WRIOTHESLEY, Thomas (1608-67)

Southampton was described by his friend Edward Hyde^†, 1st earl of Clarendon, as ‘a great man in all respects’, who possessed ‘a great sharpness of judgment, a very quick apprehension, and that readiness of expression upon any sudden debate, that no man delivered himself more advantageously and weightily’. In 1624 his father and elder brother James Wriothesley^‡, Lord Wriothesley, were appointed officers in the English forces sent to aid the Dutch that year. Their deaths that November led him to inherit the earldom at the age of just 16. Writing from The Hague on 15 Nov., Elizabeth, queen of Bohemia referred to the new earl as ‘this young lord’, suggesting that Southampton had accompanied his father and brother to the Netherlands. As a result of these bereavements, Southampton’s ‘nature very much inclined to melancholic’. Indeed, according to Clarendon, he disliked ‘the noise of attendance’ and ‘to be called “my lord”’, preferring instead his own company.1 Clarendon, ii. 529-30; HP Commons, 1604-29, vi. 863; Corresp. of Eliz. Stuart, Q. of Bohemia ed. N. Akkerman, i. 500-1.

After extensive lobbying by his father’s supporters, among them the queen of Bohemia, Southampton’s wardship was sold to his mother in March 1625 for £2,000. The following October Charles I granted the money due to the crown from the wardship to George Villiers^*, 1st duke of Buckingham, with a special recommendation that Buckingham should have oversight of Southampton’s education.2 T. Rymer, Foedera, viii. pt. 1, pp. 142-6. However, it is unlikely that the duke had much time to devote to the young earl. In the autumn of 1625 Southampton was sent to St John’s College, Cambridge, where his father and elder brother had been educated, although he seems to have stayed there less than a year.3 Scott, 126-9.

Southampton was still under age when Parliament was summoned in 1628. Nevertheless, having passed his 20th birthday by the time the session started on 17 Mar., he was summoned to the upper House four days later. He took his seat the following day and was recorded as attending 62 of the 94 sittings of the session, two thirds of the total. He took the oath of allegiance on 24 Mar. but made no speeches and received no committee appointments.4 Lords Procs. 1628, pp. 86, 96. In the 1629 session he attended ten of the 23 sittings, 43 per cent of the total. He was appointed to just one committee, on 21 Feb., to consider the petition of Mary, Lady Coningsby, who complained that an order of the upper House made the previous session concerning the estate of her deceased father-in-law, Sir Ralph Coningsby^‡ of North Mimms, Hertfordshire, had not been obeyed.5 LJ, iv. 37b, 30b; HMC 4th Rep. 21; Lords Procs. 1628, pp. 369, 570-2, 698-9.

Southampton received possession of his estates in December 1629, for which he had to pay £334. He was obliged to sell about a quarter of his lands, raising perhaps £19,000 to settle debts inherited from his father.6 Coventry Docquets, 320, 592, 595; L. Stone, Fam. and Fortune, 230-1. In 1633 he accompanied the king to Scotland and, in November, participated in the christening of Prince James (Stuart^†, duke of York).7 CSP Ven. 1632-6, p. 93; Finet Notebks. ed. A.J. Loomie, 144. The following March it was reported that Southampton had lost a large amount of money at the horse races at Newmarket and had left for France, possibly to escape his creditors. However, George Garrard^‡ downplayed the extent of his losses.8 CSP Dom. 1633-4, p. 518; Strafforde Letters, i. 225. Once in Paris, he met and rapidly fell in love with his first wife, a beautiful young Huguenot widow, whom he brought back to his English home at Titchfield, Hampshire, in August; she did not receive letters of denization until 1637. Initial rumours that his wife was fabulously wealthy proved false and, consequently, Southampton’s finances remained straitened.9 C115/106/8429, 8431; Coventry Docquets, 532; Strafforde Letters, i. 467; Stone, 231-3.

