Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon

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The English statesman and historian Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon (1609-1674), was the first minister of Charles II in exile and then in England until 1666.

The son of Henry Hyde of Dinton, Wiltshire, Edward Hyde was born on Feb. 18, 1609. He attended Oxford University and earned a bachelor of arts degree in 1626, the year after he had begun legal studies at the Middle Temple. Noted for his intellectual abilities, he associated with prominent scholars and writers, and among his friends were the playwright Ben Jonson and the statesman, poet, and literary patron Lord Falkland.

Hyde's first wife died 6 months after their marriage in 1629, and in 1634 he married Frances Aylesbury. Having been called to the bar in 1633, he soon built up a profitable legal practice and was also awarded government posts, owing in part to the influence of his father-in-law, Sir Thomas Aylesbury.

Hyde's political ideals were formed in the period before the English civil war as a member of the Falkland circle. He believed in a balanced sovereignty between Parliament and the monarchy, such as he felt had existed in the time of Queen Elizabeth. It was his tragedy that such a balance was never obtained during his career; he was driven from position to position, never truly leading policy but largely fighting rearguard actions.

In the late 1630s Hyde felt the main violation of this balanced concept of government proceeded from the king. Elected to Parliament in 1640, he was extremely active in the original movements to check royal power and was a leading formulator of the impeachment proceedings against Lord Strafford. But by late 1641 he began to oppose the revolutionary tendencies, particularly in religious matters, among the controlling parliamentary leaders. He successfully obstructed the Root and Branch Bill to destroy the Church and became an adherent of the royal minority in the Lower House.

By 1643 Hyde had become a leading councilor of King Charles I and was among those who proposed the calling of the Parliament at Oxford that opened the civil war. Appointed chief adviser to the heir apparent, Prince Charles, he followed the prince into exile in 1646. During the years of exile, although his advice was not always heeded, he was the principal figure at the prince's court.

Later Career

With the restoration of the monarchy in 1660, Hyde continued as the first minister of the returned prince, who was then styled King Charles II. In 1660 Hyde was created Baron Hyde and in 1661 Earl of Clarendon. For the first year of his ministry he, like the King, favored programs of moderation, amelioration, and toleration, but with the election of the Cavalier Parliament in 1661, Clarendon's position had to change. Since his principal responsibility was to lead Parliament into cooperation with the King, his policy had to be based on accommodation. The new Parliament being rigidly Cavalier royalist and stridently Anglican, Clarendon was forced into a similar posture. Thus the religious laws of the early 1660s, which established persecutive measures against Dissenters, are known as the Clarendon code but were framed largely by those whom Clarendon needed for support in other matters.

Clarendon's position was further complicated by the fact that a number of very ambitious courtiers constantly attacked him on nearly every issue. There were impeachment attempts made upon him as early as 1663. Clarendon was the subject of considerable envy over the marriage in 1660 of his daughter Anne to the heir apparent, James, Duke of York. When the marriage of Charles II and Catherine of Braganza of Portugual proved to be barren, it was rumored that Clarendon had purposely married the King to a barren princess to secure the throne for his own grandchildren. Clarendon was also wrongly blamed for the sale of Dunkirk to the French and for the failure of the English project at Tangier. Finally his obvious disapproval of the manners at court and his increasing high-handedness in council irritated the King.

Clarendon's fall, however, proceeded mainly from the loss of the Dutch War in 1666. Although he had been less than enthusiastic in the pursuit of this war, the defeat did not stem principally from his mishandling of the situation. But the blow to his prestige because of the English loss destroyed his already-weakened influence at court and shattered his party in Parliament. Thus, despite support of Clarendon by the Duke of York's faction and the Anglican bishops, in 1667 Parliament began impeachment proceedings against him. The court party and the King, along with almost every dissident interest in England, including many of the Cavaliers, advocated impeachment. Clarendon was persuaded to flee into exile, and the impeachment was turned into a bill for perpetual banishment.

Clarendon spent the rest of his life in France. He had the satisfaction of seeing many of his enemies shatter themselves in the scramble for office which followed his own fall. During his years in exile he wrote his memoirs and completed his History of the Rebellion and Civil Wars. His writings supply historians with some of the best available source material for the period. Clarendon died at Rouen on Dec. 9, 1674.

Further Reading

The best biographies of Clarendon are T. H. Lister, Life and Administration of Edward, First Earl of Clarendon (3 vols., 1837-1838), and B. H. G. Wormald, Clarendon (1951), which covers only the civil war period. The serious student of Clarendon or his times should also turn to Clarendon's own writings. The general works on the period, David Ogg, England in the Reign of Charles II (2 vols., 1934; 2d ed. 1962), and G. N. Clark, The Later Stuarts, 1660-1714 (1934; 2d ed. 1955), may be supplemented by such special works as Keith Feiling, A History of the Tory Party, 1640-1714 (1924), which deals extensively with Clarendon's political career.

Additional Sources

Brownley, Martine Watson, Clarendon and the rhetoric of historical form, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1985.

Clarendon, Edward Hyde, Earl of, Selections from the History of the rebellion and the Life by himself, Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 1978.

