Henry Somerset, 1st Duke of Beaufort

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Mary Capell
Issue9, including Charles, Mary, Henrietta, and Anne
FatherEdward Somerset, 2nd Marquess of Worcester
MotherElizabeth Dormer
Gloucester City Museum & Art Gallery
.

Henry Somerset, 1st Duke of Beaufort,

Marquess of Worcester. He was styled Lord Herbert from 1644 until 3 April 1667. The Dukedom of Beaufort was bestowed upon him by King Charles II
in 1682.

Early life

Henry Somerset was born at

Princess Elizabeth, the youngest daughter of King Charles I. He left the country during the First English Civil War, but returned by 1650.[1]

Lord Herbert

His father's estates had been forfeited, and those in

Member of Parliament for Breconshire in 1654–5.[2]

After Cromwell's death, Herbert then joined the party that demanded a "full and free parliament", in practical terms demanding the Restoration of the

Wootton Basset in 1660; he chose to sit for Monmouthshire in the Convention Parliament. In 1661 he was re-elected MP for Monmouthshire in the Cavalier Parliament and sat until 1667 when he inherited a peerage.[5]

As one of the twelve commissioners from the House of Commons who attended

Lord Clarendon that his son was intriguing against him.[4]

Lord Herbert kept aloof from court life, but maintained good relations with the

Marquess of Worcester.[4]

Marquess of Worcester

Worcester was created Lord President of the

William Herbert, 1st Marquis of Powis, and against Donough Kearney, an Irishman who had married his widowed stepmother, Lady Margaret O'Brien. In the event, Kearney was acquitted of treason and Lord Powis was released after five years in the Tower of London
without being brought to trial.

A steady supporter of the Court party, he voted against the

Exclusion Bill at the close of 1680, whereupon the Commons petitioned the king to remove him from his person and counsels (January 1681). Charles regarded his conduct in a different light.[4]

Duke of Beaufort

By

Exclusion Bill, Beaufort figured prominently in John Dryden's Absalom and Achitophel as Bezaliel.[6]

In November 1683 Beaufort obtained £20,000 damages in two libel actions against

11th Regiment of Foot on 20 June following.[9]

When the

Duke of Monmouth, at the close of June 1685, was hesitating to march upon Bristol, Beaufort as Lord Lieutenant occupied it in force on 16 June. He threatened to fire the city if any of Monmouth's friends were admitted, and locked up a number of dissenters and disaffected persons in the Guildhall.[10] Four days later he reviewed nineteen companies of foot and four troops of horse, and on 24 June twenty-one companies were drawn up on Redclyffe Mead and volunteers enlisted by the beat of the drum. On 6 July came tidings of Monmouth's defeat at the Battle of Sedgemoor.[9]

On 24 September James II visited the Duke at Badminton, and expressed his satisfaction at his consistent loyalty. In October 1688, when the Glorious Revolution was proceeding, Beaufort once more occupied Bristol with the train-bands of Gloucestershire, and some of his men captured John Lovelace, 3rd Baron Lovelace (who was trying to join William of Orange) at Cirencester, and lodged him a prisoner in Gloucester Castle. He prepared to defend the city, but had eventually to surrender to the superior force under the Earl of Shrewsbury and Sir John Guise. He voted for a regency in preference to the offer of the crown to William of Orange.[9]

On 14 December 1688 Beaufort waited on William at

assassination plot, his house was searched in February 1696, but nothing was found to compromise him.[9]

Last years

On 19 March 1696, when expected to attend the House of Lords to sign the Association, Beaufort "broke his shoulder". The Lords sent him the document to sign; but he refused, though he declared his abhorrence of the plot against William.[11] By November 1697 he was reconciled to the court, but he suffered the loss of his son and heir, Charles, through an accident to his coach in Wales in July 1698.[12]

Beaufort died at Badminton on 21 January 1700. He was buried in the Beaufort Chapel in

St. George's, Windsor, where an elaborate monument was set up to his memory;[c] it was moved in 1878 to Badminton.[12] Within St Michael and All Angels Church, Badminton, this monument by Grinling Gibbons is now on the North side of the chancel and consists of an effigy of the Duke in Garter robes, reclining on a sarcophagus and a plinth with relief of St George and the Dragon. There are twin Corinthian columns with embossed shafts, acanthus frieze, cornice with flaming urns, and the Duke's arms and supporters. At the top, 25 ft from the ground, is a tasselled cushion supporting a coronet; on the plinth are full-length female figures of Justice and Truth. Above the Duke's effigy, parted curtains show the heavenly host with palms and crowns. The Latin inscription displays the names of his family and the many offices he held.[13]

Roger North, in his Life of the Lord Keeper, gave an account of the state maintained by Beaufort: "a princely way of living" with a household of about 200. The Duke spent much time hunting, planting, and building, and was unfashionably strict: his servants lived in constant fear of dismissal, and even neighbouring landowners were reluctant to cross him.[12]

Family

Henry Somerset had four daughters, including Anne (pictured). The inscription on this painting is false.

