Chapter IV (2)

Sir Edward left no surviving issue, a circumstance which gave rise to almost endless contentions between the kinsmen of his name and their cousins—the Gerards. Lawsuit followed lawsuit; long and rancorous were the proceedings in the “Great Cheshire Will Case,” as it was called; and the fierce struggle, which began in one century with forgery, followed by seduction and divorce, was ended in the next, when the husbands of the two ladies who claimed to be heiresses were slain by each other in a murderous duel in Hyde Park. Immediately after the death of Sir Edward Fitton, Penelope, Anne, Jane, and Frances, his four sisters—married respectively to Sir Charles Gerard, Knight; Sir John Brereton, Knight; Thomas Minshull, Esquire; and Henry Mainwaring, Esquire—entered upon possession of the estates; but, after long litigation, they were ejected by William Fitton, son of Alexander, second surviving son of Sir Edward Fitton, Treasurer of Ireland, who claimed under a deed alleged to have been executed by Sir Edward, settling the estates upon himself, with remainder in succession to his sons, Edward and Alexander, the latter of whom succeeded him in the possession, and he obtained three verdicts in his favour. One of the sisters of Sir Edward Fitton—Penelope—had married Sir Charles Gerard, of Halsall, in Lancashire, and by him had a son, Sir Charles Gerard, created Lord Brandon in 1645, and Earl of Macclesfield in 1679. Lord Brandon was one of the notable gallants at the profligate Court of Charles II. He held the office of Gentleman of the Bedchamber, and was also Captain of the Guards—the latter a commission which he relinquished for a douceur of £12,000 when the King wanted to bestow the dignity upon his illegitimate son, the Duke of Monmouth. He kept up a large establishment in London, surrounded by trim gardens, the remembrance of which is perpetuated in the names of the streets that now occupy the site—Gerard Street and Macclesfield Street, in Soho. His wife, a French lady, brought herself into disfavour at Court through indulging in the feminine propensity of allowing her tongue to wag too freely in disparagement of the notorious courtesan, Lady Castlemaine, as we learn from an entry in “Pepys’s Diary”:—

1662-3. Creed told me how, for some words of my Lady Gerard’s
against my Lady Castlemaine to the Queene, the King did the other
day apprehend her in going out to a dance with her at a ball, when
she desired it as the ladies do, and is since forbid attending the
Queen by the King; which is much talked of, my lord her husband
being a great favourite.

On the restoration of the King, nineteen years after the death of Sir Edward Fitton, and thirty after the entail had been confirmed, as alleged by a deed-poll, Lord Gerard produced a will which would be looked for in vain in the Ecclesiastical Court at Chester, purporting to have been made in his favour by his mother’s brother, Sir Edward Fitton. Hot, fierce, and anxious was the litigation that followed, and in 1663 a small volume was printed at the Hague, entitled, “A True Narrative of the Proceedings in the several Suits-in-law that have been between the Right Honourable Charles, Lord Brandon, and Alexander Fitton, Esqr., published for general satisfaction, by a Lover of Truth.” Fitton pleaded the deed-poll, but Gerard brought forward one Abraham Grainger, then confined in the Gate House, who made oath that he had forged the name of Sir Edward to the deed under a threat of mortal violence, whereupon the Court of Chancery directed a trial to determine whether the deed-poll was genuine or not. The forgery was admitted by Grainger, and corroborated by other witnesses, who deposed that they had heard Fitton confess that Grainger had forged a deed for him, for which he had paid him £40. The judgment of the Court was given in favour of Gerard, and the deed declared to be a forgery.

The strangest part of the story remains. Grainger, impelled either by remorse or the desire to escape a heavy penalty by acknowledging the smaller offence, made a written confession setting forth that he had perjured himself when he swore that he had forged the name of Sir Edward, and had been compelled to do so by the threats of Lord Gerard. Pepys, who had a strong dislike to Lord Gerard, refers to the circumstance in his “Diary”:—

My cosen, Roger Pepys, he says, showed me Grainger’s written
confession of his being forced by imprisonment, &c., by my Lord
Gerard, most barbarously to confess his forging of a deed in
behalf of Fitton, in the great case between him and my Lord
Gerard; which business is under examination, and is the foulest
against my Lord Gerard that ever anything in the world was, and
will, all do believe, ruine him; and I shall be glad of it.

The anticipations of the gossiping diarist were not, however, realised. The confession, being unsupported by evidence, was discredited, and Fitton, who was adjudged to be the real offender, was fined £500 and committed to the King’s Bench.

Alexander Fitton, who was thus dispossessed of the property, lingered in prison until the accession of James II., when, having embraced the Romish faith, he was released from confinement and taken into favour by the King, who made him Chancellor of Ireland, and subsequently conferred upon him the honour of knighthood and created him Lord Gawsworth. He sat in the Irish Parliament of 1689, where he appears to have been actively employed in passing Acts of forfeiture of Protestant property, and attainder of Protestant personages. On the abdication of James he accompanied him into exile, where he remained, and, dying, left descendants who, it is to be feared, benefited little from the tutelar dignities his sovereign had conferred upon him.

