Jacobites Under the Beds: Bishop Francis Atterbury, the Earl of Sunderland and the Westminster School Dormitory Case of 1721
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JACOBITES UNDER THE BEDS: BISHOP FRANCIS ATTERBURY, THE EARL OF SUNDERLAND AND THE WESTMINSTER SCHOOL DORMITORY CASE OF 1721 CLYVEJONES IN British Library, Harleian MS. 7190 there is a list of names which at first glance seems puzzling, even to an historian of early eighteenth-century Britain.-^ The initial clue to its identification comes from the words 'For the Bp of Rochester' and ' Ag[ain]st' at the foot of the two columns of names. A quick check of the numbers of names reveals that this is a division list of those in the House of Lords who voted for and against Bishop Francis Atterbury's appeal against a Court of Chancery decision to proceed to trial over the building of a new dormitory for Westminster School. The vote on 16 May 1721 went in Atterbury's favour by 26 to 24. The curious nature of the list arises from an analysis of those who supported and those who opposed the Bishop. Atterbury (fig. i) was a high Tory and leading (though secret) advocate in England of the restoration of the Stuart Pretender (James Francis Edward, son of James II). Thus is seems strange that those who voted for him in the hst included several of the high officers of state in the Whig administration, including the 'prime minister', the Earl of Sunderland, while some of Atterbury's opponents were his fellow Jacobites. Was this curious state of affairs merely a result of the peers and bishops voting according to their understanding of the pros and cons of the legal case, putting aside all political considerations; or was this one of those legal cases which occasionally become inextricably entangled with politics? If the latter, then clearly it was a case which caused politicians to break the usual bonds of Whig and Tory, government and opposition.^ It was not unknown for legal cases in the House of Lords to be dominated by party considerations; such cases always aroused considerable contemporary interest.^ As we shall see, however, the Westminster School dormitory case was more interesting and more politically complex than most. One result of this interest was the production of this division list (such lists for private legal cases are very rare).^ This document enables historians to analyse the political background to the case, which involved the relationship 35 Fig. I. Francis Atterbury, by Sir Godfrey Kneller, engraved by H. T. Ryall; Edmund Lodge, Portraits of Illustrious Personages... (London, 1835), vol. x, pi. 12. io8i5.f 12 36 between the Whig Sunderland and the Jacobites - an area of some dispute amongst students of early eighteenth-century political parties.^ II The legal case resulting from the decision to build a new dormitory for Westminster School (or College) has received scant attention from historians, though its central importance in the relationship between Francis Atterbury, who became Dean of Westminster (and Bishop of Rochester) in 1713, and the Chapter of Westminster has been recognized.^ It is probable that Atterbury's personality and temperament - irascible, combative, and unable to suffer fools gladly, conditions worsened by recurrent fits of gout which clouded his judgement^ - exacerbated the situation and that any other person would have handled the problem so that it did not explode into a full-blown legal case before the House of Lords. However, the Dean's colleagues in the Chapter, the twelve prebendaries of Westminster, and the others involved in the case (most notably Dr Robert Freind, Headmaster of Westminster School from 1711 and one-time friend and Westminster schoolfellow of Atterbury's) were no angels. Political and theological differences divided them and set some of them apart from Atterbury. Samuel Bradford, for example, who became Bishop of Carlisle in 1718, was a staunch Whig who was, no doubt, appalled by Atterbury's high Tory (not to say Jacobite) politics. Atterbury had come to Westminster from Christ Church, Oxford, where he had been Dean, and before that from the Deanery of Carlisle. In this latter place he had clashed violently over the statutes of the cathedral with the equally stubborn Bishop William Nicolson,^ a disagreement which had led directly to an Act of Parliament settling the disputed statutes of all the cathedrals of the new (post-Reformation) foundation. Atterbury also came to Westminster with the reputation of a pugnacious propagandist. He had been the leading figure on the High Church side in the Convocation controversy, championing the Lower, Tory dominated House, against the Upper House, largely composed of Whig bishops. Thus personality, politics and theology became inextricably mixed and lifted what was essentially a minor private matter onto the national political stage. Atterbury, however, seems to have come out of the feud better than his opponents, particularly at the level of Chapter politics - his motive and actions when the case reached Parliament are more open to question - showing ' a genuine concern for the College as a whole; while the opposing prebendaries, in the main, sought to protect their own private interests'.