepared a petition against the bill, asking it be revised either to secure his claim to the wardship of Lord Brooke or to provide him with compensation, but when he told Clarendon of his intention he was persuaded to take no action on the grounds ‘that it might be of great ill consequence to his majesty’s service to set on foot, in the House of Commons, a claim to such a compensation, since it might be of example to divers others to do the like’. Bristol’s compliance was secured by a promise from Clarendon, given in the king’s name, that he would be provided for in other ways.
Clarendon’s failure to keep his promise, aggravated by subsequent political and factional differences, led to a rapid deterioration in the relationship between the two.
The passage of the bill to abolish the court of wards was speedy – it was brought up from the Commons on 17 Dec. and received the royal assent on 24 Dec. –- but Clarendon was probably correct in thinking that Bristol had raised a potentially controversial issue that could have delayed it. The House received a petition against it from the dowager duchess of Somerset as well as two provisos on 18 Dec. and a petition from the officers of the court the following day. The alterations made in the Lords became the subject of a conference with the Commons on 21 Dec.
In Jan. 1661, Bristol together with York joined Albemarle in the suppression of Venner’s uprising.
He also emphatically restated his willingness to serve the interests of the French at the English court. Despite his professions of poverty and ruin, he was able to buy a magnificent house in Wimbledon, which he described as the ‘noblest place in England’, from the queen mother for £4,000. He later sent her a diamond valued at £500 by way of thanks.
Contrary to his statements to Lady Bristol about sublimating his private interests to the wider public good, Bristol was determined to extract revenge and reparation from his own old enemies. He also put considerable effort into securing the rewards to which he believed himself entitled. He obtained a grant in reversion of the office of writer of the tallies (auditor of the receipt of the exchequer) for his younger son, Francis Digby. His countess petitioned for a lease of Theobald’s Park as compensation for giving up her jointure to raise the £30,000 demanded after the Civil Wars for the ‘redemption’ of her son John Digby, later the 3rd Earl of Bristol (1634 –1698) .
On 2 Aug. 1660 Bristol introduced a bill to recover £6,500 given ‘by the late pretended Parliament’ to Carew Raleigh; it received its third reading on 22 Aug. but failed to pass the Commons. Bristol also, on 11 Aug. obtained an order of the House putting him into possession of all lands formerly belonging either to himself or his father and which had been confiscated and sold for delinquency.
The question of reparations and how far they could or should be pursued was a sensitive one. On 6 Aug. in the course of debates on private provisos in the act of indemnity, Bristol’s support of the merits and sufferings of William Cavendish, marquess (later duke) of Newcastle over and above those of George Villiers, 2nd duke of Buckingham, caused an open quarrel in the House and fears of a duel, forcing Charles II to order the men to confine themselves to their lodgings. They appear to have been reconciled by the end of the month.
On 10 Sept. Bristol reported from the committee for the potentially controversial bill to restore Sir George Lane (Ormonde’s secretary) to possession of Rathclyne, Lisduff and other lands in Ireland. The following day he was named to the committee to amend the contentious bill for restoring ministers, apparently as part of an alliance with York and Clarendon that aimed to conciliate the Presbyterians and offer the hope that a more general toleration would follow. He was also named to the committees for the annexation of Dunkirk, Mardyke and Jamaica to the crown and, after reporting from the committee for the bill for disbanding the army, was named to assist Hyde in managing the consequent conference on the subject.
The Abbé Montagu’s hopes for securing Bristol’s support for France seemed to have been borne out, for by late Sept. at the latest Bristol was in regular communication with the French court, telling Mazarin that his desire to serve him was second only to his desire to serve Charles II.
Bristol was active in court life, entertaining the king of Spain’s representative, Claude Lamoral, Prince de Ligne, accompanying Charles II on state occasions and welcoming the royal household to his London house.
Bristol had considerable expectations. Whilst in exile, he had been granted the wardship of his wife’s nephew, Francis Greville, 3rd Baron Brooke of Beauchamps Court. This, ‘the only thing he relied upon to repair the losses of his family in his service, and to pay his debts, without being burdensome to the crown’, was valued at £30,000. He also had a claim to the arrears of a pension of £2,000 a year that had been granted to his father and which by the Restoration came to £36,000. He also alleged that he and his family had lost £16,000 as the price of their loyalty to the crown during the Civil Wars and Interregnum. The gap between these expectations and what he received would soon engender an implacable hostility to Edward Hyde.
Bristol returned to England in time to take his seat in the Lords on 16 June, 1660. His willingness to attend Parliament coupled with his access to the king and his Catholicism led the Abbé Montagu (the Catholic brother of Edward Montagu, 2nd earl of Manchester and high in the esteem of the queen mother) to tell Cardinal Mazarin that Bristol ‘could be useful to cultivate, even if he does not realize it’. Mazarin welcomed the abbé’s offer to influence and manage Bristol.
Bristol attended 72 per cent of the remaining sittings in the Lords that session, becoming a significant member of the House involved in debate on crucial post-restoration issues; over the course of the session he was named to 23 committees. On 19 June, 1660 he was named to the committee for privileges, the subcommittee for the Journal, and the committee to examine the acts and ordinances of the Interregnum. On 4 July he was named to the committee to confirm the privileges of Parliament and the fundamental laws of the kingdom; he also obtained an order of the House for the restoration of goods that he had lost during the ‘late wars’. Bristol’s hard-line attitude to the king’s former enemies and inability to accept the case for moderation was soon apparent. On 7, 11 and 14 July he reported from the committee for privileges on the executions of James Hamilton, duke of Hamilton, Henry Rich, earl of Holland, and James Stanley, 7th earl of Derby, as a result of which the House ordered those responsible to be secured.
