BRYDGES, James (1642-1714)

James Brydges, 8th Baron Chandos, was descended from a younger son of John Brydges, Baron Chandos^†, who had settled at Wilton Castle in Herefordshire in the sixteenth century. Wilton Castle appears to have been rendered uninhabitable during the Civil War and Chandos seems to have lived nearby in either Dewsall or Aconbury. His social and political allegiances were very different to those of his predecessor. He possessed estates in Herefordshire and Shropshire but seems to have been more interested in commercial than landed wealth and was deeply involved in the financial world of the City of London. Although he was described by one contemporary as ‘a worthy gentleman’, so many of those with whom he was closely connected had a reputation for shady dealing that it is difficult to be sure of his probity. His mother had allegedly secured the Pearle estate by seizing custody of the mentally incapacitated heir and embezzling the records. She remarried in 1655. Her second husband was William (Hinson) Powell^‡ who had been party to the notorious conveyance of the lands of Lady Powell in 1651. HP Commons 1660-90, iii. 269. At or about the time of Chandos’s succession to the peerage his wife’s sister married the financier, Josiah Child^‡. Chandos’s son and heir James Brydges, (later duke of Chandos) enriched himself in a process that has been described as ‘an undeviating narrative of opportunism and corruption’. HP Commons 1690-1715, iii. 378. Chandos himself was clearly sensitive to suggestions that he had misappropriated funds bequeathed by John Scudamore^‡, Viscount Scudamore [I], for the employment of the poor of Hereford which he managed in conjunction with Scudamore’s ‘chief agent’, Thomas Geers^‡, and was at pains to refute them in his will. It is tempting to wonder whether it was the need to rebut allegations of this kind that led in 1701 to a duel between his son and James Morgan^‡. Ibid. 381.

It is difficult to estimate the value of Chandos’s Herefordshire holdings: his house was leased out during his stay in Turkey for £115 a year, which Chandos later claimed was a deliberate undervaluation. C5/597/31. His holdings, even if not large, did give him some influence in the county. Further influence came from his kinship network. Chandos’s niece, Rebecca Child, married Charles Somerset^‡, heir apparent to Henry Somerset^* [1653], 3rd marquess of Worcester (later duke of Beaufort). Sir Thomas Williams^‡ owed much of his interest in Herefordshire to his marriage to Chandos’s half-sister, Mary Powell, in 1675. Their son, Sir John Williams^‡ was touted as a candidate for Chandos and the ‘Church party’ at the 1693 election. HP Commons 1690-1715, ii. 259. Chandos was also related to another more significant local family, the Scudamores. He was on good terms with John Scudamore^‡, 2nd Viscount Scudamore [I] and even fought a duel in1695 with Scudamore’s opponent Thomas Coningsby^* [840], Baron Coningsby [I], later earl of Coningsby, after a quarrel arising from a dispute over the office of high steward of Hereford. Luttrell, Brief Relation, iii. 532. His estates in Herefordshire naturally brought him into contact with the Harley family, a connection that may have been reinforced by Nathaniel Harley’s career in the Turkey trade. Scattered references in the Harley correspondence show both that relations between the two families were cordial rather than close, and that the Harleys thought his interest well worth cultivating. HMC Portland, iii. 421-2, 443. Chandos’s main electoral influence was in Hereford itself, where he was said to have ‘half the town’ but, nevertheless, had to resort to extensive bribery to secure the election of his son in 1698.

Chandos’s other sources of wealth are equally difficult to estimate. Towards the end of his life Chandos was deemed one of the ‘poor lords’ who would welcome a Hanoverian pension. His acquisitive son complained that Chandos ‘used him hardly’. Yet his electoral activity in Herefordshire and his shareholdings in the East India Company (said to be worth £9,550 in 1689 and £7,800 in 1692) suggest considerable resources. Add. 22185, ff. 12-13, 53. Chandos had married into a prosperous City family (his mother-in-law paid for the erection of the family vault in Aconbury Church), and he had little difficulty in securing a rich wife for his son and heir. His will does not indicate great wealth but neither does it indicate great poverty. He bequeathed £2,000 and a life interest in a manor to each of his two surviving younger sons, an income of £600 a year to his widow, generous legacies to his servants and friends, and £50 to finish the improvements that he had already begun to the church at Aconbury ‘as a small instance of my devotion to the house of my God’.

