BERKELEY, Sir John (1607-78), of Bruton, Som.

The fifth son of Sir Maurice Berkeley† and the youngest brother of Sir Charles Berkeley*, like many younger sons John Berkeley sought to build a career in the army and at court. Partly because of the excellent court connections of his mother’s family, the Killigrews, partly because of his own confidence and ambition, and partly because of the opportunities created by the civil war, he succeeded more completely than most. Together with his brothers and nephews, he helped ensure that the Bruton branch of the Berkeleys outshone the senior Berkeley Castle line of the family.

Sir Maurice died when John was aged only ten and so John received much of his education at home from his mother.41Four Portraits, 108. He then went to Oxford, ‘where he spent two or three years as well or better than gentlemen of that age usually do’.42Al. Ox.; Four Portraits, 108. He was with Sir Charles Morgan in Germany when he defended Stade in 1627-8 and, according to Edward Hyde*, he even had ‘some command’ in that engagement.43Four Portraits, 108. For health reasons, he then visited France, before returning to England.44Four Portraits, 108. In the mid-1630s, he undertook a second trip to France, going on to Spain. Sir Richard Fanshawe†, who arrived there in 1635, met him at Madrid.45Four Portraits, 108; Mems. of Anne, Lady Halkett and Ann, Lady Fanshawe, ed. J. Loftis (Oxford, 1979), 113.

Charles I’s moves towards rapprochement with France from late 1636 provided the context for Berkeley’s entry into public life. Perhaps on the recommendation of the 1st earl of Holland (Henry Rich†), the king sent Berkeley on a diplomatic mission to Stockholm to convince the Swedes that English military intervention on the continent would reassert his support for the cause of the elector palatine and strengthen Axel Oxenstierna against those in Sweden who wanted to withdraw from the war in Germany. Berkeley departed in the spring of 1637 and spent a couple of months at the Swedish court. His entourage included the exiled Presbyterian clergyman John Durie.46CSP Dom. 1636-7, pp. 380, 381, 392-3, 400; 1637, pp. 82, 145, 310, 312, 321, 324, 336, 413; Bell, Handlist, 274 Berkeley’s trip was in practice irrelevant since no military intervention materialised, but on his return, Henrietta Maria appointed him as one of her gentlemen sewers and he was soon promoted to become one of her two cupbearers.47Four Portraits, 109; Dorset RO, D/FSI Box 267, copies of official documents, 1660-4, unfol.

The rebellion of the Covenanters gave Berkeley the chance to gain more military experience. As general of horse for the Scottish campaign, Holland promptly appointed him to command his own troop of horse.48Four Portraits, 109. Berkeley also served as tserjeant-major under Henry Wilmot* as Holland’s commissary-general of horse.49Wit Restor’d, 9. In July 1639 Berkeley and his brother William were among the officers knighted by the king at Berwick.50Shaw, Knights of Eng. ii. 207. His election to the Short Parliament probably occasioned only a very brief interruption to his service with the army in the north. Holland’s patronage secured for Berkeley a seat for Reading on 12 March 1640, although some members of the corporation had complained that he was ‘a stranger and can be no friend to the town’.51Reading Recs. iii. 488-9. However, five days later he was also elected at Heytesbury, where the Berkeley interest had been sufficiently strong to return his brother Charles in the three previous Parliaments. Sir John’s only recorded contribution to the proceedings of this Parliament was to inform the Commons on 17 April 1640 that he wished to sit for Heytesbury rather than Reading.52CJ ii. 4b; CSP Dom. 1640, p. 42. Meanwhile, he continued to seek office in and around the court. In 1638 he and William Berkeley had obtained the reversion to the post of clerk of the treasury of the court of common pleas.53Coventry Docquets, 207; CSP Dom. 1638-9, p. 161. In the autumn of 1640 Berkeley would have been willing to buy one of the clerkships of the privy council, from Sir William Becher† if only Becher had been able to obtain permission to relinquish it.54CSP Dom. 1640-1, p. 205.