On 20 July, 1660 during the debate on the bill of indemnity he told the House of his rage, ‘That many of the wickedest and meanest of the people should remain, as it were, rewarded for their treasons, rich and triumphant in the spoils of the most eminent in virtue and loyalty, of all the nobility and gentry of the kingdom’. Although he would be ‘irreparably ruined’ in his fortune by the bill, the public interest nevertheless called for it to be passed quickly. He argued, successfully, that the murder of the late king had to be washed away by the ‘blood of the guilty’ and should be dealt with as a particular issue in a separate bill.
This is extracted from a very long biography which seems to be from the House of Lords. This is the time covered by the Diary; the detail explains the tensions which Pepys experiences but often doesn't understand:
George Digby succeeded to the earldom of Bristol in 1653, but even after that date his contemporaries sometimes referred to him as Lord Digby or earl of Digby, thus creating some confusion between Bristol and another branch of the family who held the barony of Digby of Gleashill in the Irish peerage (but who were English and resident in England).
Bristol was a prominent member of the court in exile and equally prominent in the factional rivalries that beset it. ... Given his earlier defence of the Church of England, Bristol’s conversion to Catholicism early in 1659 was a matter of astonishment that embarrassed Charles II and forced him to remove Bristol from the post of secretary of state.
As the Restoration unfolded, Bristol, involved in negotiations in Spain, found himself left behind by the pace of developments. Nevertheless, he naturally expected to reap the rewards of loyalty, including compensation for his losses in the king’s service, the restitution of his estates and payment of the arrears of his salary as secretary of state, which he estimated at £8,500.
Initially fearful that Monck would insist on some form of conditional restoration, Lady Bristol began to press Charles II for what she perceived as Bristol’s well-earned reward, apparently afraid that her husband’s absence would lead to him being overlooked. Bristol was far more confident of the king’s favour and feared only that his wife’s importunities might backfire to his discredit He counselled discretion, assuring her that, "I cannot fail to succeed in all that we reasonably propose to our selves for my person, fortune and family; so certain am I of his Majesty’s favourable kindness, unalterable, by any thing but by your letting him see, that we precipitating prefer the satisfying our own vanity and ambition, the consideration of drawing inconveniences upon by pressing to be near him, before he is master enough of his affairs to be able to admit it without ill consequence unto them."
He did not doubt there might be obstacles to his advancement. These included his Catholicism but, more importantly, the rivalry of those who were jealous of his credit with the king and of his ‘parts and ambitions’. He suggested that an emphasis on a desire to live quietly at Sherborne rather than to pursue places at court would persuade even his enemies ‘to be forwardest as a matter of justice, to counsel his majesty to repair my losses liberally.’
He was also convinced that Edward Hyde, the future earl of Clarendon, and James Butler, Marquis of Ormonde in the Irish peerage and subsequently also in the English peerage, would support his pretensions.
The Parliamentary bio of George Digby's son, John, gives us a more personal look into his life:
JOHN "Digby’s grandfather, the 1st Earl of Bristol, came from a cadet branch of the Midland family. He was granted the Sherborne Castle estate as a reward for diplomatic services in 1616. "His father [GEORGE] sat for the county in both Parliaments of 1640 before being called up to the Lords, having made the Lower House too hot to hold him by his unexpected and well-publicized opposition to Strafford’s attainder. "During the Interregnum, when [GEORGE] was in exile he became a convert to Rome, [JOHN] Digby seems to have lived with his Puritan mother [Lady Anne Russell, da. of Francis, 4th Earl of Bedford], whose ‘zeal cannot suffer a Catholic under her roof’. She bought back the estates from the Treason Trustees by selling her own jointure, and settled it on [JOHN] Digby on his marriage." https://www.historyofparliamenton…
L&M: George Digby, 2nd Earl of Bristol 1612-77. Politician, soldier, playwrite -- a man of brilliant gifts, but of almost no achievements, having, in Burnet's words, "no judgment or steadiness". He served King Charles, shortly and disasterously, as a Secretary of State in 1643, and was appointed to the same position by Charles II in 1657, but was made to resign on becoming a Roman Catholic. His religion excluded him from high office thereafter, and he played a spoiling game during the Diary years making himself unpopular and distrusted by everyone. The Diary has several revealing entries about his vendetta against Clarendon. The only play he published is called "Elvira" (1667).
An excerpt from GEORGE VILLIERS, SECOND DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM 1628-1687 : A STUDY IN THE HISTORY OF THE RESTORATION By WINIFRED, LADY BURGHCLERE https://archive.org/stream/cu3192…
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W. LONDON 1903
Page 250 BUCKINGHAM'S VAGARIES [chap. x.
'The usual profusion which marked the entertainments of that period was not lacking on this occasion; and with his French chef, George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham had evidently imported the Parisian fashion of serving his table. All the dishes of "costly meats both hot and cold, the sweetmeats also, and the fruit," were placed simultaneously on high stands erected to receive them down the board — an arrangement we can see depicted in the sketches of French banquets still preserved at the Musee Carnavalet.'
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I think “the board” either means the sideboard, or on the table itself of which I think I remember seeing pictures.
The website for Musee Carnavalet has fabulous pictures of 17th century French art, but not of these sketches or of pictures of dining at the time. https://www.thegeographicalcure.c…
"... does this mean that the restoration norm was having the prawn cocktail, steak and Black Forest gateaux all served at once?"
Apparently, yes. An excerpt from GEORGE VILLIERS, SECOND DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM 1628-1687 : A STUDY IN THE HISTORY OF THE RESTORATION By WINIFRED, LADY BURGHCLERE https://archive.org/stream/cu3192…
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W. LONDON 1903
Page 250 BUCKINGHAM'S VAGARIES [chap. x.