Harris, R. W. (Ronald Walter), Clarendon and the English Revolution, Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1983.

Harris, R. W. (Ronald Walter), Clarendon and the English Revolution, London: Hogarth Press, 1983.

Ollard, Richard Lawrence, Clarendon and his friends, New York: Atheneum, 1988, 1987.

Wormald, B. H. G., Clarendon - politics, history, and religion, 1640-1660, Cambridge England; New York: Cambridge University Press, 1989, 1951.

Clarendon, Edward Hyde, 1st earl of (1609-74). In the first session of the Long Parliament, 1640-1, Hyde led the attack on Charles I's prerogative courts, but in the second he perceived John Pym's policies as an equal threat to constitutional liberties. He co-authored Charles's declarations, joining him at York in May 1642. In 1643 as privy counsellor and chancellor of the Exchequer he persuaded Charles to convoke a parliament at Oxford. Similarly as adviser to the exiled Charles II he counselled him not to owe his restoration to foreign intervention.

In 1660 he became earl and lord chancellor. His pregnant daughter Anne's marriage to James, duke of York, provoked charges that he dominated the royal family. He opposed the second Anglo-Dutch War. But when the war ended in failure, Charles abandoned him, encouraging his impeachment. Clarendon fled to France, where he completed his monumental History of the Rebellion.

Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon

Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon (18 February 1609 – 9 December 1674) was an English historian and statesman, and grandfather of two British monarchs, Mary II and Queen Anne.

Contents 1 Biography 1.1 Early life 1.2 Political career 1.3 Later years and exile 2 Family 3 Portrayals 4 Bibliography 5 See also 6 References 7 External links

Biography

Early life

Edward Hyde in 1626.

Hyde was the third son^[1] of Henry Hyde of Dinton and Purton, Wiltshire, a member of a family for some time established at Norbury, Cheshire. He was initially educated at Gillingham School^[2], and entered Magdalen Hall, Oxford, (now Hertford College, Oxford, where his portrait hangs in the hall) in 1622, having been rejected by Magdalen College, and graduated BA in 1626. Intended originally for holy orders in the Church of England, the death of two elder brothers made him his father's heir, and in 1625 he entered the Middle Temple to study law. His abilities were more conspicuous than his industry, and at the bar his time was devoted more to general reading and to the society of eminent scholars and writers than to the study of law treatises.

This time was not wasted. In later years Clarendon declared "next the immediate blessing and providence of God Almighty" that he "owed all the little he knew and the little good that was in him to the friendships and conversation...of the most excellent men in their several kinds that lived in that age." These included Ben Jonson, Selden, Waller, Hales, and especially Lord Falkland; and from their influence and the wide reading in which he indulged, he doubtless drew the solid learning and literary talent which afterwards distinguished him.

In 1629 he married his first wife, Anne, daughter of Sir George Ayliffe of Grittenham, who died six months afterwards; and secondly, in 1634, Frances, daughter of Sir Thomas Aylesbury, Master of Requests. From this second marriage came a daughter, Anne. In 1633 he was called to the bar, and obtained quickly a good position and practice. His marriages had gained for him influential friends, and in December 1634 he was made keeper of the writs and rolls of the common pleas; while his able conduct of the petition of the London merchants against Portland earned Laud's approval.

Political career

In 1640 Hyde was returned to the Short Parliament and then again in the Long Parliament, he was at first a moderate critic of King Charles I, but gradually moved over towards the royalist side, championing the Church of England and opposing the execution of the Earl of Strafford, Charles's primary advisor. Following the Grand Remonstrance of 1641, Hyde became an informal advisor to the King.

During the Civil War, Hyde served in the King's council as Chancellor of the Exchequer, and was one of the more moderate figures in the royalist camp. By 1645 his moderation had alienated him from the King, and he was made guardian to the Prince of Wales, with whom he fled to Jersey in 1646.

Hyde was not closely involved with Charles II's attempts to regain the throne in 1649 to 1651. It was during this period that Hyde began to write his great history of the Civil War. Hyde rejoined the exiled king in the latter year, and soon became his chief advisor; Charles named him Lord Chancellor in 1658. On the restoration of the monarchy in 1660, he returned to England with the King and became even closer to the royal family through the marriage of his daughter, Anne, to the king's brother James, Duke of York, the heir-presumptive (who, after the death of his first wife, would succeed to the throne as James II of England & VII of Scotland). Their two daughters, Mary II and Queen Anne would each one day reign in their own right.

Later years and exile

In 1660, Hyde was raised to the peerage as Baron Hyde, of Hindon in the County of Wiltshire, and the next year was created Viscount Cornbury and Earl of Clarendon. He served as Chancellor of the University of Oxford from 1660-1667.