When the discontented officers in the northern army, especially those with connections to the queen’s household, began to plot against Parliament in the spring of 1641, Berkeley was included in their plans, quite probably recruited by his cousin Henry Jermyn*. However, as those plans began to unravel, on 14 June the Commons ordered that Berkeley and another conspirator, Daniel O’Neill†, were to be sent for as delinquents.55CJ ii. 175b-176a; Two Diaries of Long Parl. 122; Procs. LP v. 134-6, 138-9, 141-2, 146, 148-9, 152, 154. Over the following weeks, as articles were prepared against Jermyn and Henry Percy*, the claim that Berkeley had been involved were reiterated.56CJ ii. 223a, 224b-225a; Procs. LP vi. 92-3, 96. In late August the Commons took steps to halt his army pay.57CJ ii. 271a, 272b. By then, Berkeley had already fled abroad.58LJ iv. 399a-b; Four Portraits, 109. But he soon returned. On 20 October John Pym* informed the Commons that, during the recess (9 Sept.-20 Oct.), Berkeley and O’Neill had surrendered themselves to him at his house in Chelsea. Berkeley was then sent to the Tower.59CJ ii. 289a-290b, 294a, 295a; LJ iv. 399a-b, 411a. Berkeley later claimed that he had returned only because his brother Sir Charles had received assurances from Algernon Percy†, 4th earl of Northumberland.60LJ iv. 420a. On 9 December Sir John was among the conspirators formally accused of misprision of treason.61CJ ii. 337a. Eight days later, however, the Commons agreed (by 122 votes to 84) that Berkeley could be released on bail. The required bail, totalling £10,000, was put up by the 4th earl of Dorset (Sir Edward Sackville†) and the 1st earl of Stamford (Henry Grey*) on 24 December.62CJ ii. 346b-347a, 356b.

Berkeley did not keep the promises of good behaviour he made in order to secure that release. Within six months he was once again engaged in military plots against Parliament, although this time as a very active royalist in the outbreak of open hostilities. He joined the group of courtiers who, in late June 1642, set out for the United Provinces to obtain ammunition for the king, only to meet the ship bringing those supplies at sea.63Clarendon, Hist. ii. 256. In early August, he accompanied the 1st marquess of Hertford (Sir William Seymour†) into the south west to raise an army.64Clarendon, Hist. ii. 226, 283. Following their retreat from Wells, Berkeley joined Hertford at Sherborne and was appointed by him as the major-general of horse under Sir Ralph Hopton*.65Bellum Civile, 10-13; Four Portraits, 110; Clarendon, Hist. ii. 298. Sent into Devon and Cornwall in September, Hopton and Berkeley were then commissioned by the king with the 3rd Baron Mohun and William Ashburnham* to raise forces in the six western counties.66Bellum Civile, 18-19, 23; Four Portraits, 110-11; Clarendon, Hist. ii. 317, 453. Berkeley spent late 1642 and early 1643 assisting Hopton in holding the Cornish-Devon border against the attempted incursions by Col. William Ruthin and Berkeley’s surety, the earl of Stamford. After a series of engagements, in which Berkeley had mixed fortunes, he helped Hopton inflict the decisive victory against Stamford at Stratton on 16 May, allowing the royalists to regain control of most of Devon.67Bellum Civile, 30-1, 33, 34, 42-3; Clarendon, Hist. ii. 456-7; iii. 70-1. Involved in the skirmish at Chewton in June, he then assisted at the siege of Exeter, and following the city’s surrender to Prince Maurice on 4 September, he was appointed as its governor.68Clarendon, Hist. iii. 86, 88, 126, 158-60; Col. Joseph Bampfield’s Apology, ed. J. Loftis and P.H. Hardacre (London and Toronto, 1993), 39-41; Cotton and Woolcombe, Gleanings, 93. The military duties were not onerous and Hyde considered that Berkeley became lazy and insufferably vain, although he did raise men and supplies from the surrounding area.69Four Portraits, 114; Devon RO, 3799-3, warrants of Devon commrs. of array, 1644; 1392 M/L 1644/43; 1392 M/L 1644/58; 1392 M/L 1644/10.

On 16 June 1644 Henrietta Maria gave birth to a daughter, Princess Henrietta, the future duchesse d’Orléans, at Berkeley’s headquarters, Bedford House. Berkeley was a witness when the child was baptised in the cathedral on 21 July, after the queen’s departure for France.70R. Izacke, Remarkable Antiquities of the City of Exeter (1681), 158; R. Norrington, My Dearest Minette (1996), 11-14. The princess and her small group of attendants spent the next two years at Exeter as part of Berkeley’s household. He later claimed that during this period he had lent the king and the prince of Wales a total of £10,000.71CSP Dom. 1675-6, p. 357.