'The usual profusion which marked the entertainments of that period was not lacking on this occasion; and with his French chef, George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham had evidently imported the Parisian fashion of serving his table. All the dishes of "costly meats both hot and cold, the sweetmeats also, and the fruit," were placed simultaneously on high stands erected to receive them down the board — an arrangement we can see depicted in the sketches of French banquets still preserved at the Musee Carnavalet.'
Diary of Ralph Josselin (Private Collection) 1.4.1661 (Monday 1 April 1661) document 70013010
April. 1. 2. 3.
I sow oats on ley, and other land. lord command a blessing for my hope is in thee.
went towards London on Mr H. account, a sad providence, [PRESUMABLY ON THE 3RD - SDS]
oh lord melt my bowels, accept my praises for my families health, reason, return to them in favour: die.
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This tells us the weather was fine.
Ley -- noun 1. a piece of land put down to grass, clover, etc., for a single season or a limited number of years, in contrast to permanent pasture.
Mr. H = one of the Mr. Harlakandens who lived in London must have received bad news or suffered bad health. His mother/sister/aunt/cousin lives in the Manor house, and is a friend of Josselin's.
Onto the bowels question -- this meant something different in the 17th century. American Google hasn't the foggiest idea what I'm asking about. Anyone know?
And presumably he never finished the entry -- or he had suicidal thoughts after his return from London and wrote this entry!?!?
On the maid debate -- mom stays home all day, so having to deal with someone she doesn't like is a big deal. Dad has his tailoring business -- probably in one of the street-level rooms -- and has other people to interact with during his days.
Mom's vote counts the most. No matter how irrational or petty, if mom isn't happy, no-one will be happy.
Pictures of extraordinary French craftsmanship in this article, which also mentions Louis XIV's efforts to be friends with the Emperor of China (after the Diary). https://en.chateauversailles.fr/n…
Easter Sunday traditions ... are based on pagan superstitions, which of course is why the Puritans didn’t celebrate the holiday. (The Puritans didn’t like Christmas, either.) For the early Puritans, celebrating the Lord’s Day 52 times a year was quite enough. https://newenglandhistoricalsocie…
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Third Reading
About George Digby (2nd Earl of Bristol)
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PART 11
On 10 July, 1663 in the House of Lords, Bristol accused Clarendon of high treason. The charges included taking money from the Dutch to make peace, and from the Portuguese to secure the marriage of Catherine of Braganza to Charles II, of selling offices, and tricking York into marrying his daughter, Anne Hyde.
The Lords ordered a copy of Bristol’s accusations be delivered to Clarendon and Charles II, and that the judges be asked to report ‘whether the said charge hath been brought in regularly and legally? and whether it may be proceeded in? and how? and whether there be any treason in it, or no?’
On 13 July, 1663 the judges declared it was not regular or legal for one peer to bring charges of treason against another in the House of Lords and that, even if Clarendon were guilty of all the charges brought by Bristol, they did not amount to high treason.
The king’s attitude was made abundantly clear in his message of thanks to the House in which he could not but ‘take notice of the many scandalous reflections in that paper upon himself and his relations’ and which he considered as a ‘libel against his person and government’.
On 14 July the House voted unanimously to concur with the judges.
Bristol’s accusations bewildered many of his peers. Many of the Lords concluded the affair had no other foundation than the ‘spleen of an enraged and disappointed enemy’.
Pepys was not the only one to be puzzled that the accusations against Clarendon included helping Catholics.
Ormonde sarcastically remarked that, ‘My lord of Bristol’s care of the protestant religion, and against the pope’s ecclesiastical jurisdiction in England is very admirable and deserves commendation if it be the motive of his zeal against my lord chancellor.’
The potential for exacerbating strife at court worried Roger Pepys who wrote ‘What this will come to God only knows. The one hath great friends the other a great and high spirit.’
The public airing that the affair gave to the weaknesses at the center of government appalled even French observers who noted Bristol’s accusations had ‘caused a great commotion here, and will do so no less abroad, where they will be astonished that a minister of state can be accused of things which the king declares to be for the most part false’.
With the recess imminent the court wanted the matter over, but Clarendon, ‘full of confidence’ and perhaps feeling obliged to make a show of magnanimity, advised the House to give Bristol until the first week of the next session to produce witnesses to substantiate his lesser charges, particularly Ormonde and Secretary of State for Scotland, John Maitland, 2nd Earl of Lauderdale.
He even told Bristol ‘that notwithstanding he had been more injured than ever any man was by a private subject, yet he would be ready to do him all the service in the world.’
Whether he meant these public protestations to be taken seriously is a matter for conjecture; he later indicated the opposite.
About George Digby (2nd Earl of Bristol)
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PART 10
On 20 June the Commons formally demanded the name of the 'person of quality' who had acted as go-between.
On 21 June Bristol was banned from court; he was also barred from Lady Castlemaine’s. Then Sunderland broke off his engagement to Bristol’s daughter on the eve of the wedding.
On 22 June, judging by the heavily altered surviving draft, Bristol went to great lengths composing a letter to Charles II agreeing his name be revealed, and that he was ready to vindicate his actions to the Commons.
According to Gilbert Burnet, later bishop of Salisbury, the king tried to dissuade Bristol from addressing the Commons.
In the meantime, either convinced he could retrieve his situation or desperate to do so, Bristol continued his search for information with which to discredit Clarendon.
His speech to the Commons on 1 July was a magnificent performance, in which he stressed his own loyalty and service to the crown contrasting it with pointed references, easily interpreted as allusions to Clarendon, to those who negotiated for cardinals’ caps, and who amassed and sold offices for their own profit.