On 17 August 1657, he married

Mary Capell, who was the daughter of Arthur Capell, 1st Baron Capell of Hadham, sister of Arthur Capell, 1st Earl of Essex, and widow of Henry Seymour, Lord Beauchamp. They had five sons and four daughters. Three of the sons were:[12]

  • Henry, who died as an infant;
  • Charles (December 1660 – 13 July 1698), who had a military and political career and succeeded him as Marquess of Worcester;
  • Arthur (29 September 1671 – July 1743), who married Mary Russell in 1695, daughter of William Russell, 1st and last Bt., and Hesther Rouse, daughter of Sir Thomas Rouse, 1st Bt. (1608–1676). Their daughter was Mary Somerset, grandmother of Sir Charles William Rouse Boughton, 1st and 9th Bt.

Three of the daughters were:[12]

The fourth daughter—bearing an unknown name—might have died young.

Beaufort's son Charles died before he could inherit the dukedom, so on the duke's death it passed to Charles's son Henry.[12]

Family tree

Ancestry

Notes

  1. ^ Edward Somerset, 2nd Marquess of Worcester was styled Lord Herbert of Raglan from 1628–1644
  2. ^ From his half-cousin Elizabeth, daughter and heiress of Thomas Somerset, 1st Viscount Somerset of Cashel. The latter, a younger son of Edward Somerset, 4th Earl of Worcester, had died without male issue in 1650 (Seccombe 1898, p. 243).
  3. ^ For inscription see Ashmole's Berkshire, iii. 163 (Seccombe 1898, p. 245)

References

  1. ^ Seccombe 1898, p. 242.
  2. ^ Seccombe 1898, pp. 242–243.
  3. ^ Seccombe 1898, p. 243 notes it is printed in Dirck's Life of the Marquis of Worcester, p. 233, under the wrong date 1660.
  4. ^ a b c d Seccombe 1898, p. 243.
  5. ^ History of Parliament Online - Somerset, Henry, Lord Herbert of Raglan
  6. ^ Seccombe 1898, pp. 243–244.
  7. ^ Seccombe 1898, p. 244 cites Luttrell
  8. ^ Seccombe 1898, p. 244 cites Thomas Dingley, Account of the Duke's Progress, ed. 1888
  9. ^ a b c d Seccombe 1898, p. 244.
  10. ^ Seccombe 1898, p. 244 cites James Fawckner Nicholls and J. Taylor, Bristol Past and Present, 1881, iii. 111, 121
  11. ^ Seccombe 1898, p. 245 cites Ellis Corresp. ii. 293.
  12. ^ a b c d e f Seccombe 1898, p. 245.
  13. ^ St. Michael and All Angels, Great Badminton (webpage), 19 July 2013
  14. ^ Emma Major, ‘Coventry , Anne, countess of Coventry (1673–1763)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Jan 2008 accessed 28 Nov 2014

References

  • Burke's Peerage and Baronetage
     (106th edition, 1999) edited by Charles Mosley
  • Page on the Dukedom of Beaufort from Michael Moore's website HereditaryTitles.com
  • Molly McClain, Beaufort: The Duke and His Duchess, 1657-1715 (Yale University Press, 2001).
Attribution

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Seccombe, Thomas (1898). "Somerset, Henry". In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 53. London: Smith, Elder & Co. pp. 242–245.

Further reading

Parliament of England
Unknown
Wootton Basset
1660
With: John Pleydell
 Succeeded by
Preceded by
Member of Parliament for Monmouthshire
1660–1667
With: William Morgan
 Succeeded by
Military offices
New regiment Colonel of the Duke of Beaufort's Regiment of Foot
1685 		Succeeded by
Honorary titles
English Interregnum
 		Lord Lieutenant of Gloucestershire,
Herefordshire
and Monmouthshire
1660–1689 		Succeeded by
Custos Rotulorum of Monmouthshire
1660–1689
Preceded by Custos Rotulorum of Herefordshire
1671–1689
Preceded by
Lord President of Wales
Lord Lieutenant of Wales

1672–1689
Preceded by Custos Rotulorum of Somerset
1668–1672 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Custos Rotulorum of Brecknockshire
1679–1689 		Succeeded by
Peerage of England
New title
Duke of Beaufort

1682–1700 		Succeeded by
Preceded by
Marquess of Worcester

1667–1700
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