The whimsical _finesse_ of the law, which wrested from Alexander Fitton the lands owned for so many generations by his progenitors and bestowed them upon the Gerards, though it added wealth, did not convey peace or contentment to the successful litigants. Their history during the brief period they owned the Gawsworth estates partakes much of the character of a romance in real life, but it is one that is by no means pleasant to contemplate. Charles Gerard, on whom the barony of Brandon and the earldom of Macclesfield had been successively conferred, died in January, 1693-4, when the titles and estates devolved upon his eldest son, who bore the same baptismal name. Charles, the second earl, was the husband of the lady who, by her adulterous connection with Richard Savage, Earl Rivers, and as the heroine of the famous law case that followed upon the birth of the celebrated but unfortunate poet, Richard Savage, acquired an unenviable notoriety even in that age, when profligacy formed such a prominent characteristic of society.

The Countess of Macclesfield, under the name of Madame Smith, and wearing a mask, was delivered of a male child in Fox Court, near Brook Street, Holborn, by Mrs. Wright, a midwife, on Saturday, the 16th January, 1697-8. The earl denied the paternity, and satisfactorily proved the impossibility of his being the father of the son borne by his countess; who, on her side, narrated a stratagem she had devised, whereby the disputed paternity could not be denied. The stratagem was not unknown in the licentious comedies of the time, but no credit was given to it in this case; and thus the honour of Gerard was saved from being tainted by the bastard of Savage. A divorce was granted in 1698; but the law deemed the earl to be accountable, through his own profligacy, for the malpractices of his wife, and decreed that he should repay the portion he had received with her in marriage. With this amount she married Colonel Brett, the friend of Colley Cibber, by whom she had a daughter, Ann Brett, the impudent mistress of George I., her illegitimate offspring by Lord Rivers—Richard Savage, whom she disowned—being educated at the cost of her mother, Lady Mason. It has been alleged that Savage was an impostor, and this opinion was held by Boswell, the biographer of Dr. Johnson, who says: “In order to induce a belief that the Earl Rivers, on account of a criminal connection with whom Lady Macclesfield is said to have been divorced from her husband by Act of Parliament, had a peculiar anxiety about the child which she bore to him, it is alleged that his lordship gave him his own name, and had it duly recorded in the register of St Andrew’s, Holborn. I have,” he adds, “carefully inspected that register, and I cannot find it.” That Boswell should have failed in the discovery is explained by a reference to “The Earl of Macclesfield’s Case,” presented to the House of Lords in 1697-8, from which it appears that the child was registered by the name of Richard, the son of John Smith, and christened on Monday, January 18th, in Fox Court, and this statement is confirmed by the following entry in the register of St. Andrew’s, Holborn:—

Jany., 1696-7. Richard, son of John Smith and Mary, in Fox Court,
in Gray’s Inn Lane, baptized the 18th.

Notwithstanding the discredit that has been thrown upon Savage’s story, there can be little doubt of its truth. It was universally believed at the time, and no attempt was ever made by the countess to contradict or to invalidate any of the statements contained in it. Moreover, he was openly recognised in the house of Lord Tyrconnell, a nephew of the Countess of Macclesfield, with whom he resided as a guest for two years, and he was also on terms of acquaintance with the Countess of Rochford, the illegitimate daughter of Earl Rivers by Mrs. Colydon.[20]

[Note 20: In a tavern brawl, in 1727, Savage had the misfortune to kill a Mr. James Sinclair, for which he was tried and condemned to death. His relentless mother, it is said, endeavoured to intercept the royal mercy; but he was pardoned through the influence of Queen Caroline, and set at liberty. He afterwards addressed a birthday ode to the Queen, in acknowledgment of which she sent him £60, and continued the same sum to him every year.]

The Earl of Macclesfield did not long survive the granting of his divorce. He was sent as Ambassador to Hanover, and died there, November 5, 1701, when the title devolved upon his younger brother, Fitton Gerard, who died unmarried in the following year, when the Earldom of Macclesfield became extinct, the estates then passing under the will of the second earl to his niece and co-heiress, the daughter of his sister, Charlotte Mainwaring, married to Charles, Lord Mohun, son of Warwick, Lord Mohun, by Philippa, daughter of Arthur, Earl of Anglesey. The preference thus shown offended the Duke of Hamilton, who had married the daughter of another niece, Elizabeth, daughter and sole heiress of Digby, Lord Gerard—by his wife, the Lady Elizabeth Gerard—the heir-general of the Macclesfield family, who felt himself injured by this disposition of the property. A lawsuit to determine the validity of Lord Macclesfield’s will was commenced, much jealousy and heart-burning followed, and eventually the two disputing husbands brought their feud to a sanguinary end in the memorable duel which proved fatal to both.