Described in The Complete Peerage as having ‘acted with the Tories’, a close examination of Chandos’s parliamentary career suggests a far more complex picture. Chandos’s deeply held anti-Catholic and ‘country’ beliefs involved him in a series of shifting political allegiances that defy easy labelling. He took his seat as soon as Parliament reconvened after the long prorogation of 1675-7 and, with the exception of one session, maintained his attendance at a very high level until he left for Constantinople early in 1681. During the 1677-8 session he was present on just under 90 per cent of sitting days; for the May to July 1678 session on just over 88 per cent; for the October-December session on nearly 41 percent; for the first Exclusion Parliament 95 per cent (additionally attending on five of the seven prorogation days); and nearly 76 per cent for the second Exclusion Parliament.

For most of this period he was associated with the opposition group led by Anthony Ashley Cooper, earl of Shaftesbury, who marked him as worthy in his May 1677 list. On 5 July 1678 Chandos entered a dissent to the resolution in the case of Darrell v. Whichcot. Between 23 Oct. and 30 Nov. 1678 his proxy was held by Thomas Osborne, earl of Danby (later marquess of Carmarthen and duke of Leeds). Yet he was scarcely one of Danby’s most trustworthy allies. On 20 Dec., along with other Shaftesbury associates, he signed the two dissents against the supply bill, having voted against insisting on the Lords’ amendment which would have required the payment of money into the exchequer, and Chandos voted for Danby’s committal in December 1678. By February 1679 he was involved with Child in an attempt to reconcile Danby and Shaftesbury by means of a set of proposals aimed at securing a Protestant succession and apparently concocted by a group meeting twice weekly at a coffee house in the City ‘where coffee clubbers like we discourse public matters.’ Knights, Pols. and Opinion, 43; HMC 9th Rep. pt 2, 456. In March and April 1679 Danby listed him as a supporter; in April Chandos voted against Danby’s attainder. On 2 May Chandos protested against the resolution not to amend the bill to remove popish inhabitants from London and Westminster, and on 10 May he voted against a joint committee of both Houses to consider the impeachments against the ‘popish lords’. On 27 May he probably voted for the right of the bishops to stay in the House during capital cases.

Despite his apparent rapprochement with Danby, at the Essex election of August 1679 he (together with Ford Grey^* [1779], 3rd Baron Grey of Warke, later earl of Tankerville) led the country opposition against the court candidate. HP Commons 1660-90, i. 229. His involvement in this election is somewhat puzzling since he is not known to have had any property in the county. It seems likely that he was acting on behalf of his brother-in-law, Josiah Child, who was building up a substantial Essex estate. In September Chandos was said to be interested in becoming ambassador to Turkey, a position that was usually filled on the nomination of the Levant Company. HMC 7th Rep. 475. He also demonstrated his belief in the allegations of Titus Oates by joining Shaftesbury and other opposition peers at the trial of Knox and Lane in November 1679. Alongside Shaftsbury, he was also a member of the group of peers who dined together once a week at the Swan Tavern in Fish Street in order to plan a mass petitioning movement to persuade the king to recall Parliament. CSP Dom. 1679-80, p. 296. Chandos was not only one of the signatories to the subsequent address to the king in December 1679; he was also one of the smaller group of peers who presented it to the king in person. HMC Hastings, iv. 302; Domestick Intelligence, 9 Dec 1679; Morrice, Ent’ring Bk. ii. 210.

In January 1681 Chandos was still said to be ‘a great friend and entirely in the interests of my lord Shaftesbury’. HMC Finch, ii. 96. Shaftesbury’s ability to rally, ‘All those who in any way dissent from the government’ to vote for Chandos was said to have been a crucial factor in securing him the Levant Company’s nomination as ambassador to Turkey. Halifax Letters, i. 216, n2; HMC 7th Rep. 478. Securing the king’s approbation of the appointment was another matter. Chandos was forced to appear before the committee of foreign affairs in April. There he had to face the king’s disfavour and was forced to repudiate his actions ‘and beg his majesty’s pardon for the same, alleging for his excuse that he did not know it was contrary to his majesty’s pleasure, and did then think it might have been for his majesty’s service.’ HMC Ormonde, n.s. v. 310-11; Luttrell, Brief Relation, i. 42-43. Not unnaturally his recantation, which was widely publicized, upset many of his erstwhile supporters in the Levant Company who were expected either to overturn his appointment or to punish him by reducing the ambassador’s ‘annual present’ as a result. A rumour that Chandos had publicly disowned the recantation then upset the king still further. The upshot appears to have been that Chandos, ‘as a disaffected person’ was forced to serve ‘at an under rate.’ HMC Downshire, i. 215; HMC Finch, ii. 75-78. Even so, it was a lucrative posting; when he finally left Turkey in 1687, it was said that, ‘Few have made more of the place than he hath. He has doubtless raised his estate considerably by it.’ HMC Portland, ii. 242.