During his absence in France, Southampton ordered the sale of a large quantity of timber from his estates in Hampshire in order to settle his debts. The wood was very suitable for shipbuilding and attracted the interest of the Navy board. Despite a previous promise from the king that the timber would not be appropriated for his service, the Council, on 20 June 1634, halted the sale until the officers of the crown had time to inspect the produce.10 CSP Dom. 1634-5, p. 65; PC2/44, f. 22. A year later, Southampton was still awaiting a decision from the admiralty commissioners concerning his timber. However, soon thereafter they agreed to purchase 1,000 trees for £2,294 10s., which sum was paid in full on 11 July.11 CSP Dom. 1635, pp. 121, 388; E403/1747, unfol. (11 July 1635). It has been suggested that Southampton’s timber was undervalued, but the Navy’s principal officers stated that the king paid as well as anyone else.12 D.L. Smith, Constitutional Royalism, 47; CSP Dom. 1634-5, p. 65.

Clarendon later claimed that, before the Civil War, Southampton experienced ‘some hardness’ at the hands of the Caroline regime.13 Clarendon, ii. 530. There was certainly some truth in this claim. However, at the end of June 1635 the king attended the christening of Southampton’s first son at the earl’s London home in Holborn.14 CSP Ven. 1632-6, p. 418. Moreover, in February 1636 Southampton secured an order for payment of the two years of arrears of his father’s pension of £2,000 p.a., outstanding at the latter’s death.15 E403/3041, p. 198. Nevertheless, in autumn 1635 the earl fell victim to the crown’s attempts to extend the traditional boundaries of the royal forests, threatening him with the loss of property in the New Forest valued at £2,000 a year. The following July he secured a royal pardon, which also disafforested the lands in question, for which he may have had to compound.16 Strafforde Letters, i. 463, 467; Coventry Docquets, 273; S.R. Gardiner, Hist. of Eng. viii. 86.

In March 1637 Southampton sought permission to pull down his London house and develop the property to take advantage of the expansion of the London suburbs. However, despite having the support of the king, the scheme was initially blocked by the Council, and it was not until the autumn of 1638 that he was allowed to proceed. (He subsequently also received permission to build a new town house in Bloomsbury, though this was not finished until 1660.) By the eve of the Civil War Southampton was receiving over £400 a year in rent from his property in Holborn.17 HMC De L’Isle and Dudley, vi. 96; Strafforde Letters, ii. 57; Stone, 234, 237; SO3/11, unfol. (Sept. 1638); SO3/12, ff. 4, 71; Coventry Docquets, 287; SP23/192, pp. 202-3. In 1638 Southampton was given leave to colonize the island of Mauritius, but permission was rescinded the following year after opposition from the East India Company.18 SO3/11, unfol. (Mar. 1638); Cal. Ct. Mins. E.I. Co. 1635-9, p. 352.

Southampton made no known response after the king summoned the peerage to York in 1639 to fight the Scottish Covenanters, and in the Short Parliament he was among those peers who thought that grievances should be given precedence over supply.19 CSP Dom. 1640, p. 66. However, during the Long Parliament he quickly gravitated towards the king, for despite his opposition to Charles I’s first minister, Thomas Wentworth^*, 1st earl of Strafford, he regarded, according to Clarendon, the latter’s impeachment as ‘exceed[ing] the limits of justice’.20 HMC De L’Isle and Dudley, vi. 350; Clarendon, ii. 530. In January 1642 he was appointed to the Privy Council. A royalist in the Civil War, he was rewarded at the Restoration for his loyalty with the lord treasurership, by which time he was also earl of Chichester, having succeeded to this title following the death in 1653 of his second wife’s father, Francis Leigh^*. Having no surviving sons, his title died with him in 1667. He was buried on 18 June at Titchfield, his will, dated 11 July 1666, being proved on 22 May 1667.21 Titchfield Par. Reg. 1634-78, p. 120; PROB 11/323, f. 448.