377 



ASHBURNHAM, JOHN. 



ASHBURTON, BARON. 



378 



ria.' During this lime he transacted professional business, and also 

 published a great number of pamphlets, chie8y of a political character. 

 Of the numerous pamphlets upon various political and theological 

 subjects published by Asgill, many were of merely temporary interest. 

 Several were in defence of the Hanoverian succession, and against the 

 pretensions of the house of Stuart. Asgill also wrote some pamphlets 

 on the public funds, aud among his more miscellaneous pieces may be 

 mentioned, ' Mr. Asgill's Defence on his Expulsion from the House of 

 Commons of Great Britain in 1707,' 8vo, 1712, and one or two others 

 defending his strange views on death; 'An Essay for the Press,' 1712 ; 

 a pamphlet denouncing a proposed scheme for licensing and taxing 

 the press ; ' A Question upon Divorce,' 1717 ; 'A Short Essay on the 

 Nature of the Kingdom of God within us/ 1718; 'The Computation 

 of Advantages saved to the Publick by the South Sea Scheme, as pub- 

 lished in the Moderator of Wednesday, the 26th of April, 1721, 

 detected to be fallacious; with a Postscript,' 8vo, 1721. A list of 

 these, with some curious particulars respecting Asgill, is given in 

 'Notes and Queries,' voL vL, pp. 3 and 300. An interesting notice of 

 Asgill, with copious extracts from his writings, will be found in 

 Southey's 'Doctor.' The chief authority for the life of Asgill is the 

 article by Dr. Campbell in the ' Biographia Britannica," which is 

 avowedly founded on ' A Manuscript by Mr. A. N." 



(Biographical Dictionary of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful 

 Knowledge.) 



ASHBURNHAM, JOHN, was the eldest son of Sir John Ash- 

 burnham, of Ashburnham, in Sussex, where the family had long been 

 settled. Sir John died in 1620, after having run through all his 

 estates, leaving his widow and children in a state of destitution. 

 John, who, at his father's death was seventeen years of age, appears 

 to have gone to court in attendance on the Duke of Buckingham, 

 whose duchess was of the same family as Lady Ashburnham. In the 

 year 1628, through Buckingham's influence, he was appointed groom 

 of the bedchamber to King Charles I., to whom he was already so 

 familiarly known that he both spoke and wrote of him as 'Jack 

 Ashburnham.' In 1640 he was elected member of parliament for 

 Hastings, and for some time he was an active member of the long 

 parliament, and by his thorough support of the king, gave great 

 offence to the majority of the House. In 1642 orders were given 

 that he should be proceeded against for contempt of the summons of 

 the House; on the 5th of February 1643 he was 'disabled' for being 

 in the king's quarters ; and in September of the same year an order 

 was issued that his estate should be sequestered, which was carried 

 into effect with so much rigour, that the petition of his wife for an 

 allowance sufficient to educate their children was rejected. At this 

 time Ashburnham was acting as treasurer and paymaster of the royal 

 army. In 1644 he was one of the commissioners for the treaty of 

 Uxbridge, and in 1645 one of the four commissioners named by the 

 king to lay propositions for a peace before the parliament. He was 

 employed also in many other missions of importance, and when the 

 king determined to leave Oxford to join the Scots army before Newark, 

 April 27, 1646, Ashburnham was his only attendant, with the exception 

 of Dr. Hudson, whose local knowledge was indispensable for the 

 journey. He attended Charles to Newcastle, but was compelled soon 

 after to make a precipitate escape, in consequence of the parliament 

 sending orders for his being arrested and carried to London. He fled 

 to France, and joined the court of the queen; but in 1647, wheM a 

 favourable turn in the king's affairs allowed him to do so, he resumed 

 his attendance on his master. He had a principal share in the con- 

 trivance and execution of the king's escape from Hampton C'jurt, 

 November 11, 1647, and bis surrender to Colonel Hammond, Governor 

 of the Isle of Wight. The disastrous consequences of this measure 

 led to much blame being thrown upon all who were concerned in it, 

 but especially on Ashburnham, who was supposed to have suggested 

 the surrender. He was even suspected of treachery, and a report was 

 spread that he had received 40,0002. to deliver the king into the hands 

 of his enemies. Those who did not credit this report, which indeed 

 the whole tenor of his life belied, supposed that he had been deceived 

 by Cromwell and Ireton, with whom he was in constant communica 

 ti'ni, ag the king himself had been, during Charles's residence at 

 Hampton Court. Ashburnham was so stung by the imputations on 

 his honour, that in 1648 he printed 'A Letter to a Friend, concerning 

 liis deportment towards the King at Hampton Court and the Isle of 

 Wight,' in which production he chiefly confined himself to a denial of 

 the imputations upon his own character. 



Ashburnham, who was confined by the parliament in Windsor 

 Castle until he was released by an exchange of prisoners, remained 

 in England after the death of the king, which led many royalists to 

 give credence to the reports against him. He had however obtained 

 leave of Charles II. to remain, as the only method of preserving the 

 estates acquired by his second marriage with the dowager Lady 

 Poulett, which took place in 1649, and he received no favour from the 

 party in power. He was compelled to compound for his estate at the 

 unusually high rate of half its value; was three times banished to 

 Guernsey, and in 1654 committed to the Tower for transmitting money 

 to the king ; and was kept imprisoned until the death of Cromwell. 