Chandos’s name appears in the House of Lords attendance list for 15 Nov. 1680 when the crucial exclusion vote was taken. According to Daniel Finch, the future 2nd earl of Nottingham, Chandos was still ‘a great friend and entirely in the interests of my lord Shaftesbury’. HMC Finch, ii. 96. One might have expected him therefore to have been a determined exclusionist, although his subsequent difficulty in accepting the 1688 revolution suggests that there were limits to his willingness to implement his anti-Catholic prejudices. Equally, his recent experiences may have made him reluctant to oppose the king so publicly. In the event the evidence of the surviving division lists for that day are simply confusing. He is listed as having voted against putting the question that the bill be rejected at its first reading but also as having voted for its rejection. In December 1680 he voted for the attainder of William Howard, Viscount Stafford. His last recorded attendance at the House of Lords before leaving for Turkey was on 7 Jan. 1681; given the regularity of his attendance this almost certainly means that he either left the country shortly after that date or was preparing to do so, although he did not arrive in Constantinople until 22 July. Ibid. 116. His failure to sign the address to the king in January 1681 therefore probably indicates an inability to sign through absence rather than a reluctance to sign at all.

James II attempted to recall Chandos at his accession in 1685. Chandos was in no doubt that this represented a loss of favour and implored help ‘against the irregular, and undue combination and practices of ambitious and unkind men, that altogether unprovoked on my part seek to make me a sacrifice to the rising sun.’ Stowe 219, ff. 144-6. Problems about appointing a successor meant that Chandos did not arrive back in England until February 1688. CSP Dom. 1685, p. 42; Add. 70081, newsletter, 21 Feb. 1688. Before his return his name was being included on various lists as an opponent of James II’s policies in general and of the repeal of the Test Act in particular. Roger Morrice was not quite so sure; he noted that Chandos ‘was of Shaftesbury’s party but now is otherwise minded’. Nevertheless, it was reliably reported in March that Chandos was indeed opposed to the repeal of the Test Act and William Sancroft, archbishop of Canterbury, was confident that he would be prepared to act as bail in the Seven Bishops’ case, although in the event he was not in court to do so. Morrice, Ent’ring Bk, iv. 237; Longleat, Bath mss, Thynne pprs. 43 f. 37; Add. 72516, ff. 60-62; Bodl. Tanner 28, f. 76; Carte 76, f. 28.

On his return Chandos again took up the threads of commercial life in London. He resumed his directorship of the East India Company and became an exceptionally active member of its committee, attending 41 of 42 possible meetings in 1688. Add. 22185 ff. 12-13. In August 1688 he dined with Robert Harley, the future earl of Oxford, who noted that the talk had been of elections and that Chandos ‘will adhere to the Prince’s interest and steer as Sir E[dward Harley^‡] will desire.’ HMC Portland, iii. 416. In November 1688 Chandos subscribed his name to the petition for a free Parliament, and in December he signed the declaration to the prince of Orange and was one of the peers who met at Guildhall and Whitehall. Bodl. ms Eng. hist. d. 307 f. 6; Kingdom without a King, 67, 74, 79, 85, 92, 105, 115, 117. Together with Charles North^* [1773], 5th Baron North, and John Bennet^* [322], Baron Ossulston, he interrogated George Jeffreys, Baron Jeffreys, about the whereabouts of the missing Great Seal of England. HMC 14th Rep. IX. 453-4.

He resumed his seat at the first sitting of the Convention Parliament and was present for 77 per cent of the first session, but only 49 per cent of the second session. His long years of opposition did not make it easy for him to accept the revolution and henceforth Chandos was increasingly identified with the Tories and supporters of the Anglican Church. In January 1689 Chandos voted for a regency and against declaring William and Mary to be king and queen. In February he voted against agreeing with the Commons in the use of the word ‘abdicated’ and ‘that the throne is thereby vacant’, entering a dissent on 6 Feb. when the resolution passed. His faith in Titus Oates and the reality of the Popish Plot was shaken; in May he voted against reversing Titus Oates’ conviction for perjury and in July voted in favour of adhering to the Lords’ amendments to the bill. That same month he appears to have been seeking a fresh ambassadorial appointment. Add. 72517, ff. 25-26.