The circumstances of this tragic affair are recorded in Dean Swift’s “History of the Four Last Years of Queen Anne,” published in 1758, and are more fully detailed in “Transactions During the Reign of Queen Anne,” published in Edinburgh in 1790, by Charles Hamilton, a kinsman of one of the combatants. It appears that upon the return of Lord Bolingbroke, after the peace of Utrecht, and the suspension of hostilities between Great Britain and France, the Duke of Hamilton, long noted for his attachment to the Stuarts, and the acknowledged head of the Jacobite party, was appointed Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to the Court of France. Previous to his departure he wished to bring to a close the Chancery suit which had been pending between Lord Mohun and himself. With that view he, on the 13th November, 1712, attended at the chambers of Olebar, a Master in Chancery, where his adversary met him by appointment. In the course of the interview, Mr. Whitworth, formerly the steward of the Macclesfield family, gave evidence, and, as his memory was much impaired by age, the duke somewhat petulantly exclaimed, “There is no truth or justice in him,” upon which Lord Mohun retorted, “I know Mr. Whitworth. He is an honest man, and has as much truth as your grace.” This grating remark was allowed to pass unnoticed at the time, but Lord Mohun afterwards meeting with General Macartney and Colonel Churchill, both violent men, and declared partisans of the Duke of Marlborough, who had then been removed from the command of the army by the party to which the Duke of Hamilton was attached, it would seem that the offending person was induced by them to challenge the person offended. Preliminaries having been arranged, the combatants met in Kensington Gardens, Hyde Park, on the morning of the 15th November—the duke attended by his relative, Colonel Hamilton, and Lord Mohun by General Macartney. In a few moments the affair was ended, and when the park keepers, alarmed by the clashing of swords, rushed to the spot whence the sound proceeded, they found the two noblemen weltering in their blood—Lord Mohun was already dead, and the Duke of Hamilton expired before he could be removed. Nor had the combat been limited to the principals alone. The seconds had crossed swords and fought with desperate rancour. Colonel Hamilton remained upon the field, and was taken prisoner, but Macartney fled to the Continent. Colonel Hamilton subsequently declared upon oath, before the Privy Council, that, when they met upon the ground, the duke, turning to Macartney, said, “Sir, you are the cause of this, let the event be what it will.” To which Macartney replied, “My lord, I had a commission for it.” Lord Mohun then said, “These gentlemen shall have nothing to do here.” Whereupon Macartney exclaimed, “We will have our share.” To which the duke answered, “There is my friend—he will take his share in my dance.” Colonel Hamilton further deposed that when the principals engaged, he and Macartney, as seconds, followed their example; that Macartney was immediately disarmed; but that he (Colonel Hamilton), seeing the duke fall upon his antagonist, threw away the swords, and ran to lift him up; and that, while he was employed in raising the duke, Macartney, having taken up one of the swords, stabbed his grace over Hamilton’s shoulder, and retired immediately.

A prodigious ferment was occasioned by this duel, which assumed a high political character. Neither of the combatants were men who could lay claim to any great admiration on the score of integrity or principle. Lord Mohun had, in fact, been long known as a brawler, and had acquired an infamous reputation for his share in the murder of William Mountford, the player, before his own door, in Howard Street, Strand. The Duke of Hamilton, as we have said, was the recognised head of the Jacobite faction, whilst his antagonist, Lord Mohun, was a zealous champion of the Whig interest. The Tories exclaimed against this event as a party duel, brought about by their political opponents for the purpose of inflicting a vital wound on the Jacobite cause, then in the ascendant, by removing its great prop before his departure to the Court of France. They affirmed that the duke had met with foul play, and treated Macartney as a cowardly assassin. That the allegation was well founded may be doubted, for all the evidence points to the conclusion that both sets of antagonists, seconds as well as principals, were so blinded by the virulence of personal hatred as to neglect all the laws both of the gladiatorial art and the duelling code, and assailed each other with the fury of savages. A proclamation was issued by the Government offering a reward of £500 for the apprehension of Macartney, and £300 was offered in addition by the Duchess of Hamilton. After a time Macartney returned, surrendered, and took his trial, when he was acquitted of murder, and found guilty of manslaughter only. Subsequently he was restored to his rank in the army, and entrusted with the command of a regiment. After the accession of George I. he was in great favour with the Court of Hanover, and was employed in bringing over Dutch troops on the occasion of the insurrection in England, which ended in the capitulation at Preston of the Earls of Derwentwater and Nithsdale, and other English and Scottish lords and gentlemen.

The Gawsworth property, which Lord Mohun had acquired by his first wife, Charlotte Mainwaring, he bequeathed by will to his second wife, Elizabeth, daughter of Dr. Thomas Lawrence, first physician to Queen Anne; and the Lady Mohun, who thus became possessed of the estates, which she held in trust, directed that at her death they should be sold, and the proceeds, after the payment of certain specified bequests, applied to the use of her two daughters by her first husband, Elizabeth Griffith, wife of Sir Robert Rich, Bart., and Ann Griffith, wife of the distinguished soldier and statesman, William Stanhope, who, in recognition of his public services, was elevated to the peerage, Nov. 20, 1729, by the title of Baron Harrington, and subsequently raised to the dignities of Viscount Petersham and Earl of Harrington. Lord Harrington in 1727 purchased the manor from his wife’s trustees, and thus passed into the family of Stanhope an estate with which they had no connection by blood or by alliance. From the first Earl of Harrington the property has descended in regular succession to the present owner, Charles Augustus Stanhope, the eighth earl.

A curious feature in connection with the Old Hall of Gawsworth, and one strongly suggestive of the warlike spirit of its former owner, is the ancient tilting ground in the rear of the mansion. Ormerod, the historian, was of opinion that this relic of a chivalrous age had been a pleasure ground; but Mr. Mayer, the honorary curator of the Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire, who made a careful survey some years ago, shows, with much probability, that it was intended for jousts and other displays of martial skill and bravery. The “tilt-yard,” the form of which may still be very clearly traced, is about two hundred yards in length and sixty-five in width, surrounded on three of its sides by a steep embankment or mound, sixteen yards in width. Within this enclosure the lists were arranged and the barriers erected, and here the knights, with pointless lances or coronels in rest, assembled to perform the _hastiludia pacifica_ or peaceable jousts for the amusement of the ladies and other spectators who occupied the embankment.