In the spring of 1645 Berkeley supported Lord Goring (George Goring*) at the first siege of Taunton.72CCSP i. 259, 261, 262. Two months later he there again, and took over command of the second siege from a wounded Sir Richard Grenville†.73CSP Dom. 1644-5, p. 512; Clarendon, Hist. iv. 18-19, 20, 29. Arguments between the two men soon descended into an open feud.74CSP Dom. 1644-5, p. 480; Clarendon, Hist. iv. 19, 28, 29, 31, 69. This did much to poison relations within the circle around the prince of Wales, now the nominal royalist commander in the south west. When Berkeley was preferred over Grenville for the (unsuccessful) task of laying siege to Plymouth, Grenville resigned his commission in protest.75Clarendon, Hist. iv. 47, 61, 65; CCSP i. 270. When Sir Thomas Fairfax* threatened Exeter in October the city corporation presented £100 to Berkeley, probably as a contribution to efforts to resist an attack from the New Model army.76CCSP i. 283; HMC City of Exeter, 325. The attack did not materialise then, but the end came on 9 April 1646, when a by then very much exposed Berkeley accepted the inevitable and surrendered Exeter to Fairfax.77Som. RO, DD/BK/9/2/1d; Sir Thomas Fairfaxes Letter or Summons sent to Sir John Berkley (1646, E.330.20); The Agreement for the surrender of the City of Exeter (1646, E.333.7); A true Copy of the Articles Agreed on at the surrender of Exeter (1646, E.334.4); The Articles of Exeter (1647, E.416.6); CSP Dom. 1645-7, p. 416. Three months later he helped smuggle Princess Henrietta out of the country.78CCSP ii. 104; Norrington, My Dearest Minette, 17-21; CSP Dom. 1675-6, p. 357. He was subsequently able to join the queen in Paris.79Clarendon, Hist. iv. 232.

That Henrietta Maria liked and trusted Berkeley did much to shape his career in the years that followed. He was sent on missions to The Hague (May 1647) and then with John Ashburnham* to England to make contact with the army leadership, in the hope of encouraging them to deal with the king.80HMC Pepys, 206; A Narrative of John Ashburnham (1830), ii. pp. cxxxi-cxxxiii; Four Portraits, 115; Clarendon, Hist. iv. 232-3. He linked up with royalist agents including William Legge†, Sir Allen Apsley† and John Denham†.81Narrative of John Ashburnham, ii. pp. cxxxiii, cxxxix. His most useful contact on the parliamentarian side proved to be William Stane*.82Clarendon, Hist. iv. 271. After meetings were arranged with Oliver Cromwell*, Thomas Rainborowe* and Sir Hardress Waller*, Berkeley was allowed to speak with the king.83Narrative of John Ashburnham, ii. pp. cxl-cxli; Clarendon, Hist. iv. 233-4, 260. For the rest of 1647 Berkeley was the most senior royalist with direct access to Charles I, consistently advising him – in line with the queen’s intentions – to make at least some concessions. This was grounded in cynicism: Berkeley took it for granted that everyone was negotiating in equally bad faith. He subsequently claimed that, on being accused of being pro-Presbyterian, he had told Cromwell

I was as much Presbyterian as Independent; that I, as well as others, was inclined to think the better of them, because they pretended to mind the king’s restoration; but bid them be assured, that as soon as I should discover they were not real, I, and, I thought, all the king’s party, would join with any that would but dissemble better than they.84Narrative of John Ashburnham, ii. p. cxliii.

Yet, his willingness to talk to the army leadership did produce some results. He persuaded Henry Ireton* to make a number of adjustments to his draft of the Heads of Proposals, although he then failed to persuade the king to accept them.85Narrative of John Ashburnham, ii. pp. cxlv-cxlvi , cl-clv.