Bristol won over Members of the Commons who, impressed by Bristol’s eloquence, cleared Temple from all charges.
Members of the Lords were upset at his decision to address the Commons without the leave of the House, although they were forced to accept that there was a precedent for his conduct.
The king, to whom Bristol repeated his speech, was furious.
Ruvigny, Louis XIV’s envoy, told his master that Charles II considered it, "... the most seditious speech there could be in an assembly, that he now thought that everything he had been told about his ambition, that being Catholic and being unable to enter offices because of his religion, he had resolved to turn everything upside down so as to find a place in the disorder and confusion. The earl of Bristol’s reply was bold; his master told him quite mildly that he would be a poor king if he could not manage an earl of Bristol. God preserve your majesty from such subjects and so little power."
Ruvigny went on to report that Bristol had asked the king for permission to accuse Clarendon in Parliament and although the king had specifically forbidden this, Bristol was ‘in the depth of despair’ and intent on revenging himself on king and chancellor.
Comminges, the French ambassador, concluded that, "The earl, full of vanity and feeling triumphant at the victory that he imagined he had carried off in the lower chamber, and thinking that he had a fair wind, he could undertake anything, and that the fall of the chancellor hung only on his pressing his point, misinterpreted the king’s kindness and flattered himself at the mildness of his behaviour."
About George Digby (2nd Earl of Bristol)
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PART 9
Bristol seems to have been confident of his position and on 14 Feb. had renewed his request for payment of the arrears of his salary as secretary of state.
Bristol attended the 1663 session for 63 per cent of sitting days and was named to 13 committees.
The early weeks of the session were dominated by controversies over the declaration and opposition to the bill that it had spawned.
By mid-March the bill was dead but factional discord at court continued. ‘They are so bent on destroying themselves that the sky might fall without them noticing’, wrote the French ambassador in April 1663, ‘the king could not occupy himself with anything of greater importance than reconciling them … [but] to achieve this would require more resolve, firmness, involvement and even authority than he has’.
The Ambassador was not the only observer to believe that Bristol would win out in the end.
Bristol, Ashley and Robartes, together with the two secretaries of state, often (or so it was said) transacted business in which Clarendon played ‘only a small part’, whilst in the Commons Bristol’s allies including Sir Richard Temple led an oblique attack on Clarendon by seeking an enquiry into the sale of public offices.
That Bristol remained in favour was demonstrated in May by the king’s decision to order payment of £10,000 for his arrears as secretary of state.
Bristol and his allies, wrote Pepys, ‘have cast my lord chancellor upon his back, past ever getting up again; there now being little for him to do, and waits at court attending to speak to the king as others do’.
Yet more attempts to promote a reconciliation with Clarendon followed but Bristol now began to overplay his hand.
On 12 June, 1663 Bristol’s Commons ally Sir Richard Temple opposed the court on a vital supply motion.
Clarendon’s ally Henry Coventry then created a furore in the Commons when he delivered a message from the king denouncing Temple as an ‘undertaker’ who had offered, via a ‘person of quality’, to manage the Commons in order to secure supply.
Bennet deserted to the chancellor and Bristol was left dangerously exposed, his situation made all the worse by a temporary deterioration in the king’s relationship with Lady Castlemaine resulting from his infatuation with Frances Stuart and her alleged affair with Henry Jermyn, Baron Jermyn.
By 15 June, 1663 Charles II had formed an inner group of advisers from which Bristol and his allies were pointedly excluded. The king even avoided meeting Bristol socially.
Bristol made matters worse by threatening to ruin the king’s business unless Ashley and Robartes were made part of the new group of advisors.
About George Digby (2nd Earl of Bristol)
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PART 8
One of Bristol’s identifiable allies at this time was another member of the committee of 8 Apr. 1662, the moderate episcopalian John Gauden, Bishop of Exeter, who wrote in glowing terms of Bristol who ‘takes nothing upon trust, but brings all to the test of reason and religion, justice and honour.’
Over the next few months Gauden corresponded with Bristol, sought his ‘potent interception’ with Charles II on behalf of one of his clients and stayed at his house in Wimbledon. Yet he seems to have had no inkling of the news that would astonish the political world early in June: that Bristol had turned Protestant.
In July Gauden wrote again to Bristol asking for more information about his decision to change ecclesiastical communion.
Sir Henry Yelverton (who had always believed Bristol to be ‘too learned for a papist’) concluded that the conversion reflected a belief that rewards were more easily available to Protestants than to Catholics and, much as he deplored the possibility of Bristol’s advancement, he was glad to learn that ‘interest runs against popery’.
Late in July 1662 it was reported that the rift between Clarendon and Bristol had been repaired and ‘that the king is the master and the chancellor has all the credit’.
It did not last.
In Aug. the ejection of nonconformist ministers on ‘Black Bartholomew’s day’ brought about an alliance between Bristol and Anthony Ashley Cooper, Baron Ashley, and John Robartes, 2nd Baron Robartes in favour of toleration;
then in Oct., Sir Edward Nicholas was replaced as secretary of state by Bennet at the behest of Bristol and other members of the anti-Clarendon faction at court.
Charles II was still trying to ensure a permanent reconciliation between his warring courtiers. In order to do so he promoted the possibility of a marriage between Bristol’s daughter, Anne, and Clarendon’s heir, Henry Hyde, then styled Lord Cornbury.
It is unlikely the alliance was taken seriously for only a few months later arrangements were being made for the marriage of Anne Digby to Robert Spencer, 2nd earl of Sunderland.
In December 1662, whilst Clarendon was incapacitated by illness, Charles II agreed to a declaration of indulgence. Although Bristol’s involvement was obvious, he was, according to the French ambassador, ‘very prudently’ holding himself at a distance from it.