As Lord Chancellor, it is commonly thought that Clarendon was the author of the "Clarendon Code", designed to preserve the supremacy of the Church of England. However, he was not very heavily involved with the drafting and actually disapproved of much of its content. It was merely named after him, as he was a chief minister.^{[citation needed]}

In 1663, the Earl of Clarendon was one of eight Lords Proprietor given title to a huge tract of land in North America which became the Province of Carolina. However, he began to fall out of favour with the king, and the military setbacks of the Second Anglo-Dutch War of 1665 to 1667 led to his downfall. Clarendon was impeached, in part, for blatant violations of habeas corpus; sending prisoners out of England to places like Jersey, and holding them there without benefit of trial. He was impeached by the House of Commons, and forced to flee to France in November, 1667. Clarendon was accompanied to France by his private chaplain and ally William Levett, later Dean of Bristol.^[3]

He spent the rest of his life in exile, working on the History of the Rebellion and Civil Wars in England, his classic account of the English Civil War. (The proceeds from this book's publication were instrumental in building the Clarendon Building at Oxford.) He died in Rouen on 9 December 1674. Shortly after his death, his body was returned to England, and he is buried in Westminster Abbey.

Family

The Earl of Clarendon's arms^[4]

Clarendon was grandfather to Mary II and Queen Anne, via the marriage of his daughter Anne Hyde to the future James II. Clarendon's sons, Henry Hyde, 2nd Earl of Clarendon, and Lawrence Hyde, Earl of Rochester, were also major political figures in their own right. Clarendon's two cousins, Richard Rigby, Secretary of Jamaica and his son, Richard Rigby, Chief Secretary of Ireland and Paymaster of the Army, were successful politicians in the succeeding generations.

Portrayals

In the film Cromwell, Clarendon (called only Sir Edward Hyde in the movie), is portrayed by Nigel Stock as a sympathetic, conflicted man torn between Parliament and the King. He finally turns against him altogether when Charles I pretends to accept Cromwell's terms of peace, but secretly and treacherously plots to raise a Catholic army against Parliament and start a second civil war. Clarendon reluctantly, but bravely, gives testimony at the King's trial which is instrumental in condemning him to death.

In the 2003 BBC TV miniseries Charles II: The Power and The Passion, Clarendon was played by actor Ian McDiarmid. The series portrayed Clarendon (referred to as 'Sir Edward Hyde' throughout) as acting in a paternalistic fashion towards Charles II, something the King comes to dislike. It is also intimated that he had arranged the marriage of Charles and Catherine of Braganza already knowing that she was infertile so that his granddaughters through his daughter Anne Hyde (who had married the future James II) would eventually inherit the throne of England.

In the 2004 film Stage Beauty, starring Billy Crudup and Claire Danes, Clarendon (again referred to simply as Edward Hyde) is played by Edward Fox.

Bibliography

George Smith, Sidney Lee The Dictionary of National Biography, Adamant Media Corporation, 1961 ISBN 1402170688, 9781402170683 contains a list of Clarendon's works.^[5]

• The history of Rebellion and Civil War in Ireland (1720)
• A Collection of several tracts of Edward, Earl of Clarendon, (1727)
• Religion and Policy, and the Countenance and Assistance each should give to the other, with a Survey of the Power and Jurisdiction of the Pope in the dominion of other Princes (Oxford 1811, 2 volumes)
• History of the Rebellion and Civil Wars in England: Begun in the Year 1641 by Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon (1717):
  • Volume I, Part 1,
  • Volume I, Part 2,
  • Volume II, Part 1,
  • Volume II, Part 2,
  • Volume III, Part 1,
  • Volume III, Part 2
• Essays, Moral and Entertaining by Clarendon (J. Sharpe, 1819)
• The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon, Lord High Chancellor of England, and Chancellor of the University of Oxford Containing:
  • I Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon: An Account of the Chancellor's Life from his Birth to the Restoration in 1660
  • II Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon: A Continuation of the fame, and of his History of the Grand Rebellion, from the Restoration to his Banishment in 1667

See also

• Clarendon House

References

1. ^ Birth of the First Earl of Clarendon History Today]
2. ^ Gillingham Grammar School, Dorset - An Historical Account" by A F H V Wagner, MA
3. ^ The Correspondence of Henry Hyde, Earl of Clarendon, and of His Brother, Laurence Hyde, Earl of Rochester, Henry Colburn, London, 1828
4. ^ Maclagan, Michael; Louda, Jiří (1999), Line of Succession: Heraldry of the Royal Families of Europe, London: Little, Brown & Co, pp. 27, ISBN 0-85605-469-1 
5. ^ George Smith, Sidney Lee The Dictionary of National Biography, Adamant Media Corporation, 1961 ISBN 1402170688, 9781402170683 contains a list of Clarendon's works pp. 387-389

External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon

• Works by Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon at Project Gutenberg
• Essays by Edward Hyde at Quotidiana.org
• Volume 2 of The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon by Henry Craik from Project Gutenberg
• The Life of Edward, Earl of Clarendon, in which is included a Continuation of his History of the Grand Rebellion by Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon (Clarendon Press, 1827): Volume I, Volume II, Volume III
• Historical Enquiries Respecting the Character of Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon by George Agar-Ellis (1827)

Political offices
Preceded by Sir John Colepeper	Chancellor of the Exchequer 1643–1646	Succeeded by Sir Anthony Ashley-Cooper
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