^ Ill The dispute originally arose from a bequest in 1710 of £1,000 for a new lodgings for the forty Queen's scholars at Westminster School.^** The money had been left by Sir Edward Hannes, physician to Queen Anne and former Professor of Chemistry at Oxford and an old boy of the school. Hannes's will of 5 May 1708 stipulated that the lodging be erected 'in such a Place as the Dean and Chapter should direct', the Chapter having first 37 consulted Sir Christopher Wren and Henry Aldrich of Christ Church (who died in 1710). Before the legacy was paid, however, it was unsuccessfully challenged in the Court of Chancery by Hannes's heir. It was not until July 1711 that Lord Chancellor Harcourt confirmed the terms of the will. In the meantime Dean Sprat of Westminster, Bishop of Rochester (Atterbury's predecessor, who was to die in 1713), had encountered opposition (so the respondents - the anti-Atterbury side - in the later case claimed) from some of the prebendaries, and in April 1711 these opponents had signed an instrument stating their case against building a new lodging. Sprat did in fact decide in favour of not building anew because the legacy of ;£ 1,000, upon the expert advice of Wren, was considered insufficient for the job (/;i,5oo being estimated for the rebuilding). However, the money would allow a thorough repair and partial rebuilding of the existing accommodation (see no. 3 in fig. 2). Thus in March 1712 an act of the Chapter confirmed this decision^^ and the Attorney General, on behalf of the scholars, preferred a petition to this effect to the Lord Chancellor. A year later in April 1713 the Lord Chancellor finally agreed to the restoration of the old building, but Dean Sprat died before work could begin. The new Dean, Atterbury, quickly took the opposite view, and carried a majority of the Chapter with him. In January 1714, upon the prospect of raising contributions to finance the new lodging, an order was made by the Chapter for the dormitory to occupy part of the College garden (see nos. i and 2 in fig. 2).^^ The respondents later claimed that this order was forgotten for five years until the designs for the new building emerged in 1718. The other side in the case - the appellants, led by Atterbury - stated that part of these five years had been occupied in raising the extra money, and that by December 1718, when the Chapter confirmed the earlier order to build anew, enough money had been raised. Contributions, rather surprisingly considering Atterbury's known political stance, were headed by King George I with ;(;i,ooo and the Prince of Wales with £500.^^ Atterbury further claimed that Robert Freind, one of the chief opponents of the Dean's scheme, had agreed along with the Chapter to the new designs revealed in 1718. The respondents counter-claimed that their agreement had been tricked out of them, and had passed the Chapter in the unavoidable absence of two members. Consequently in May 1719 the respondents exhibited a bill in Chancery against the new building, and on 18 and 20 June 1720 Lord Chancellor Parker heard the case and decreed that it should proceed to full trial in the Court of King's Bench to decide who had rights over the College garden. It was in order to prevent this further proceeding that Atterbury and his supporters appealed to the House of Lords. They asked for a ruling in their favour and the award of costs against the respondents. The case came before the Upper House on 28 March 1721 when the counsel for the appellants, Thomas Lutwyche and Charles Talbot, were heard.^* The counsel for the respondents, Philip Yorke and Spencer Cowper, were heard on the following day.^^ Two adjournments took place on 18 April and 4 May, and finally on 16 May the Lords ordered the decree in Chancery reversed, declared the College garden a more proper place for the dormitory than the present site, and dismissed the Attorney General's bill in favour of the respondents.'1"6 38 Fig2. Plan of Westminster School showing the College Garden and the Site of'The new intended Dormitory', c. 1718, by W. Dickinson and J. Kipp: Westminster Abbey Muniment 24877A. By courtesy of the Dean and Chapter of Westminster. Key: i. The College garden; 2. The new intended dormitory; 3. The present old dormitory; 4. Dr Onley's house; 5. Mr Sub Dean Evans's house; 6. Dr Dent's house and garden; 7. Mr Farrar's house; 8. Dr Freind's house (indicated as 'now in the possession of Mrs Berisford'); 9.