At the further end of the long flat is a raised circular mound, with a base twenty-five yards square, on which was placed the tent of the Queen of Beauty, who, surrounded by her attendants, could overlook the whole field, and to her the successful competitors were heralded to receive at her hand the prize or guerdon to which their chivalrous skill had entitled them. Near to this mound is a smaller piece of ground, about fifty-seven yards in length, with three rows of seats cut out of the bank, on three of its sides, and one row on the fourth, that nearest the throne of the “Queen of Beauty.” This, Mr. Mayer surmises, was intended for battles by single combat with the sword and quarter-staff, for wrestling, and other athletic displays; where, also, at Christmastide, and at wakes and festivals, the mummers practised their rude drolleries; where, too, the itinerant bards sang their rugged and unpolished lays in glorification of the achievements of the Cheshire warriors of ancient days, and where

Minstrel’s harp poured forth its tone
In praise of Maud and Marguerite fair.

The level ground is divided by a small stream that flows through the middle, and the flat space beyond, which is hemmed in by a mound similar to that surrounding the “tilting ground,” is supposed to have been used for such games as football, leap-frog, prison-bars, and foot-racing, in which the people generally participated. Here, too, is a raised circular earthwork, corresponding with the lady’s mound already referred to, where it is probable the awards were made and the prizes distributed to the successful competitors. The stream, after passing by the eastern end of the Old Hall, empties itself into the uppermost of the series of lakes before referred to, which are divided from each other only by a narrow strip of land, and where, as has been said, in days of yore the water jousts took place.

Taken altogether, in the tilting ground, with its raised terraces for spectators—the court, which formed the arena for quarter-staff, wrestling, and similar games of strength—and the lakes or ponds, used for water jousts and other aquatic sports—we have one of the most remarkable, as well as one of the most complete, memorials to be found in the North of England illustrative of the manners and customs of our forefathers—of the military pomp and pageantry, and those displays of prowess, skill, daring, and strength, which in the reigns of the Plantagenet and Tudor Kings the English gentry so much encouraged, and the common people so greatly delighted in—the relic of an age the most chivalrous and the most picturesque in our country’s history, when there was no lack of heroism and brave hearts and noble minds, when men ruled by the stern will and strong arm, and through successive ages fought the battle of England’s liberties, and laid the foundations of the freedom we enjoy. The place seems to belong so entirely to a bygone age that imagination wings her airy flight to those remote days, and in fancy’s eye we re-people the Old Hall, when

Every room
Blazed with lights, and brayed with minstrelsy;

and call up in each deserted nook and shady grove the figures of those who have long ago returned to dust. We can picture in imagination the time when these grass-grown terraces were thronged with a gay company of gallant youths and fair maidens, of stern warriors and sober matrons, assembled to witness the princely entertainments provided by the proud owners of Gawsworth. We see the barriers set up, and hear the braying of the trumpets, and the proclamations of the heralds; we see the knights, with their attendant esquires, mounted upon their well-trained steeds, with their rich panoply of arms and plumed and crested casques, and note the stately courtesy with which each, as he enters the arena, salutes the high-bred queen of the tournament; we hear the prancing of horses, the clang of arms, the shock of combat, and the loud clarions which proclaim to the assembled throng the names of the gallant victors. But the days of tilt and tournament have passed away, the age of feudalism has gone by, and in the long centuries of change and progress that have intervened, time has mellowed and widened our social institutions, and raised the lower stratum of society to a nearer level with the higher. Yet, while we boast ourselves of the present, let us not be unmindful of what we owe to the past, for those times were instinct with noble and true ideas, and with Carlyle we may say that, “in prizing justly the indispensable blessings of the new, let us not be unjust to the old. The old _was_ true, if it no longer is.” The glories of Gawsworth are of the past. The old mansion is still to be seen, and the silent pools, the deserted terraces, the forlorn garden grounds, and the stately trees still remain as representatives of the once goodly park and pleasaunce, but those who here maintained a princely hospitality, and bore their part in those splendid pageantries, are sleeping their last sleep. We may not lift the veil which hides their secret history, or reveal much of the story of their hopes and fears, their perils by flood and field, and their deep feuds and still deeper vengeances. Their graven effigies and gaudily-painted tombs are preserved to us, but

The knights’ bones are dust,
And their good swords rust,
Their souls are with the just
We trust.

In this quiet, out-of-the-way nook, amid these old landmarks, an afternoon will be neither unpleasantly nor unprofitably spent. We may learn something of English history, and of the historic figures which played their parts in our “rough island story.” Our thoughts and fancies will be stirred anew, and our sense of patriotism will be nothing lessened by the contemplation of the relics of that past on which our present is securely built

Any notice of Gawsworth would be incomplete that did not make mention of the remarkable series of fresco paintings that were discovered during the work of restoring the church in the autumn of 1851. At that time the fabric underwent a thorough repair, and the remains of coloured ornamentation in the timber-work of the roof led to the belief that the same method of decoration had been applied to the surface of the walls. Accordingly a careful examination was made, and on the removal of the whitewash and plaster some curious and interesting examples of mediæval art were discovered; but, unfortunately, no effort was made at the time to preserve them. Happily, however, before their destruction careful copies were made by a local artist, Mr. Lynch, which have since been published as illustrations to a work he has written. The three principal frescoes represented St. Christopher and the Infant Saviour; St. George slaying the Dragon; and the Doom, or Last Judgment. From the details they would appear to have been executed in the early part of the fifteenth century—probably about the time the tower was built and some important additions made to the main structure, which, as previously stated, would be between the years 1420 and 1430.