The declaration, published on 26 Dec. 1662, promised to seek an act of Parliament to enshrine the king’s claim to a dispensing power in matters of religion, but to Clarendon’s horror the draft bill that emerged for presentation to Parliament when it met again on 18 Feb. 1663 was much more radical.
Its chances of success, like the possibility of a reconciliation of factions at court, were not improved by news that Bristol had returned to the Catholic church.
About George Digby (2nd Earl of Bristol)
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PART 7
On the first day of the debate, 18 Mar., Clarendon proposed a proviso which he claimed to be at Charles II’s instigation which granted the king a power of dispensation over the wearing of the surplice and making the sign of the cross.
Bristol declared a proviso proposed by the king amounted to a breach of privilege, that it was improper, and he knew that the king opposed it. He drew some support from John Cosin of Durham, who denied that the king had any power of dispensation in such matters.
The next day Bristol spoke at length against it, then interrupted Clarendon’s response, claiming that Clarendon’s references to Cosin’s speech amounted to a transgression of the rules of the House as well as a denial of free speech.
At the end of the debate, which lasted several hours, Bristol put in his own proviso –- to enable the king to give liberty to all.
Clarendon, appalled, pointed out that this would admit popery, insisted on a division and threatened to enter a protest.
Bristol’s proviso was rejected. Clarendon’s was accepted, but perhaps ominously for Clarendon, on the following day (20 Mar.), Bristol was added to the committee for the bill.
On 8 Apr. he was named to the committee to draw up a different kind of proviso, one that would enable the king to offer some form of compensation to those clergymen who would be deprived under the Act of Uniformity.
Bristol remained an active and powerful member of the House.
On 25 Apr. 1662 he was named to the committee for the bill for loyal and indigent officers.
On 10 May when the bill was returned by message from Commons with further amendments, the House decided that the proper method of proceeding would have been for the Commons to have requested a conference rather than simply return the bill. Bristol was named to a small committee to draw up an appropriate response.
That day he was also named as one of the managers of the first conference on the militia bill (settling the forces).
On 13 and 16 May he was named as a manager for the second and third conferences on the bill.
Despite the setbacks over the Act of Uniformity, Bristol was still a significant political figure at a court beset by faction and in command, so it was said, of ‘a powerful cabal’.
About George Digby (2nd Earl of Bristol)
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PART 6
In July, Samuel Pepys noted that Bristol and Buckingham endeavoured to undermine Clarendon at court.
In the same month the French ambassador told Louis XIV that Clarendon had openly declared that Bristol was his enemy and that Clarendon had opposed concessions to Catholics solely in pursuit of his feud with Bristol. He later went on to suggest that Clarendon had been organizing opposition to Catholic demands by underhand methods.
Charles II’s known sympathy to some form of toleration for Catholics coupled with his open humiliation of the chancellor in Aug. 1661 when he gave the post of keeper of the privy purse to Bristol’s ally Henry Bennet (the future earl of Arlington) encouraged Clarendon’s ‘enemies and enviers’ to believe that the time was right for an attack.
Emboldened, Bristol and Bennet spoke openly to Charles II, only to find that he ‘took it very ill that they should conspire to decry the conduct of a man who served him well’.
Bristol and Clarendon were summoned before the king who ‘told both of them to forget the past and in future to live in harmony together’.
Perhaps it was this attempt at reconciliation that prompted a grant that month to Bristol of the Broyle and Ashdown Forest in Sussex, for which he had petitioned the crown in Dec. 1660.
Clarendon may have thought this went a long way towards fulfilling his promise but the grant proved to be a source of litigation and little profit. It also soured relations with Richard Sackville, 5th earl of Dorset, who had previously received a grant of the same properties for his own and his son’s lives.
Further evidence of some sort of reconciliation at court was provided in September when a Privy Seal passed for the payment of £6,000 to Bristol in consideration of his father’s pension on the court of wards; of this £2,000 was paid the following Feb.
Bristol continued to be an important member of the Lords.
On 7 Dec. 1661 he was deputed to be one of the managers of the conference concerning the swearing of witnesses to be examined in the Commons regarding Sir Edward Powell’s fines, on 14 Dec. of that concerning legislation to confirm private acts and on 4 Feb. 1662 on the bill for the execution of attainted persons.
On 6 Feb. 1662 he protested against the bill to restore the estates of Charles Stanley, 8th earl of Derby.
One doubts that Bristol’s reconciliation with Clarendon was genuine; but it was short-lived.
In Mar. 1662 a furious row broke out between the 2 during the debates over the bill of uniformity.
About George Digby (2nd Earl of Bristol)
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PART 5
Early in Feb. 1661 it was reported Bristol was to visit to Flanders and Germany. The purpose was variously given as personal business relating to his daughter’s marriage, or to the ‘unhandsome disbanding of British regiments’ by the king of Spain, but it was widely suspected to relate to the choice of a bride for the king, particularly the need to provide convincing proof that serious consideration had been given to finding a suitable Protestant bride.
According to the French ambassador there was another reason: Clarendon’s desire to get Bristol out of the way so he could increase his influence over the king.
Despite his earlier protestations of support for the French, Bristol, who was born and brought up in Spain, advocated a Spanish match for the king.
Clarendon and Ormonde had initially agreed, but by the time Bristol returned to England (early May, 1661) Clarendon had switched his support to an alliance with Portugal, a policy that Bristol vehemently opposed.
Differences between Clarendon and Bristol also reflected larger rivalries at court. Bristol enjoyed the friendship of the king’s mistress, Barbara Villiers, Lady Palmer, as well as Queen Mother Henrietta Maria, who were both against Clarendon.