In what later became a long-running dispute, Berkeley always claimed to have played only a secondary role in the schemes for the king’s escape from captivity which (according to him) Ashburnham divulged to him in early November 1647.86Narrative of John Ashburnham, ii. pp. cl, clxiii-clxv. Clarendon was inclined to think that both had acted honourably but that they ought to have trusted each other more; he believed Berkeley’s claim that he had no advance warning except of the basic decision to escape.87Clarendon, Hist. iv. 266-72. Berkeley joined the king, Ashburnham and Legge on their flight from Hampton Court on 11 November.88Narrative of John Ashburnham, ii. p. clxiv; Clarendon, Hist. iv. 263; Memoirs of the Two last Years of the Reign of...King Charles I (1702), 37. Once it was decided to seek refuge on the Isle of Wight, he and Ashburnham were sent ahead to make contact with Robert Hammond*.89LJ ix. 525b; Narrative of John Ashburnham, ii. 112-17, clxviii-clxxv; Four Portraits, 116-17; Clarendon, Hist. iv. 264-5; Memoirs of the Two last Years, 160-1; Ludlow, Mems. i. 168-70. Neither man would ever quite live down the smear that they had thus handed their king back into the hands of his enemies.

The Commons responded to the news of the king’s arrival at Carisbrooke by ordering that Berkeley, Ashburnham and Legge be brought to London as delinquents.90CJ v. 356b, 359a. Hammond refused to go along with this, so Parliament let the matter drop.91CJ v. 366a; LJ ix. 537b, 538b-539a; HMC 6th Rep. 210, 211; Narrative of John Ashburnham, ii. p. clxxviii; Ludlow, Mems. i. 172. Sent by the king, with Hammond’s encouragement, to Windsor on 26 November with an offer to Fairfax for a personal treaty, Berkeley realised that the army council was even less sympathetic than before, and wrote advising Charles to flee once again; he saw the possibility of a deal with the Scots as a dangerous distraction.92Propositions from the Kings Majesty to his Excellency Sir Thomas Fairfax (1647, E.418.8); Narrative of John Ashburnham, ii. pp. clxxix-clxxx , clxxxiv, clxxxvii-clxxxviii. After spending time in London, he was recalled by the king to the Isle of Wight.93CCSP i. 401, 402; Narrative of John Ashburnham, ii. clxxxvi-clxxxvii. Another failed escape attempt, on 28 December, led Hammond to dismiss the king’s remaining servants, including Berkeley.94CCSP i. 407. Parliament then passed the Vote of No Addresses. Suspected by the Derby House Committee of planning yet another escape attempt, Berkeley and Ashburnham initially withdrew to Somerset, where they stayed with Berkeley’s brother, Sir Charles, at Bruton, and then sailed for France.95CSP Dom. 1648-9, p. 6, 7; A. Wyndham, Claustrum Regale Reseratum (1667), 24; CCSP i. 408; Clarendon, Hist. iv. 268.

After briefly serving with the French forces under the duc d’Enghien fighting the final campaign against the Spanish Netherlands in the Thirty Years’ War, by late July 1648, against James’s own wishes, Berkeley was appointed by Henrietta Maria as governor to the duke of York in the absence of Sir John Byron†.96CCSP, i. 428, 443, 449; ii. 21; HMC Pepys, 219, 221-2, 282, 224-5, 247, 262; Four Portraits, 117-18; Clarendon, Hist. iv. 328, 338-9, v. 225. That November he was with York during his brief excursion with the royalist fleet off the Dutch coast.97CCSP i. 445. During the latter half of 1649 he was part of York’s entourage on Jersey.98CCSP ii. 32; Royal Archives, SP/ADD/1/19: Charles II to Sir E. Walker, 15/25 Jan. 1650; S.E. Hoskins, Charles the Second in the Channel Islands (1854), ii. 315. By now he was convinced that the best chance of a restoration would be through an alliance with the Catholics and the Presbyterians.99CCSP ii. 32. On Byron’s return in 1650, he relinquished the governorship of York’s household, allegedly with much bad grace.100Four Portraits, 118; Clarendon, Hist. v. 164. That autumn Berkeley accompanied York from the Channel Islands to The Hague, before travelling on by himself to Paris.101CSP Dom. 1650, pp. 289, 320. There his ambition for office annoyed others at the exiled court, while his involvement in its political intrigues strained his long-standing friendship with Sir Edward Hyde*, who disliked his association with ‘men void of conscience, honour and honesty’ like Henry Jermyn, now Lord Jermyn.102Four Portraits, 119; Clarendon, Hist. v. 227-30; CCSP ii. 46, 48, 49, 65, 73, 76; CSP Dom. 1650, p. 482. In July 1651 Hyde offered candid advice on Berkeley’s proposed marriage to Lady Dalkeith, now dowager countess of Morton, and as late as 1657 Sir Henry Bennet† still viewed Berkeley and Hyde as close friends.103CCSP ii. 105, iii. 376. But Hyde’s reservations were to prevail when he set down the account which fixed Berkeley’s historical reputation.