At the period referred to, St. Christopher had come to be regarded as a kind of symbol of the Christian Church, and the stalwart figure of the saint wading the stream with the Infant Jesus upon his shoulder was a favourite subject for painting and carving in ecclesiastical buildings. The Gawsworth fresco is especially interesting, from the circumstance of its being an exact _fac-simile_ (except that it is reversed) of the earliest known example of wood engraving, supposed to be of the date 1423—an original and, as is believed, unique impression of which was acquired by Lord Spencer, and is now preserved in the Spencer library. The second picture represents St. George on horseback, armed _cap-à-pie_, brandishing a sword with his right hand, whilst with the left he is thrusting a spear into the mouth of the dragon. In the distance is the representation of a castle, from the battlements of which the royal parents of the destined victim witness the fray, whilst the disconsolate damsel is depicted in a kneeling attitude. The knight’s armour and the lady’s costume furnish excellent data in fixing the time when the work was done. The third subject—the Last Judgment—occupied the space between the east window and the south wall. It was in three divisions, representing heaven, hell, and earth, and from the prominent position it occupied was no doubt intended to be kept continually before the eyes of the worshippers, that, to use the words of the Venerable Bede, “having the strictness of the Last Judgment before their eyes, they should be cautioned to examine themselves with a more narrow scrutiny.”

Among the rectors of Gawsworth was one who added lustre to the place, but whose name is, curiously enough, omitted from the list given in Ormerod’s “Cheshire”—the Rev. Henry Newcome, M.A., who held the living from 1650 to 1657, when he was appointed to the chaplaincy of the Collegiate Church at Manchester. Newcome was born in November, 1627, at Caldecote, in Huntingdonshire, of which place his father, Stephen Newcome, was rector. In January, 1641-2, both his parents died, and were buried in one coffin, when Henry removed to Congleton, where his elder brother Robert had recently been appointed by the Corporation master of the Free School. The circumstance is thus referred to in his “Autobiography”:—

I was taught grammar by my father, in the house with him; and when
my eldest brother, after he was Batchelor in Arts, was master
of the Free School at Congleton, in Cheshire, I was in the year
1641, about May 4, brought down thither to him, and there went to
school three quarters of a year, until February 13, at which time
that eloquent and famous preacher, Dr. Thomas Dodd, was parson at
Astbury, the parish church of Congleton, where I several times
(though then but a child) heard him preach.

Newcome entered at St. John’s, Cambridge, May 10, 1644, and began to reside in the following year. In 1646 he was a candidate for the mastership of a Lincolnshire grammar school, but failed in obtaining the appointment—a disappointment he bore with much stoicism. In September, 1647, he was nominated to the mastership of the Congleton School, and in the February succeeding he took his degree of B.A.

From his boyhood he seems to have had a fondness for preaching, and the inclination grew with his years. His first sermon was delivered at a friend’s church (Little Dalby) in Leicestershire; and on settling down at Congleton, as he tells us, “he fell to preaching when only 20 years old.” He was appointed “reader” (curate) to Mr. Ley, at Astbury, and preached sometimes in the parish church and sometimes at Congleton. At first he “read” his sermons and “put too much history” into them, whilst “the people came with Bibles, and expected quotations of Scripture.” Before he had attained the age of 21 he entered the marriage state, his wife being Elizabeth, daughter of Peter Mainwaring, of Smallwood, to whom he was married July 6, 1648. He speaks of himself as rash in taking this step at so early an age, but admits that it turned to his own good, and he dwells on the excellent qualities of his wife. It was indeed not only a happy, but in a worldly sense an advantageous match, as by his alliance with the Mainwarings he became connected with some of the most influential families in the county, and to their interest he undoubtedly owed his preferment to Gawsworth. He was ordained at Sandbach in August, 1648, the month following that of his marriage, and began his ministerial labours at Alvanley Chapel, in Frodsham parish, to which place he went for many weeks on the Saturday to preach on the following day; but before the close of the year he had settled at Goostrey, where he officiated for a year and a half. It was whilst residing here that he received the startling intelligence of the trial and execution of Charles I., for, under date January 30, 1649, he writes: “This news came to us when I lived at Goostrey, and a general sadness it put upon us all. It dejected me much (I remember), the horridness of the fact; and much indisposed me for the service of the Sabbath next after the news came.” Newcome, though a zealous Presbyterian, was a scarcely less zealous Royalist, and boldly avowed his abhorrence of the murder of the King.

Shortly after this event his name was mentioned in connection with the then vacant rectory of Gawsworth, and an effort was made, through the interest of the Mainwaring family, to secure his induction under the Broad Seal. Under the Usurpation Independency was in the ascendant, and “Dame ffelicia ffitton,” the widow of Sir Edward Fitton, in whom the patronage of Gawsworth had been vested, was then included in the list of delinquents whose estates were to be sequestered for loyalty to the sovereign. Eventually the instrument of institution under the Broad Seal was obtained. It bears date November 28, 1649, and the opening sentence sets forth that, “Whereas, the rectory of the parish church of Gawsworth, in the county of Chester, is become void by the death of the last incumbent, and the Lords Commissioners of the Great Seal of England have presented Henry Newcome, a godly and orthodox divine, thereunto. It is therefore ordered,” &c. Considerable demur was made, however, to the appointment, and the people locked the church doors against their new minister; but eventually, as we are told, “it pleased God to move upon the people when I thought not of it, and they came (some of the chief of them) over to Carincham on February 12th, and sent for me, and told me they were desirous to have me before another; and so were unanimously consenting to me, and subscribed the petition, not knowing that the seal had come.”

The obstacles to this induction having been removed, Newcome and his family took up their abode in the pleasant old rectory-house at Gawsworth, April, 1650, and on the 14th of the month he preached his first sermon to his new flock from Ezekiel iii., 5.