Bristol again took his seat in the House on 10 May, 1661, 2 days after the opening of the new session.
He was present on 75 per cent of sitting days and was named to many committees, which included some on the most significant issues of the day: the reversal of the attainder of Thomas Wentworth, earl of Strafford, on 14 May,
the security of the king’s person and government on 24 May,
the regulation of corporations on 18 July
and the restoration of ecclesiastical jurisdiction on 19 July.
In July it was thought Bristol would support the attempt of Aubrey de Vere, 20th earl of Oxford, to secure the great chamberlaincy.
Differences with Clarendon were becoming more obvious.
In June 1661 the House debated Catholic demands for inclusion in the benefits of the Declaration of Breda, a modification of the oath of allegiance and the removal of the penal laws.
Such demands faced considerable opposition especially as it was widely believed that Catholics did not consider themselves bound by oaths that conflicted with their obedience to the pope.
As Bristol admitted during the debates, ‘there is little hopes for us to obtain any ease from penalties till your lordships be satisfied what security we will give by oath of our duty and allegiance to his majesty.’
The debates did produce a committee to draft a bill to repeal the sanguinary laws against Catholics on 28 June to which Bristol was named.
The resultant proposals would have reduced rather than abolish the various restrictions on Catholics but were never introduced.
Just who was responsible for the failure remains unclear. Clarendon blamed divisions amongst the Catholics. The Catholics, including Bristol, blamed Clarendon.
About George Digby (2nd Earl of Bristol)
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PART 4
He is known to have been present at at least one gathering of Catholic nobility and gentry, in Nov. 1660; this may have been the meeting called to discuss a general toleration described by William Howard, Viscount Stafford, in his ‘confession’ of Dec. 1680, although the presence of Ormonde suggests that Irish interests rather than purely Catholic ones may have been the focus of the meeting.
On 6 Dec. he sought further direction from the House for the benefit of the committee considering the bill to vacate Sir Edward Powell’s fines and reported the bill itself as fit to pass on 8 Dec.
On 12 Dec. after a debate in a committee of the whole he was named to the subcommittee to consider provisos to the bill against the regicides.
Given that the most substantial part of Bristol’s claims related to his father’s unpaid pension and the wardship of Lord Brooke, he was naturally extremely concerned about the prospect of the formal abolition of the court of wards. The Commons passed a bill to this effect in Dec. 1660 and backdated it to the last sitting of the court in Feb, 1646.
Bristol prepared a petition against the bill, asking it be revised either to secure his claim to the wardship of Lord Brooke or to provide him with compensation, but when he told Clarendon of his intention he was persuaded to take no action on the grounds ‘that it might be of great ill consequence to his majesty’s service to set on foot, in the House of Commons, a claim to such a compensation, since it might be of example to divers others to do the like’.
Bristol’s compliance was secured by a promise from Clarendon, given in the king’s name, that he would be provided for in other ways.
Clarendon’s failure to keep his promise, aggravated by subsequent political and factional differences, led to a rapid deterioration in the relationship between the two.
The passage of the bill to abolish the court of wards was speedy – it was brought up from the Commons on 17 Dec. and received the royal assent on 24 Dec. –- but Clarendon was probably correct in thinking that Bristol had raised a potentially controversial issue that could have delayed it.
The House received a petition against it from the dowager duchess of Somerset as well as two provisos on 18 Dec. and a petition from the officers of the court the following day. The alterations made in the Lords became the subject of a conference with the Commons on 21 Dec.
In Jan. 1661, Bristol together with York joined Albemarle in the suppression of Venner’s uprising.
He also emphatically restated his willingness to serve the interests of the French at the English court.
Despite his professions of poverty and ruin, he was able to buy a magnificent house in Wimbledon, which he described as the ‘noblest place in England’, from the queen mother for £4,000. He later sent her a diamond valued at £500 by way of thanks.
About George Digby (2nd Earl of Bristol)
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PART 3
Contrary to his statements to Lady Bristol about sublimating his private interests to the wider public good, Bristol was determined to extract revenge and reparation from his own old enemies.
He also put considerable effort into securing the rewards to which he believed himself entitled. He obtained a grant in reversion of the office of writer of the tallies (auditor of the receipt of the exchequer) for his younger son, Francis Digby.
His countess petitioned for a lease of Theobald’s Park as compensation for giving up her jointure to raise the £30,000 demanded after the Civil Wars for the ‘redemption’ of her son John Digby, later the 3rd Earl of Bristol (1634 –1698) .
On 2 Aug. 1660 Bristol introduced a bill to recover £6,500 given ‘by the late pretended Parliament’ to Carew Raleigh; it received its third reading on 22 Aug. but failed to pass the Commons.
Bristol also, on 11 Aug. obtained an order of the House putting him into possession of all lands formerly belonging either to himself or his father and which had been confiscated and sold for delinquency.
The question of reparations and how far they could or should be pursued was a sensitive one.
On 6 Aug. in the course of debates on private provisos in the act of indemnity, Bristol’s support of the merits and sufferings of William Cavendish, marquess (later duke) of Newcastle over and above those of George Villiers, 2nd duke of Buckingham, caused an open quarrel in the House and fears of a duel, forcing Charles II to order the men to confine themselves to their lodgings. They appear to have been reconciled by the end of the month.
On 10 Sept. Bristol reported from the committee for the potentially controversial bill to restore Sir George Lane (Ormonde’s secretary) to possession of Rathclyne, Lisduff and other lands in Ireland.
The following day he was named to the committee to amend the contentious bill for restoring ministers, apparently as part of an alliance with York and Clarendon that aimed to conciliate the Presbyterians and offer the hope that a more general toleration would follow.
