styled Ld. Clinton 1692-3; suc. fa. 1 Sept. 1693 (a minor) as 7th earl of LINCOLN
First sat 25 Mar. 1708; last sat 11 May 1728
b. 1686,1 2nd but 1st surv. s. of Sir Francis Clinton, (later 6th earl of Lincoln) and his 2nd w. Susannah, da. of Arthur Penniston, of Stow, Lincs.; bro. of Hon. George Clinton‡. educ. Wolfenbüttel 1705.2 m. 16 May 1717, Lucy (d.1736), da. of Thomas Pelham, Bar. Pelham, 3s. (1 d.v.p.), 5da. (4 d.v.p.). KG 25 Apr. 1721. d. 7 Sept. 1728; admon. 31 Oct. 1728 to wid.3
Gent. of bedchamber, Prince of Denmark Aug.?-Oct. 1708,4 George I 1714-27; master of horse, Prince of Wales Sept.-Nov. 1714; paymaster-gen. (jt.) 1715-20; PC 26 Oct. 1715-d.; cofferer 1725-d.
Constable, Tower of London 1723-5; ld. lt., Tower Hamlets 1723-5, Cambs. 28 Mar. 1728-d.5
Associated with: Pall Mall, Westminster;6 Tilt Yard, Westminster (to 1720);7 Oatlands, Weybridge, Surr (from 1716).8
Likenesses: oil on canvas by Sir G. Kneller, c.1721 (joint portrait with Thomas Pelham Holles, duke of Newcastle), NPG 3215; oils on canvas by Sir G. Kneller, aft. 1721, Univ. of Nottingham (acc. no. UON.045).
Henry Clinton, son of Sir Francis Clinton*, 6th earl of Lincoln, was seven years old when he inherited the title upon his father’s death in early September 1693. On 6 Nov. 1696 his mother Susanna, dowager countess of Lincoln, submitted a petition to the House begging for the revocation of a chancery decree of earlier that June which had given much of the Clinton estates in Lincolnshire to Samuel Rolle‡, Hugh Fortescue‡, and Vere Booth. Edward Clinton, 5th earl of Lincoln, had entailed his lands and personal goods at Tattershall Castle in Lincolnshire to his heir male Sir Francis Clinton in his will of 6 Nov. 1684. Rolle, Fortescue and Booth, cousins to the 5th earl through the daughters of Theophilus Clinton, 4th earl of Lincoln, their mutual grandfather, argued successfully in chancery that the strict settlement made in this will had been later rendered void by the terms of a marriage settlement the 5th earl had entered into in 1691, when he was proposing to marry Anne Calvert.9 Consideration of the matter was continuously postponed throughout December 1696 and January 1697 as the House dealt with the attainder of Sir John Fenwick‡, but eventually in a close division, the House on 21 Jan. 1697 rejected the petition and upheld the decree by only two votes, thus depriving the young lord of a large part of his estate, worth £2,500 a year.10 In the early part of his career, then, Lincoln found himself without sufficient landed income to maintain his dignity and was in constant need of a pension and office. From 1698 until the time he came of age in 1707 Lincoln’s mother received a pension of around £200 a year ‘as royal bounty towards the support and maintenance’ of her son.11 Sometime in 1703 or 1704 Thomas Bruce, 2nd earl of Ailesbury, then in exile in the Netherlands, conferred with the visiting captain-general John Churchill, duke of Marlborough, on English politics and the means of managing an unruly House of Lords. Among his other recommendations Ailesbury suggested that Marlborough ‘add to the pensions given to the poor peers who had come to the title by entail without any estate but the little they had before’, singling out in this Lincoln, ‘then my neighbour in Bedfordshire where he lived in an obscure manner for want of what to support him in his dignity; else a person altogether unknown to me’.12 Lincoln‘s guardians were anxious when he went to Wofenbüttel in Hanover to study in 1705 that he would not be able to live according to his quality. He was at that time,