There are several incidents recorded in his “Autobiography” which throw light on the life and habits of the youthful divine at this period. Thus he writes:—

Whilst living here (Goostrey) my cousin, Roger Mainwaring, would
needs go to Gawsworth (the park being then in the co-heirs’
possession) to kill a deer, and one he killed with the keeper’s
knowledge; but they had a mind to let the greyhound loose, and to
kill another that the keeper should not know of, partly to hinder
him of his fees and partly that it might not be known that he had
killed more than one. I was ignorant of their design; but had
the hap to be one of the two that was carrying the other little
deer off the ground, when the keeper came and only took it and
dressed it, as he had done the other, and sent it after them to
the alehouse where the horses were. But I remember the man said
this word, that “_priests should not steal_.” I have oft after
thought of it, that when I was parson at Gawsworth, and that
tho’ Edward Morton, the keeper, was sometimes at variance with
me, he never so much as remembered that passage to object against
me; which, though I could have answered for myself in it, yet it
might have served the turn to have been retorted upon me when the
Lord stirred me up to press strictness upon them. But the Lord
concealed this indiscretion of mine, that it was never brought
forth in the least to lessen my authority amongst them.

It is pleasant to reflect that while Newcome was residing in his snug parsonage at Gawsworth, he was visited by his brother-in-law, Elias Ashmole, the learned antiquary and founder of the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford, who spent some time with him at the rectory and rambled thence into the Peak country. They had married sisters; Ashmole, who was Newcome’s senior by ten years, having had to his first wife Eleanor, daughter of Peter Mainwaring. This lady died in 1641, and in 1649 Ashmole married Lady Mainwaring, the widow of Sir Thomas Mainwaring, of Bradfield, who died in 1668; and the same year he again entered the marriage state, his third wife being Elizabeth, daughter of Sir William Dugdale, Norroy, and afterwards Garter King of Arms. Ashmole, in his “Diary,” thus refers to his visit to Gawsworth and his ramble in the Peak:—

1652.

Aug. 16.—I went towards Cheshire.

" 28.—I arrived at Gawsworth, where my father-in-law, Mr.
Mainwaring, then lived.

Sept. 23.—I took a Journey into the Peak in search of plants and
other curiosities.

Nov. 24.—My Good Father-in-law, Mr. Peter Mainwaring, died at
Gawsworth.

Oddly enough, Ashmole nowhere makes mention of Newcome’s name in his “Diary,” but Newcome himself refers to the visit in one of his letters to his brother-in-law, preserved among Ashmole’s MSS. in the Bodleian Library, and printed by Mr. Earwaker in his “Local Gleanings,” where, speaking of the Theatrum Chymicum he had lent to Hollinworth, the author of “Mancuniensis,” he says, “It was with him when you were with me at Gawsworth, and I then sent for it home.”

Puritan though he was, Newcome was by no means of a soured or morose disposition, nor so rigid in his notions as were some of his southern brethren. He was fond of amusement within reasonable limits, and his experiences he relates with charming candour and impartiality. Indeed, sometimes his hilarity was a little too exuberant. “I remember,” he says, “this year (1650), when the gentlewomen from the hall used to come to see us, I was very merry with them, and used to charge a pistol I had, and to shoot it off to affright them.” Notwithstanding his liveliness of disposition, he set himself determinedly against the vices to which some of his parishioners were addicted. Drinking and swearing seem to have been prevalent, and he records how, one Sabbath evening, at the house of Lady Fitton, a Mr. Constable,—

A known famous epicure ... told the lady there was excellent ale
at Broad [heath—what this place was does not appear], and moved
he might send for a dozen, some gentlemen of his gang being with
him. I made bold to tell him that my lady had ale good enough in
her house for any of them; especially, I hoped, on a Sabbath day
she would not let them send for ale to the alehouse. The lady took
with it, and in her courteous way told him that her ale might
serve him. But notwithstanding, after duties, he did send; but
durst not let it come in whilst I staid.... At last I took leave;
and then he said, “Now he is gone! Fetch in the ale.”

“My lady” was the beautiful and youthful Felicia Sneyd, the second wife, and then widow of Sir Edward Fitton, who resided at the hall, her jointure house. In all Newcome’s efforts to improve the spiritual condition of his parish Lady Fitton warmly joined; the Sacrament, which hitherto had been discontinued, was with her co-operation revived. She offered herself to the minister for instruction, and instituted family prayers twice a day in her house, which Newcome for a while read; and we gather from several passages that the fascination and dignified bearing of the youthful widow greatly attracted the divine of twenty-three. It was not long, however, before he had occasion to describe another and more painful scene. Lady Fitton, as has been previously stated, re-married Sir Charles Adderley; and on the 20th January, 1654, Newcome writes she “was in lingering labour.”

I had been at Congleton, and was just come home; and they came
shrieking to me to pray with Lady Fitton; she did desire it, it
should seem. I went as fast as I could; but just as I came the
fit of palsy took her. We went to prayer in the gallery for her
again and again. Mr. Machin[21] came in, and he helped me to pray.
We prayed there two or three times over. We begged life for mother
and child, very earnestly at first. After we begged either, what
God pleased. After the night we were brought to beg the life of
the soul, for all other hopes were over. The next day I went, and
prayed by her i’ th’ forenoon. I was much afflicted to see her
die, as in a dream, pulling and setting her head clothes as if she
had been dressing herself in the glass; and so to pass out of the
world. A lovely, sweet person she was; but thus blasted before us,
dyed Jany. 21 (1654), just after evening service. She was buried
the next day, at night.... Sir C. Adderley was removed, and all
manner of confusion and trouble came upon the estate, Mr. Fitton
and the co-heirs striving for possession, which begat a strange
alteration in the place.