He was also named to the committees for the annexation of Dunkirk, Mardyke and Jamaica to the crown and, after reporting from the committee for the bill for disbanding the army, was named to assist Hyde in managing the consequent conference on the subject.
The Abbé Montagu’s hopes for securing Bristol’s support for France seemed to have been borne out, for by late Sept. at the latest Bristol was in regular communication with the French court, telling Mazarin that his desire to serve him was second only to his desire to serve Charles II.
Bristol was active in court life, entertaining the king of Spain’s representative, Claude Lamoral, Prince de Ligne, accompanying Charles II on state occasions and welcoming the royal household to his London house.
About George Digby (2nd Earl of Bristol)
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PART 2
Bristol had considerable expectations.
Whilst in exile, he had been granted the wardship of his wife’s nephew, Francis Greville, 3rd Baron Brooke of Beauchamps Court. This, ‘the only thing he relied upon to repair the losses of his family in his service, and to pay his debts, without being burdensome to the crown’, was valued at £30,000.
He also had a claim to the arrears of a pension of £2,000 a year that had been granted to his father and which by the Restoration came to £36,000.
He also alleged that he and his family had lost £16,000 as the price of their loyalty to the crown during the Civil Wars and Interregnum.
The gap between these expectations and what he received would soon engender an implacable hostility to Edward Hyde.
Bristol returned to England in time to take his seat in the Lords on 16 June, 1660.
His willingness to attend Parliament coupled with his access to the king and his Catholicism led the Abbé Montagu (the Catholic brother of Edward Montagu, 2nd earl of Manchester and high in the esteem of the queen mother) to tell Cardinal Mazarin that Bristol ‘could be useful to cultivate, even if he does not realize it’. Mazarin welcomed the abbé’s offer to influence and manage Bristol.
Bristol attended 72 per cent of the remaining sittings in the Lords that session, becoming a significant member of the House involved in debate on crucial post-restoration issues; over the course of the session he was named to 23 committees.
On 19 June, 1660 he was named to the committee for privileges, the subcommittee for the Journal, and the committee to examine the acts and ordinances of the Interregnum.
On 4 July he was named to the committee to confirm the privileges of Parliament and the fundamental laws of the kingdom; he also obtained an order of the House for the restoration of goods that he had lost during the ‘late wars’.
Bristol’s hard-line attitude to the king’s former enemies and inability to accept the case for moderation was soon apparent.
On 7, 11 and 14 July he reported from the committee for privileges on the executions of James Hamilton, duke of Hamilton, Henry Rich, earl of Holland, and James Stanley, 7th earl of Derby, as a result of which the House ordered those responsible to be secured.
On 20 July, 1660 during the debate on the bill of indemnity he told the House of his rage, ‘That many of the wickedest and meanest of the people should remain, as it were, rewarded for their treasons, rich and triumphant in the spoils of the most eminent in virtue and loyalty, of all the nobility and gentry of the kingdom’.
Although he would be ‘irreparably ruined’ in his fortune by the bill, the public interest nevertheless called for it to be passed quickly.
He argued, successfully, that the murder of the late king had to be washed away by the ‘blood of the guilty’ and should be dealt with as a particular issue in a separate bill.
About George Digby (2nd Earl of Bristol)
San Diego Sarah • Link
This is extracted from a very long biography which seems to be from the House of Lords. This is the time covered by the Diary; the detail explains the tensions which Pepys experiences but often doesn't understand:
George Digby succeeded to the earldom of Bristol in 1653, but even after that date his contemporaries sometimes referred to him as Lord Digby or earl of Digby, thus creating some confusion between Bristol and another branch of the family who held the barony of Digby of Gleashill in the Irish peerage (but who were English and resident in England).
Bristol was a prominent member of the court in exile and equally prominent in the factional rivalries that beset it. ...
Given his earlier defence of the Church of England, Bristol’s conversion to Catholicism early in 1659 was a matter of astonishment that embarrassed Charles II and forced him to remove Bristol from the post of secretary of state.
As the Restoration unfolded, Bristol, involved in negotiations in Spain, found himself left behind by the pace of developments. Nevertheless, he naturally expected to reap the rewards of loyalty, including compensation for his losses in the king’s service, the restitution of his estates and payment of the arrears of his salary as secretary of state, which he estimated at £8,500.
Initially fearful that Monck would insist on some form of conditional restoration, Lady Bristol began to press Charles II for what she perceived as Bristol’s well-earned reward, apparently afraid that her husband’s absence would lead to him being overlooked.
Bristol was far more confident of the king’s favour and feared only that his wife’s importunities might backfire to his discredit He counselled discretion, assuring her that, "I cannot fail to succeed in all that we reasonably propose to our selves for my person, fortune and family; so certain am I of his Majesty’s favourable kindness, unalterable, by any thing but by your letting him see, that we precipitating prefer the satisfying our own vanity and ambition, the consideration of drawing inconveniences upon by pressing to be near him, before he is master enough of his affairs to be able to admit it without ill consequence unto them."
He did not doubt there might be obstacles to his advancement. These included his Catholicism but, more importantly, the rivalry of those who were jealous of his credit with the king and of his ‘parts and ambitions’. He suggested that an emphasis on a desire to live quietly at Sherborne rather than to pursue places at court would persuade even his enemies ‘to be forwardest as a matter of justice, to counsel his majesty to repair my losses liberally.’
He was also convinced that Edward Hyde, the future earl of Clarendon, and James Butler, Marquis of Ormonde in the Irish peerage and subsequently also in the English peerage, would support his pretensions.