very industrious to qualify himself for the army to live in some figure, which the misfortune of losing the greatest part of his estate will not let him do, without some employment, and though his present circumstances will not allow him to pay the salary that belongs to his quality, he will content himself to be upon the same foot with gentlemen’s sons rather than lose the opportunity of learning his exercises.13
After he came of age, Lincoln was made a gentleman of the bedchamber to George, prince of Denmark (also duke of Cumberland), with a salary of £600 p.a., and even after the prince’s death in October 1708 he continued to claim that pension for the next several years.14 He first took his seat in the House on 25 Mar. 1708, one week before the final prorogation and eventual dissolution of Anne’s second Parliament in early April 1708. His political career really began in the following Parliament starting in November 1708, where he was present at 69 per cent of each of its two sessions. In the first session (1708-9) he was named to drafting committees on 23 Dec. 1708 and 1 Mar. 1709 for addresses to the queen concerning the continental war. Dependent upon the court for his pension, he supported the ministry of Sidney Godolphin, Baron (later earl of) Godolphin, against the attacks of the Whig Junto by voting on 21 Jan. 1709 that the queen’s commissioner in Scotland, James Douglas, 2nd duke of Queensberry [S], recently created a peer of Great Britain as duke of Dover and an ally of Godolphin, had the right to vote in the election of the Scots representative peers. Despite this vote for the court he was already at this point on friendly social terms with a large number of Whigs, including some lieutenants of the Junto. According to the diary of Charles Bennet, 2nd Baron Ossulston (later earl of Tankerville) only a few days after this vote, on 24 Jan. 1709, Lincoln dined at the house of Charles Powlett, 2nd duke of Bolton, with Bolton’s client, George Rodney Brydges‡, Member for Winchester, and a number of other Whigs. Lincoln also dined with Ossulston, Bolton, Brydges and a number of the same dining companions on 3 March.15
In the 1709-10 session he was noted for his opposition to Dr. Henry Sacheverell. Lincoln diligently attended the hearings on Sacheverell throughout February and March 1710 and often, according to Ossulston’s diary, had his dinner in the House of Lords with his companions during the long hearings and debates on the impeachment. On 17 Mar. 1710 Ossulston dined in the House with Lincoln, Bolton and Charles Montagu, 4th earl (later duke) of Manchester.16 Three days after that Lincoln voted Sacheverell guilty of high crimes and misdemeanours, and on the following day, 21 March, he voted that Sacheverell should receive no further preferment despite his mitigated sentence.17 In the last days of the session he acted as a manager in a conference on the Commons’ objections to the House’s amendment to the Edistone (Eddystone) Lighthouse Bill. Lincoln’s animus towards Sacheverell lasted beyond the prorogation of 5 Apr. and in June 1710 it was recounted that he, with Bolton’s son Charles Powlett, (later 3rd duke of Bolton), at that time Member for Hampshire, George Brydges and a small group of Whig Members, had been in a tavern in Greenwich ‘drinking confusion’ to the doctor. 18 Unfortunately for him and his friends, it was at this time that the Godolphin-Whig ministry began to unravel in the face of the unpopularity of the prosecution of Sacheverell, leading to the reshaping of the ministry and the elections of that autumn.