[Note 21: John Machin was then minister of Astbury, and an intimate friend as well as neighbour of Newcome’s.]

Lady Fitton, “a very courteous, respectful friend to me while she lived,” as Newcome observes, lies near the east end of the church of Gawsworth, close by the communion rails, and near to the stately tomb of her first husband, on which she is described as “_nulli secundam_.” In her death Newcome lost a good friend, for the living of Gawsworth was very poor, and, finding it difficult to equalise the wants of a growing family and the supplies of a small stipend, he was led to consider the expediency of removing to some other and more lucrative charge. His labours had been by no means confined to his own parish. On the contrary, he devoted a good deal of his time to ministerial work in other places. The fame of the wonderful young preacher spread to the larger towns, and those who had heard him once wished to hear him again. Among other places, he had visited Manchester, and preached in the Old Church during the sickness of Richard Hollinworth. It was only on one Sunday, but the generosity of the town brought him considerable relief at the moment that the necessities of his family were pressing inconveniently upon him. As Dr. Halley tells us, the relief produced an effect the contributors did not intend, as it induced him, when contemplating his removal, to remain in Gawsworth, where Providence had so unexpectedly relieved him of his anxieties by their liberality. He painted his rectory-house, parted off a little study from his parlour, and spent what he could of his friends’ bounty in smartening his home and making it pleasant and comfortable.

Newcome was not allowed to remain long in undisturbed tranquillity in his quiet parsonage. On the 3rd November, 1656, Mr. Hollinworth died; four days later a meeting of the “Classis” was held at Manchester to nominate to the vacancy. Three persons were mentioned as suitable—Mr. Meeke, of Salford; Mr. Bradshaw, of Macclesfield; and Mr. Newcome, of Gawsworth—but the feeling was so unanimous in favour of Newcome that nothing was said about the other two. Friday, December 5th, was fixed for the election; but here a difficulty occurred. Newcome had spent a Sunday at Shrewsbury as well as at Manchester. He had preached at “Alkmond’s, and the people of Julian’s” (there were no saints in Puritanical times) “set their affections” upon him while ministering in the neighbouring church, and by a curious coincidence, on the same day that he received intelligence of the arrangement at Manchester he received letters from the people of “Julian’s,” from the Mayor of Shrewsbury, and from three of its ministers, entreating him to accept their invitation. On the Sunday preceding the election at Manchester he preached in the Old Church, and, as he tells us, “the women were so pleased that they would needs send tokens,” which amounted to seven pounds. This gave great dissatisfaction to the proud Salopians, who were evidently afraid the young preacher might not be proof against the fascinations of the “Lancashire Witches,” and so they “gave him a very unhandsome lash” for being drawn away from them by “women’s favours.” Angry contentions arose, Richard Baxter was asked to interfere, and a conference was suggested, but the good folks of Shrewsbury were resolved upon securing the services of Newcome, and would not agree to arbitration, or listen to any other proposition. They were doomed, however, to disappointment, and, in opposition to the advice of Baxter, Newcome, on the 24th of December, made choice of Manchester.

His removal from Gawsworth was a sorrowful time both for himself and his rustic congregation. The sight of the wagons sent to remove his furniture overwhelmed him with sorrow, and when the time came for leaving the old rectory, he says, “I was sadly affected, and broken all to pieces at leaving the house. I never was so broken in duty as I was in that which I went into just when we were ready to go out of the house;” and he adds, “I prayed the Lord the sin of the seven years might be forgiven us, and that we might take a pardon with us.” On his arrival in Manchester he was welcomed with extraordinary manifestations of friendship and pleasure, and many of the townspeople went out to Stockport to meet him.

This “prince of preachers,” as he has been called by his friends, continued his ministrations in the Church at Manchester until the passing of the Act of Uniformity, when, unable to conform to the discipline of the Church, he withdrew from her communion, to the great grief of his people, by whom he was greatly beloved. On the passing of the Act of Toleration, at the accession of William of Orange, the wealthy Presbyterians of Manchester gathered round their favourite divine and built him a tabernacle on the site of the present Unitarian Chapel in Cross Street—the first erected for the use of the Nonconformist body in the town. He was not long permitted, however, to continue his ministrations, his death occurring on the 17th September, 1695, little more than a year after the opening of the “great and fair meeting house.”

The church in which Newcome ministered, and where rest the bones of so many of the “Fighting Fittons,” well deserves a careful examination. Let us bend our footsteps towards the ancient fane. It is a fair and goodly structure—small, it is true, but presenting a dignified and pleasing exterior—

Beauty with age in every feature blending.

The bold, free hand of the old English architect is seen in every detail—in the deep mouldings, the varied tracery, and the quaintly grotesque carvings, where burlesque and satire and playful fancy have almost run riot. The restoring hand of the modern renovator—Sir Gilbert Scott—is also visible; but what he has done has been well done, and, if we except the interesting examples of mediæval art to which reference has already been made, everything that was worth retaining has been carefully preserved. Though erected at different times, the general features harmonise and point to the conclusion that nearly the whole of the existing fabric was erected in the period extending from the end of the 14th to the middle of the 15th centuries.