 At the Restoration he became groom of the bedchamber to the King 

 Charles II., and received a grant of Ampthill and other parks in Bed 

 fordsliire for eighty Year', as a reimbursement of various sums ex 



>ended by him in the royal cause. He remained a familiar companion 

 >f Charles II. until his death, which took place in the year 1671, in 

 ris sixty-eighth year. He had repurchased the family estates which 

 ii3 father had dissipated, and which are still enjoyed by his descend- 

 ants, now earls of Ashburnham : the first peer of the family was his 

 jrandson, who was called to the upper house by William and Mary. 



Besides the ' Letter,' published in 1648, Ashburnham wrote a long 

 _ ustifi catory narrative, which was handed about among his friends, 

 ifter the Restoration, partly to counterbalance a similar paper which 

 lad been drawn up and circulated by Sir John Berkley, the other 

 attendant on the king in his flight from Hampton Court, on whom 

 suspicion had been thrown. Berkley's paper was printed before the 

 close of the 17th century, but Ashburnham's, after serving its tempo- 

 rary purpose, remained in manuscript until the year 1830, when it 

 was published by the late Earl of Ashburnham. It is entitled ' A 

 Narrative, by John Ashburnham, of his attendance on King Charles I., 

 from Oxford to the Scotch army, and from Hampton Court to the Isle 

 of Wight, never before printed. To which is prefixed, a Vindication 

 of his Character and Conduct from the Misrepresentations of Lord 

 Clarendon.' The Narrative and Vindication together amply suffice to 

 :lear Ashburuham's character from the stain which had rested upon 

 it in consequence of the doubtful manner in which Clarendon gave 

 his opinion of his innocence. 



A younger son of Sir John Ashburnham, Colonel WILLIAM ASH- 

 BURNHAM, was an active military commander for the king during the 

 Civil Wars, and in 1644, when governor of Weymouth, defended the 

 town for four months 'against the parliamentary army. He was after- 

 wards imprisoned by Cromwell, on a charge of being concerned in a 

 plot against his life. He died in 1679. 



(Biographical Dictionary of the Society fir the Diffusion of Useful 

 Knowledge.) 



ASHBURTON, ALEXANDER BARING, BARON, was born 

 October 27, 1774, and was the second son of Sir Francis Baring, Bart., 

 an eminent merchant in the city of London. He was removed from 

 school at a rather early age, and placed in the mercantile establish- 

 ment of his father. Having here completed his commercial training 

 he was sent to the United States, where, and in Canada, he for some 

 years conducted the American business of the firm. Here he acquired 

 much of that wide and varied commercial knowledge, which, later in 

 life, gave so much authority to his opinions on all matters connected 

 with trade and commerce. In 1798 he married the daughter of 

 William Bingham, Esq., Senator of the United States; and on the 

 death of his father iu 1810 he became the head of the great firm of 

 Baring, Brothers, and Co. 



Mr. Baring entered Parliament in 1812 as member for Taunton, 

 which town he continued to represent till 1820, when he was returned 

 forCallington, and remained its representative until it was disfranchised 

 by the Reform Act. Prior to the introduction of the Reform Bill, 

 Mr. Baring had voted steadily with the whig party ; but he warmly 

 opposed that measure, and in future ranked among the supporters of 

 Sir Robert Peel. When Peel accepted office in December, 1834, he 

 acknowledged the advantage which he had derived from the adhesion 

 of his proselyte, by introducing Mr. Baring into his Cabinet as Presi- 

 dent of the Board of Trade and Master of the Mint. The appoint- 

 ment was a popular one, especially in the City and with the House of 

 Commons, where Mr. Baring had long been regarded as a high authority 

 on all commercial subjects. But the ministry had but a short tenure 

 of office. Peel resigned in April, 1835, and the President of *he 

 Board of Trade of course went out with him having however first 

 been created Baron Ashburton. When Sir Robert Peel returned to 

 office, September 1841, the differences of the United States respecting 

 the boundary question excited some anxiety, and Peel requested Lord 

 Ashburton to proceed to America as special commissioner, with powers 

 to conclude a definite treaty. Both in England and America the 

 nomination was received with satisfaction ; and Lord Ashburton con- 

 ducted the negociations in so conciliatory a spirit, that Sir Robert 

 Peel was able at the opening of the session of 1843 to announce that 

 a treaty had been concluded with the United States, in which "the 

 adjustment of the boundary question was far more favourable to this 

 country than the award of the King of the Netherlands," and that 

 the other points under discussion between the two governments had 

 been arranged in an equally satisfactory manner. In the House of 

 Lords, Lord Ashburton continued to support the policy of Sir Robert 

 Peel until that statesman brought forward his bill for the repeal of 

 the duties on the importation of com, when he gave to that measure 

 a resolute opposition. After it became law he took little part in 

 politics. He died May 13, 1848, and was succeeded in the title by his 

 son the present peer. Lord Ashburton cannot be termed a statesman 

 in the proper acceptation of the term. But he brought to the con- 

 sideration of political questions a clear calm business-like understand- 

 ing and considerable experience, and though far from an eloquent 

 speaker, his extensive knowledge and unquestioned probity, as well as 

 his high mercantile standing, caused him in his place as a member of 

 either branch of the legislature to be always listened to with respect. 

 As a public man he will be remembered in connection with the treaty 

 which is usually called by his name. Lord Ashburtou was also well 

 known as a liberal patron of arts and artists, not neglecting while 

 forming a valuable collection of pictures by ancient masters to employ 