Lincoln maintained much the same attendance level in the first two sessions of the new Tory-dominated Parliament, coming to 65 per cent of each of the 1710-11 and 1711-12 sessions. In the months before the first meeting of Parliament in November 1710, Robert Harley, (later earl of Oxford) felt that Lincoln’s political affiliation could be ‘doubtful’, especially as he was so dependent on the government’s largesse. But Lincoln quickly revealed a continuing firm allegiance to the Whigs, regardless of its affect on his finances. On 11-12 Jan. 1711 he joined 35 other members, almost all of them Whigs, in signing three protests against the resolutions condemning the generals Henri de Massue de Ruvigny, earl of Galway [I], Charles O’Hara, Baron Tyrawley [I] and James Stanhope, (later Earl Stanhope) for their conduct of the war in Spain and against the rejection of the generals’ petitions to be heard in their own defence. This potentially dangerous defiance of the ministry was remarked on by Lincoln’s colleagues. Anne Clavering wrote to her brother James on 16 Jan. of ‘that glorious honest youth, Lord Lincoln, who has nothing but a pension to depend on, and votes for his country’.19
Lincoln continued to defend the previous ministry’s policy in the Spanish war and on 3 Feb. 1711 he subscribed to two protests against resolutions of the House condemning the Whig ministers’ ‘neglect of their service’ by inadequately supplying the troops in Spain. Regardless of these protests the House was intent on drafting a representation strongly condemning the former war policy in Spain. Ossulston recorded that on 7 Feb. 1711 he attended a dinner at the house of Charles Montagu, Baron Halifax, where also present were Lincoln, Manchester and Charles Beauclerk, duke of St Albans. Perhaps they were gathered to discuss strategy to counter this growing attack. Certainly Lincoln joined in two protests on 8 Feb. in an attempt to prevent the address being delivered to the queen, and the following day he and 19 other Whig members were impelled to subscribe to a further three protests against the resolutions that expunged from the Journal the reasons given in the earlier protest of 3 February. That same day, Lincoln was again found in the company of Whigs, dining at Ossulston’s with Halifax, St Albans, Evelyn Pierrepoint, marquess of Dorchester (later duke of Kingston) and William Cavendish, 2nd duke of Devonshire. Ossulston’s diary further shows that over the following few days Lincoln continued to be a participant at dinners and gatherings of Whig peers and commoners, particularly Dorchester, Thomas Wharton, earl (later marquess) of Wharton and Robert Darcy, 3rd earl of Holdernesse.20 Lincoln also ensured that when he was away from the House for a brief period of time between 17 and 26 May 1711 his proxy was in the hands of a Whig, Charles Fitzroy, 2nd duke of Grafton. In addition, from 8 June 1711 until the prorogation four days later Lincoln held the proxy of Charles Mohun, 4th Baron Mohun.
On 7 Dec. 1711, the first day of the 1711-12 session, Lincoln defied the ministry once again, despite the lobbying attempts and confidence of Harley, now earl of Oxford, by voting in favour of the additional clause to the address of thanks to the queen emphasizing that there should be ‘No Peace without Spain’. On 20 Dec. he voted to deny the right of James Hamilton, 4th duke of Hamilton [S], to sit in the House as a peer of Great Britain, duke of Brandon. Two days following this he was placed on a drafting committee for an address requesting the queen to order her plenipotentiaries in Utrecht to maintain a strict correspondence with the ambassadors of the Allied powers in order to effect a mutual ‘Guaranty’ to ensure a Protestant Succession in Britain. He registered his proxy briefly with Mohun from 11 to 13 Feb. and again from 25 to 30 May 1712. He is recorded in a contemporary pamphlet as having voted on 28 May 1712 in favour of the motion to address the queen against the ‘restraining orders’ which had been issued to the captain-general James Butler, 2nd duke Ormond, ordering him not to engage in offensive military action against the French, but it is likely that this vote was made through his proxy with Mohun rather than in person.21 Lincoln later also joined 25 other members in protesting against the decision of 7 June 1712 to remove from the House’s reply to the queen’s speech on the peace terms a clause insisting on a mutual guarantee among the allied powers for the Protestant succession.
At this time Lincoln was a member of both the Kit-Kat Club and of the Hanover Club.22 His Tory adversary Jonathan Swift also included him among the prominent Whigs who were members of the spurious ‘Calves’ Head Club’ and who were reputedly able to indulge in self-delusion through their constant inebriation at these gatherings. Under the influence of drink, Swift suggested, ‘Lincoln then imagines he has land’.23 His loyalty to the Whig cause and his financial desperation were also noted by supporters of the Hanoverian succession in England. John Churchill, duke of Marlborough, suggested early in 1712 to the Hanoverian agent in England, Bothmer, that the Elector provide Lincoln with a pension of £600 in order to secure his continuing opposition to a separate Anglo-French peace. Lincoln came to just over three-quarters of the session beginning in April 1713 in which the terms of the Peace were laid out before the House. He most likely opposed them and in June 1713 Oxford predicted that he would vote against the French commercial treaty – if it ever came before the House. Such diligence and fidelity led Charles Spencer, 3rd earl of Sunderland, in July 1713 to suggest to another envoy from Hanover that the earl be given a pension of £1,000 p.a. to secure his support. About the earl he commented that he was ‘not paid a farthing of his pension, as one of the Prince’s servants and has hardly bread’.