The nave, which is three bays in length, is undoubtedly the oldest part, and the point at which it originally terminated is clearly shown by the diagonal projection of the angle buttress which still remains. The chancel appears to have superseded an older foundation of smaller dimensions. It is of equal width with the nave, and, in fact, a continuation of it, and both are covered in with a timber roof of obtuse pitch, with elaborately moulded and ornamented beams and rafters. The external walls of both the nave and chancel are surmounted by an embattled parapet, relieved at intervals with crocketted pinnacles, that are carried above the edge of the parapet wall as a termination to each buttress. There being no clerestory or side aisles, the windows are unusually lofty. They are of pointed character, with traceried heads and mouldings, terminating in curiously-carved corbels, that have afforded scope for the humorous fancy of the mediæval masons. On the south side is an open porch with stone seats, that has at some time or other been added to the original structure, as evidenced by the fact that the greater portion of the buttress has been cut away where it is joined up to the main wall. It has coupled lights on each side, with hood mouldings, the one on the west terminating in a curiously-carved corbel, representing a rose with two heads enclosed in the petals, an evidence that this part of the fabric must have been built shortly after the union of the rival houses of York and Lancaster, in the persons of Henry VII. and Elizabeth the eldest daughter of Edward IV. The tower is well proportioned, and, rising gracefully as it does above the surrounding foliage, forms a conspicuous object for miles around. It is remarkable for the armorial shields, 14 in number, carved in relief, in stone, on each face. These insignia are especially interesting to the antiquary and the genealogist, as showing the alliances of the earlier lords of Gawsworth. They include the coats of Fitton, Orreby, Bechton, Mainwaring, Wever, Egerton, Grosvenor, and Davenport, as well as those of Fitton of Bollin, and Fitton of Pownall, and there is one also containing the arms of Randle Blundeville, Earl of Chester, with whom the Fittons appear to have been connected.

The interior of the church is picturesque and well cared for, and the garrulous old lady who brought us the keys looks upon it with an affection that is not diminished by the serving and tending of many long years. It is an interesting specimen of an old English house of worship. As you cross the threshold a host of memories are conjured up, and you feel that you are in the sanctuary where in times past have communed, and where now rest, the remains of a line famous in chivalry, the members of which, in their day and generation, did good service to the State. The seats are low and open, and the appearance has been greatly improved by the removal of the heavy cumbrous pews with which until late years it was filled. At the east end, within the chancel rails, are the effigies and stately tombs of the Fittons already described. The shadows of centuries seem to fall on the broad nave, while the slanting rays of the westering sun, as they steal through the tall windows, brighten the elaborate figures of the knights in armour, and bring out the colouring of gown and kirtle, where their stately dames are reposing by their side. During the restorations some of them were removed from their original positions, and shorn of their original canopies, as the inscription upon a tablet affixed to the north wall testifies. Near the centre of the aisle is a plain marble slab with a brass fillet surrounding it, on which is an inscription commemorating the marriage and death of Thomas Fitton of Siddington, the second son of Sir Edward of Gawsworth, by his wife Mary, the daughter of Sir Guiscard Harbottle.

After our brief survey we passed out through the western door into the churchyard. The sun was circling westwards over the woods, a warm haze suffused the landscape, and the shadows were lengthening over the hillocks and grass-grown mounds in the quiet graveyard. As our cicerone turned the key in the rusty wards of the lock and turned to depart, a robin poured out its wealth of song in the neighbouring copse, a fitting requiem to the expiring day. We stood for a moment looking through the trees at the picturesque old parsonage. What a lovely spot!—the spot of all others that a country clergyman might delight to pass his days in. Well might good Henry Newcome be “sadly affected and broken all to pieces” at leaving it.

Another celebrity connected with Gawsworth, though of a widely different character to Henry Newcome, deserves a passing notice—Samuel Johnson, popularly known by the title of “Lord Flame,” and sometimes by the less euphonious _sobriquet_ of “Maggotty Johnson.” This eccentric character was well known in his day as a dancing master, to which he added the professions of poet, player, jester, and musician. He appears to have been among the last of the paid English jesters, those professional Merry Andrews whose presence was considered indispensable in the homes of our wealthier forefathers—their duty being to promote laughter in the household, and especially at meals, by their ready wit and drollery. Johnson was frequently hired out at parties given by the gentry in the northern counties, where he had licence to bandy his witticisms, and to utter or enact anything likely to enliven the company or provoke them to laughter. “Lord Flame” was the name of a character played by him in his own extravaganza, entitled “Hurlothrumbo, or the Supernatural,” a piece which had a lengthened run at the Haymarket in 1729. It is upon this burlesque that his fame chiefly rests. After much patient labour he succeeded in getting it on the London boards. Byrom records the circumstance in his “Journal” under date April 2, 1729:—

As for Mr. Johnson, he is one of the chief topics of talk in
London. Dick’s Coffee-house resounds “Hurlothrumbo” from one
end to the other. He had a full house and much good company on
Saturday night, the first time of acting, and report says all
the boxes are taken for the next Monday.... It is impossible to
describe this play and the oddities, out-of-the-wayness, flights,
madness, comicalities, &c. I hope Johnson will make his fortune
by it at present. We had seven or eight garters in the pit. I saw
Lord Oxford and two or more there, but was so intent on the farce
that I did not observe many quality that were there. We agreed
to laugh and clap beforehand, and kept our word from beginning
to end. The night after Johnson came to Dick’s, and they all got
about him like so many bees. They say the Prince of Wales has been
told of “H,” and will come and see it.... For my own part, who
think all stage plays stuff and nonsense, I consider this a joke
upon ’em all.

On the same day, in a letter to Mrs. Byrom, he writes—