Chandos may not have been living in Herefordshire, as he had leased his house at Dewsall for 21 years in 1680, and the absence of his name from discussions of what sums it was appropriate for local gentlemen to offer towards the expenses of the prince of Orange in December 1688 suggests that he was still living elsewhere at that date. C115/109/8911; C5/597/31. Nevertheless, he was classed by Carmarthen as among the supporters of the court in a list of October 1689 to February 1690, and he was regularly consulted on local electoral issues. At the general election of 1690 he promised his support to Sir Edward Harley and intervened to prevent a rival from standing. HMC Portland, iii. 443; Add. 70014, f. 299. His attendance recovered to just over 79 per cent in the first session of the 1690 Parliament. His continuing unease with the new regime was demonstrated yet again on 10 Apr. 1690 when he entered a protest against the razure of the reasons for the protest of 8 Apr. concerning the recognition of William and Mary as rightful and lawful sovereigns and to confirm the acts of the Convention, and on 11th he told n the question as to whether the previous day’s vote should be entered in the journal as they were read without any Alteration. He also acted as a teller on the question of whether to refer the state of the London militia to a select committee. He seems to have been seeking a further term of office overseas: in February 1690 he was said to be angling for the post of governor of Jamaica, and not long afterwards he was soliciting for the post of ambassador to Turkey in place of Sir William Trumbull^‡. HMC Downshire, i. 335, 345; Add. 72516, ff. 121-3. His somewhat grudging support for the new regime did not prevent the queen from endorsing his appointment in August to command a troop of horse raised by the East India Company to counter a possible French invasion. BL, OIOC, B/40, 4 Aug. 1690.

The 1690-1 session saw him present on 69 per cent of sitting days. In October he was involved in local discussions over the proposed Wye and Lugg navigation bill. Add. 70014, f. 348. On 6 Oct. he voted for the discharge of James Cecil* , 4th earl of Salisbury and Henry Mordaunt, 2nd earl of Peterborough, from their imprisonment in the Tower. In November 1690 Chandos braved ‘a most tempestuous night’ to attend the meeting of the Commons’ committee that deliberated on the return of Robert Harley as Member for New Radnor Boroughs, even though as a peer he had no vote to cast. HMC Portland, iii. 451; HMC Dartmouth, i. 229; Add. 70014, ff. 355-6. His attendance over the 1691-2 session dropped slightly to 66 percent but he acted as a teller on two occasions, on the question of Brown v Wayte (30 Nov.) and a bill for preserving prize salt for the use of the navy (14 December). His attendance recovered in 1692-3 to just over 82 per cent, when he acted as a teller once more on a legal matter pertaining to the grammar school in Birmingham. Not everyone was convinced of his loyalty. Writing to Hans Willem Bentinck, earl of Portland, an anonymous (and alarmist) correspondent predicted disruption of the 1692-3 session by disgruntled Tories and Jacobites. Amongst other details he described how Chandos had ‘sat up all night a gaming and got drunk and in his drink run round the table like a mad man saying god damn me, I am a Jacobite, I am a Jacobite, and hope to see King James here again in a short time: with other reflective words’. UNL, PwA 2792.

Three times in January and once in February 1692 Chandos had acted as teller in divisions in proceedings concerning the divorce bill for Henry Howard, 7th duke of Norfolk. When the bill was revived in January 1693, Thomas Bruce, 2nd earl of Ailesbury, listed Chandos as a possible opponent and he did indeed go on to vote against it. In December 1692 and again in January 1693 he voted in favour of the place bill; it may have been for this purpose that he held Ailesbury’s proxy from 11 to 27 Jan. 1693. In February 1693 he became involved in a quarrel, cause unknown, with John Sheffield, earl of Mulgrave, (later duke of Buckingham). The House issued an injunction against them on 18 Feb. in order to prevent a duel. That month he found Charles Mohun, 4th Baron Mohun not guilty of murder, and also became involved in supporting William Walcot’s attempts to secure a statute renewing his patent for a machine to freshen seawater. Chandos may well have had a financial interest in this scheme. He was distantly related to the Walcots; his daughter subsequently married William Walcot’s nephew, Charles; another nephew, Humphrey Walcot^‡, set up a company to exploit the desalination process in 1701 in which Chandos was the first and most prominent shareholder. HMC 14th Rep. VI. 378; HP Commons 1690-1715, v. 762. On 6 Mar. he invoked privilege of Parliament to protect his footmen from arrest. On 13 Mar. 1693 Chandos chaired the committee on the Salwarpe river navigation bill. HMC 14th Rep. VI. 339. The following day he was one of the managers of the conference on the bill to prohibit all trade with France and for the encouragement of privateers. In the meantime, throughout the early months of 1693, he was active in securing the success of Sir Edward Harley at the by-election for Herefordshire. Add. 70128, Sir E. Harley to [?R. Harley], 10 Jan. 1692[-3]; 70014, P. Foley to Sir E. Harley, 10 Jan. 1693.