Lincoln maintained his highest attendance record in the Parliaments of Queen Anne in the first session of the new Parliament beginning in February 1714, in which he attended 87 per cent of the sittings. In late May Daniel Finch, 2nd earl of Nottingham, was sure that Lincoln would vote against the Schism Bill. Thomas Grey, 2nd earl of Stamford, may have made the same calculation and registered his proxy with Lincoln on 11 June, just before the Schism Bill came to a vote. Lincoln’s two votes against the bill were to no avail, but he did subscribe to the large protest against the bill’s passage on 15 June. Lincoln was able to hold his full complement of two proxies from 29 June, when Charles Cornwallis, 4th Baron Cornwallis, also registered his proxy with him. Lincoln held both proxies until the end of the session. On its penultimate day, 8 July, Lincoln protested against the resolution not to bring to the queen’s attention abuses in the disposition of the Assiento which, the Whigs alleged, was being used by individuals such as Henry St John, Viscount Bolingbroke, for personal gain. Lincoln dutifully came to all but three sittings of the session of August 1714 which took steps to ensure a peaceful Hanoverian Succession following the death of Anne, and from 5 Aug. he also held the proxy of John Sydney, 6th earl of Leicester, for the rest of the session.
He may have been so assiduous in August 1714 because, as a supporter of the Hanoverian Succession who had even spent time at the Hanoverian academy at Wolfenbüttel, he could have expectations of being rewarded by the new king. Lincoln was quickly made a gentleman of the bedchamber for the new king in October 1714. The following month he submitted a petition claiming that he was due £2,100 in arrears of his annual pension of £600, payment of which Oxford had deliberately withheld in an unsuccessful attempt to force him to support the ministry. In November 1714 Lincoln was given £1,800 as partial payment of these arrears 24 He served as bearer of the second crown at the coronation of the new king and played a prominent role on the second day of the new king’s Parliament, on 21 Mar. 1715, in helping to introduce to the House five new recently created or promoted peers. Most rewarding, both financially and in terms of prestige, was his appointment in October 1715 as joint paymaster-general of the armed forces, with a salary of £3,000 p.a. and an ex officio place on the Privy Council.25 After this lucrative office had been handed over in 1720 to Robert Walpole, (later earl of Orford), Lincoln in recompense was installed, in 1721, as a knight of the garter and further made, in 1725, cofferer of the royal Household.26
Lincoln’s most surprising stroke of good fortune came from an unexpected quarter, the admiral Arthur Herbert, earl of Torrington, who bequeathed in his will of April 1716 much of his estate, including the manor house of Oatlands in Weybridge, Surrey, and 10,000 acres in the Bedford Level, to the impecunious Whig stalwart.27 An anecdote recounts that ‘Lord Torrington, one day at table with his heir at law (probably Henry Herbert, 2nd Baron Herbert of Chirbury), whom he hated, the conversation turned upon the poor Quality in England’. One of the party mentioned the worthiness and poverty of Lincoln, ‘a noble family, with only £500 per annum’, after which Torrington, ‘though he never saw Lord Lincoln, left him his estate of £6,000 per annum at his death, which happened a few days after’.28 This legacy also included, at least by one probably exaggerated account, a bequest of £120,000 to Lincoln, and an auction of some of Torrington’s moveable goods raised £3,000 for the earl. It also involved Lincoln and his agents in years of litigation and parliamentary lobbying to secure the estate.29 One correspondent of Sarah, duchess of Marlborough, commented on Torrington’s impulsive generosity that ‘Everybody is surprised that my Lord Torrington should do so generous and right a thing as to leave his estate to Lord Lincoln, and in his will he says he leaves it him for his public virtue. This is very surprising in a man that had neither public nor private virtue himself.’30
With his lucrative government offices and this unexpected legacy from a distant stranger, Lincoln’s fortunes were suddenly transformed, and were then further enhanced by his marriage in May 1717 to Lucy Pelham, daughter of Thomas Pelham, Baron Pelham, and sister to Thomas Pelham Holles, duke of Newcastle, and of Henry Pelham‡. The 7th earl’s new family connections to some of Britain’s leading statesmen and magnates bound him more tightly to the Whigs and increased his standing among them. During the remainder of George I’s reign, Lincoln remained a leading member of the Whig ascendancy, newly wealthy, landed, and with strong family connections to an increasingly powerful political family. It was a dramatic transformation from his early impecunious days.