About George Digby (2nd Earl of Bristol)
San Diego Sarah • Link
The Parliamentary bio of George Digby's son, John, gives us a more personal look into his life:
JOHN "Digby’s grandfather, the 1st Earl of Bristol, came from a cadet branch of the Midland family. He was granted the Sherborne Castle estate as a reward for diplomatic services in 1616.
"His father [GEORGE] sat for the county in both Parliaments of 1640 before being called up to the Lords, having made the Lower House too hot to hold him by his unexpected and well-publicized opposition to Strafford’s attainder.
"During the Interregnum, when [GEORGE] was in exile he became a convert to Rome, [JOHN] Digby seems to have lived with his Puritan mother [Lady Anne Russell, da. of Francis, 4th Earl of Bedford], whose ‘zeal cannot suffer a Catholic under her roof’. She bought back the estates from the Treason Trustees by selling her own jointure, and settled it on [JOHN] Digby on his marriage."
https://www.historyofparliamenton…
About George Digby (2nd Earl of Bristol)
San Diego Sarah • Link
L&M: George Digby, 2nd Earl of Bristol 1612-77.
Politician, soldier, playwrite -- a man of brilliant gifts, but of almost no achievements, having, in Burnet's words, "no judgment or steadiness".
He served King Charles, shortly and disasterously, as a Secretary of State in 1643, and was appointed to the same position by Charles II in 1657, but was made to resign on becoming a Roman Catholic.
His religion excluded him from high office thereafter, and he played a spoiling game during the Diary years making himself unpopular and distrusted by everyone.
The Diary has several revealing entries about his vendetta against Clarendon.
The only play he published is called "Elvira" (1667).
About Wednesday 11 March 1667/68
San Diego Sarah • Link
More about the French style of food delivery:
An excerpt from GEORGE VILLIERS, SECOND DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM 1628-1687 : A STUDY IN THE HISTORY OF THE RESTORATION
By WINIFRED, LADY BURGHCLERE
https://archive.org/stream/cu3192…
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W. LONDON
1903
Page 250 BUCKINGHAM'S VAGARIES [chap. x.
'The usual profusion which marked the entertainments of that period was not lacking on this occasion; and with his French chef, George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham had evidently imported the Parisian fashion of serving his table. All the dishes of "costly meats both hot and cold, the sweetmeats also, and the fruit," were placed simultaneously on high stands erected to receive them down the board — an arrangement we can see depicted in the sketches of French banquets still preserved at the Musee Carnavalet.'
@@@
I think “the board” either means the sideboard, or on the table itself of which I think I remember seeing pictures.
The website for Musee Carnavalet has fabulous pictures of 17th century French art, but not of these sketches or of pictures of dining at the time.
https://www.thegeographicalcure.c…
About Wednesday 5 June 1667
San Diego Sarah • Link
"... does this mean that the restoration norm was having the prawn cocktail, steak and Black Forest gateaux all served at once?"
Apparently, yes. An excerpt from GEORGE VILLIERS, SECOND DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM 1628-1687 : A STUDY IN THE HISTORY OF THE RESTORATION
By WINIFRED, LADY BURGHCLERE
https://archive.org/stream/cu3192…
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W. LONDON
1903
Page 250 BUCKINGHAM'S VAGARIES [chap. x.
'The usual profusion which marked the entertainments of that period was not lacking on this occasion; and with his French chef, George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham had evidently imported the Parisian fashion of serving his table. All the dishes of "costly meats both hot and cold, the sweetmeats also, and the fruit," were placed simultaneously on high stands erected to receive them down the board — an arrangement we can see depicted in the sketches of French banquets still preserved at the Musee Carnavalet.'
About Monday 1 April 1661
San Diego Sarah • Link
Diary of Ralph Josselin (Private Collection)
1.4.1661 (Monday 1 April 1661)
document 70013010
April. 1. 2. 3.
I sow oats on ley, and other land. lord command a blessing for my hope is in thee.
went towards London on Mr H. account, a sad providence, [PRESUMABLY ON THE 3RD - SDS]
oh lord melt my bowels, accept my praises for my families health, reason, return to them in favour: die.
@@@
This tells us the weather was fine.
Ley -- noun
1. a piece of land put down to grass, clover, etc., for a single season or a limited number of years, in contrast to permanent pasture.
Mr. H = one of the Mr. Harlakandens who lived in London must have received bad news or suffered bad health. His mother/sister/aunt/cousin lives in the Manor house, and is a friend of Josselin's.
Onto the bowels question -- this meant something different in the 17th century. American Google hasn't the foggiest idea what I'm asking about. Anyone know?
And presumably he never finished the entry -- or he had suicidal thoughts after his return from London and wrote this entry!?!?
About Sunday 31 March 1661
San Diego Sarah • Link
Correct, 徽柔.
About Monday 1 April 1661
San Diego Sarah • Link
On the maid debate -- mom stays home all day, so having to deal with someone she doesn't like is a big deal.
Dad has his tailoring business -- probably in one of the street-level rooms -- and has other people to interact with during his days.
Mom's vote counts the most. No matter how irrational or petty, if mom isn't happy, no-one will be happy.
Pepys should known that.
About Louis XIV (King of France, 1643-1715)
San Diego Sarah • Link
Pictures of extraordinary French craftsmanship in this article, which also mentions Louis XIV's efforts to be friends with the Emperor of China (after the Diary).
https://en.chateauversailles.fr/n…
About Easter
San Diego Sarah • Link
Easter Sunday traditions ... are based on pagan superstitions, which of course is why the Puritans didn’t celebrate the holiday. (The Puritans didn’t like Christmas, either.)
For the early Puritans, celebrating the Lord’s Day 52 times a year was quite enough.
https://newenglandhistoricalsocie…