Chandos was then absent from the House for the next two sessions. Despite explaining on 18 Dec. 1694 that his absence at a call of the House was involuntary and solely attributable to problems with his horses, he did not resume his seat until 10 Feb. 1696, well into the 1695-6 session. HMC Lords, i. 415. Perhaps he was distracted by yet another commercial scheme: in June he was appointed governor of the Company for Digging and Working Mines in England, a project that involved an eclectic mix of Whigs, Tories, country supporters and courtiers. CSP Dom. 1693, p. 207.

Chandos’s political outlook seems to be summed up in the letter that he sent to Paul Foley^‡, Speaker of the Commons, in the autumn of 1695. In it he declared himself to be ‘for sober men that would support the public incorrupt and against necessary expense, and withal he was for neighbourhood, friendship and relation.’ These apparently straightforward ‘country whig’ sentiments masked continuing scruples about the legitimacy of the new regime that were pushing him towards Jacobitism – albeit as an armchair Jacobite rather than an active plotter. His return to Parliament in February 1696, just days before the discovery of the Assassination Plot, may well have been linked to the recent successes of Foley and Harley in the Commons and rumours of the imminent appointment of Nottingham, as lord chancellor. Rev. Pols. 155-6. Equally it may have had a more prosaic reason, the debate on 11 Feb. over the question of the East India Company’s charter. He remained to the end of the session, marking himself out as an enemy of the government by refusing to sign the Association. HMC Lords, n.s. ii. 206-8.

He was again absent at the beginning of the 1696-7 session. On 30 Nov. 1696 as part of the preparations for the attainder of Sir John Fenwick^‡ the House voted to attach those members who did not attend; Chandos complied on 4 Dec. following. During that month he entered two dissents over the conduct of the trial, voted against the attainder and protested against Fenwick’s conviction. If the government needed any further proof of his Jacobite leanings, his possession from 12 Mar. 1697 of the proxy of Theophilus Hastings, 7th earl of Huntingdon, must have confirmed it. His attendance overall for the session was a mere 18 per cent.

It remained low for the following (1697-8) session: just under 38 per cent. In February 1698 Chandos was again angling for appointment as ambassador to Constantinople. CSP Dom. 1698, pp. 97, 105. In March 1698 he opposed the bill of pains and penalties against Charles Duncombe^‡. Between 19 May and 15 June, and again between 29 June and the end of the session, he registered his proxy to John West, 6th Baron De la Warr. At the general election of that year Chandos promised his support for Paul Foley^‡ though it was noted that ‘none of his creatures will promise’. Add. 70114, T. Foley to Sir E. Harley, 16 July 1698. Chandos’s son, James Brydges, was returned at the top of the poll. Politically ambitious, Brydges, made much of his determination to distance himself from his father’s Jacobitism, but Chandos continued to put his electoral influence at his son’s disposal, and father and son remained on affectionate terms. Cocks Diary, 95; HMC Portland, iv. 10. In reality it seems likely that since both shared country sentiments and financial interests, their political outlook was very similar, even though their ambitions for office were not.

Chandos failed to attend the first session of the 1698 Parliament but was present for just over 46 per cent of sitting days for the second (1699-1700) session; his attendance remained at a similar level for the first and second Parliaments of 1701. Like his son, who was by now acting as one of Harley’s undermanagers in the Commons, Chandos supported the bill for continuing the East India Company in February 1700. Despite his own poor attendance, he still seems to have taken a considerable interest in interest in parliamentary elections: it was at a meeting at Chandos’s London house in November 1701 that Robert Harley joined with other Herefordshire gentlemen to support the candidature of Sir John Williams. HP Commons 1690-1715, ii. 261.