During the reign of George I, Lincoln was an energetic member of the House, who acted there as a leading spokesmen and proxy manager for the Whig ministry and Hanoverian court which had rewarded him so well. A far more detailed account of his political activities in and out of the House during the reign of George I will appear in the 1715-90 volumes on the House of Lords. Lincoln died intestate at his mansion of Oatlands on 7 Sept. 1728. His earldom and lands, those unexpectedly gained through Torrington’s bequest, were inherited in succession by his two surviving sons, George Clinton, 8th earl of Lincoln and Henry Fiennes Clinton, 9th earl of Lincoln, whose ties to the Pelham family were reinforced by his marriage to his cousin and who succeeded his Pelham uncle as duke of Newcastle-under-Lyne in November 1768 under the terms of a special remainder.
C.G.D.L.- 1 Luttrell, Brief Relation, iii. 183; Add. 70081, newsletter, 12 Sept. 1693.
- 2 Beinecke Lib. OSB mss 1, box 3, folder 163, Lady Dewes to E. Poley, 7 May 1705.
- 3 TNA, PROB 6/104, f. 161.
- 4 Bodl. Ballard 7, f. 120; CTB, xxiii. 221, 297.
- 5 HMC Var. viii. 331.
- 6 HMC Cowper, iii. 116.
- 7 CTB, xxix. 809.
- 8 VCH Surr. iii. 478.
- 9 TNA, PROB 11/410; 11/416; HMC Lords, n.s. ii. 260-2.
- 10 Luttrell, Brief Relation, iv. 78, 172; HEHL, Stowe ms 26 (Jnl of James Brydges), 22 Jan. 1697.
- 11 CTB, xiii. 406; xiv. 326; xv. 360; xvi. 66; xvii. 75; xviii. 215; xxviii. 404, 449.
- 12 Ailesbury Mems, 560-2.
- 13 Beinecke Lib. OSB mss 1, box 3, folder 163, Lady Dewes to Edmund Poley, 7 May 1705.
- 14 CTB, xxiii. 221, 297; xxix. 185; Bodl. Ballard 7, f. 120.
- 15 TNA, C104/113, pt. 2 (Ossulston’s diary), 24 Jan., 3 Mar. 1709.
- 16 Ibid. 17 Mar. 1710.
- 17 G. Holmes, Trial of Dr Sacheverell, 284, 286.
- 18 Add. 61461, ff. 62-63.
- 19 Clavering Corresp. ed. Dickinson (Surtees Soc. clxxviii), 108.
- 20 TNA, C104/113 pt. 2 (Ossulston’s Diary), 7, 9, 15, 18 Feb. 1711.
- 21 PH, xxvi. 175-6 n1, 180.
- 22 Pols. in Age of Anne, 299.
- 23 POAS, vii. 567.
- 24 CTB, xxix. 185, 499, 529, 617; Pols. in Age of Anne, 388.
- 25 CTB, xxix. 827.
- 26 HMC Polwarth, iii. 52.
- 27 VCH Surr. iii. 478.
- 28 T.L. Kington Oliphant, Jacobite Lairds of Gask, 17.
- 29 Verney ms mic. M636/56, M. Lovett to J. Verney, 17 Apr. 1716; Add. 28052, ff. 168-87, 205-10, 223-31, 239-51.
- 30 Add. 61463, f. 149.