In 1652, Berkeley once again became governor to the duke of York, with complete control over the prince’s meagre finances and increasing influence over him.104CCSP ii. 304; Clarendon, Hist. v. 247; TSP ii. 312; Add. 19399, f. 59; Dorset RO, D/FSI Box 267, acct. bk. of Charles II’s household expenses, 1659-60, unfol. He and Jermyn promoted the idea that York should marry the daughter of the prominent frondeur, the duc de Longueville.105Clarendon, Hist. v. 247-8. He then attended York as he served as an officer in the French army under Turenne, fighting once again against the Spanish in north-eastern France.106The Life of James the Second, ed. J.S. Clarke (1816), i. 54; Four Portraits, 118; Clarendon, Hist. v. 225-6. In May 1652 he saw action with the duke at the siege of Etampes.107Life of James the Second, i. 73 By the mid-1650s Berkeley, together with his nephew, Charles Berkeley†, was regarded as an ally of Jermyn in opposition to Hyde.108Life of James the Second, i. 275. Berkeley’s memoirs, with their criticism of Ashburnham, were already circulating in manuscript and made him further enemies among exiled royalists.109CSP Dom. 1657-8, p. 5. He had reconciled himself to the need to ‘find my subsistence on this side [of] the seas’, even if he still hoped that, in time, he would have ‘some other innocent retreat’.110TSP v. 104.

In September 1656, Charles appears to have taken steps towards dismissing Berkeley on the pretext that his strongly anti-Spanish views would not sit well in the companion of York in the Spanish Netherlands, but York ignored an order to leave him behind.111Life of James the Second, i. 276-7, 279-80; CCSP iii. 226, 227; TSP v. 131, 325; Four Portraits, 119-20. At about this time Berkeley dismissed a suggestion from Joseph Bampfield, acting as a spy for John Thurloe*, that York should marry one of Cromwell’s daughters.112TSP v. 511. York adhered to Berkeley in the face of continued disapproval from Charles, until the latter was forced to relent.113CCSP iii. 223, 225, 229, 237, 307; Letters of Elizabeth Queen of Bohemia ed. L.M. Baker (1953), 187; TSP v. 770; vi. 33, 57, 135, 304, 363; CSP Dom. 1656-7, p. 250; 1657-8, p. 147; Life of James the Second, i. 284-9, 292-3; Four Portraits, 120. By early 1658 there were rumours that, to satisfy York, the king would enoble Sir John.114Letters of Sir Robert Moray to the Earl of Kincardine, 1657-73, ed. D. Stevenson (Aldershot, 2007), 121; CSP Dom. 1657-8, pp. 259, 265; TSP vi. 730, 732, 733; Four Portraits, 120. In May, he became Baron Berkeley of Stratton.115CP ii. 148; CCSP iv. 127; Life of James the Second, i. 292-3; Eg. 2551, f. 7.

Berkeley returned to England in 1660 and received further rewards for his loyal service to the Stuarts. Charles II continued to be wary of him and, unlike his eldest brother, Berkeley was never given a court office of the first rank, but he became lord lieutenant of Ireland and ended his career with a couple of important diplomatic postings. The king’s friendship with with Berkeley’s nephew Sir Charles† was warm, and together the Berkeleys of Bruton became one of the pre-eminent court families of the 1660s and 1670s. Moreover, Berkeley left behind a more tangible memorial: after the Restoration he bought the plots of land to the north of Piccadilly became the site of Berkeley Square.116Johnson, Berkeley Square to Bond Street, 51-65. His peerage became extinct on the death of his grandson, the 5th baron (Hon. John Berkeley†), in 1773.