The death of James II in exile followed by Anne’s accession to the throne may have helped reconcile Chandos to the regime, for in September 1702 he was again being tipped for an appointment as ambassador, this time as ambassador to Hanover ‘to negotiate some affairs of consequence’. Luttrell, Brief Relation, v. 194. Nevertheless, he remained deeply suspicious of the ministry and his attendance at the House was lacklustre: from the 1702 Parliament to the end of the 1710 Parliament it generally hovered between 33 and 38 per cent, although it fell to 28 per cent in the 1704-5 session, and to 23 per cent in the first two sessions of the 1705 Parliament. Throughout 1703 Chandos was listed as a supporter of the bill to prevent occasional conformity. In the disputes over the Scotch Plot, he supported Nottingham by entering a dissent on 3 Mar. 1703 to the resolution that the key to the gibberish letters be made known only to the queen and the (Whig) committee of investigation. In November of the same year he was listed as a likely supporter of the tack. On 27 Feb. 1705 he was named to the committee to consider the heads for a conference on the Aylesbury men. In March 1705, when he realized that a general election was imminent, he wrote immediately to James Scudamore^‡, 3rd Viscount Scudamore [I], urging him to stand for Herefordshire and assuring him that discussions with Robert Harley had indicated that no opposition was to be expected. C115/109/8920. In an analysis of the peerage in relation to the succession (April 1705) Chandos was described as a Jacobite. On 6 Dec. his protest at the resolution that ‘the Church … is now … in a most safe and flourishing condition’ further underlines his alliance with the Tory opposition. In Harley’s abortive plans for a new ministry in 1708, Chandos was expected to receive office. Beinecke Lib. Manchester pprs. 1696-1732, p. 8. In the spring of 1710 he consistently opposed the trial of Dr. Sacheverell and voted to acquit him.

In October 1710 Chandos was listed by Harley as a supporter (like his son) of the new ministry. Chandos was also included on a list of lords to be canvassed on the ‘No Peace without Spain’ motion. He was present on the day of the division (7 Dec. 1711) and was also present on 8 Dec. when the ministry tried to overturn the previous day’s vote, but there is no record of what he actually did. Perhaps significantly his next attendance was not until 20 Dec. – when he voted with the ministry in favour of the claim of James Hamilton, 4th duke of Hamilton [S] and duke of Brandon, to sit in the House as an English peer. Harley (now earl of Oxford) was either uncertain of Chandos’s continuing allegiance or determined to retain it. He listed Chandos as one of the ‘lords to be contacted during the Christmas recess’. Meanwhile, Bothmar included his name (with a suggested pension of £600) in the list of ‘poor lords’ that he sent to Hanover early in January 1712.

Oxford’s attentions did not encourage the elderly Chandos to attend the House more assiduously. During the 1710-11 session he was recorded as being present on 29 occasions; during the 1711-12 session he managed only 13 attendances, and then (on 16 May) gave his proxy for the remainder of the session to the lord chancellor, Simon Harcourt, Baron (later Viscount Harcourt). He was similarly present on just 12 sitting days in the 1713 session. His name appeared again on ministerial lists of supporters drawn up in the spring of 1713, and in the summer he was present during the difficult debates on the union with Scotland (1 June) and the Malt Tax (5 and 8 June). Although no division lists survive for these votes, Chandos almost certainly voted with the government, for Oxford was confident that he would vote for the bill to implement the eighth and ninth articles of the French commercial treaty. Oxford could not, however, count on Chandos’s support on all issues. Bolingbroke’s schism bill was the subject of debate on the day of Chandos’s last recorded attendance at the House, and despite Oxford’s equivocation towards it, Nottingham predicted that Chandos would vote in favour. Chandos then gave his proxy to De la Warr, another of Oxford’s ‘poor lords’, for the remainder of the session.

Chandos drew up his will in June 1713. Although no Puritan he directed his funeral to be performed ‘with great privacy and frugality … declaring … that immoderate expenses in burying the dead is a very unaccountable vanity and too often proves a lamentable occasion of grievous immoralities profaneness and sin among the meaner sort that usually frequent such solemnities for very ill purposes’. He attended the House for ten days in April and May 1714 but in September was reported to be dangerously ill. He died the following month and was buried, as he had directed, with his parents-in-law in the family vault at Aconbury.