BELLINGHAM, James (1623-50), of Over Levens, Heversham, Westmld.

In contrast to his father, James Bellingham sided unambiguously with Parliament during the first civil war – his allegiance probably influenced by his godly leanings (he was nominated to the Westmorland classis in 1646) and the apparently close ties he enjoyed with his uncle, Raphe Assheton I*, a leading figure among the Lancashire Presbyterians.14Supra, ‘Raphe Assheton I’; Musgrave, A Word to the Wise, 6; Shaw, Hist. Eng. Church, ii. 370, 371. In May 1644, he received a commission from the commander of Parliament’s northern army, Ferdinando, 2nd Baron Fairfax*, as a captain of horse, and in September he was commissioned as a colonel of foot. According to Fairfax, Bellingham ‘was in actual service’ between May 1644 and June 1645, ‘behaving himself faithfully and valiantly like a soldier of honour’.15SP28/267, f. 305. In October 1644, soon after the Scottish forces had invaded Westmorland, Richard Barwis* and the other parliamentary commissioners in the north included Bellingham among their nominees for appointment to the county bench.16HMC Portland, i. 186. He and his regiment served with Sir Wilfrid Lawson* and Thomas Cholmley* at the siege of Carlisle between September 1644 and June 1645.17SP16/507/33, f. 50; CSP Dom. 1644-5, p. 423.

Like many of the region’s leading parliamentarians, Bellingham was on bad terms with the Scots by mid-1645, and in June he helped to send down to Westminster complaints from Westmorland about the ‘taxings and drivings’ of the Scottish army.18SP16/507/118, f. 168; CSP Dom. 1644-5, pp. 575-6. These charges were enthusiastically endorsed by Barwis, Henry Darley* and other leading figures among the northern Independents in the Commons.19Supra, ‘Richard Barwis’; infra, ‘Henry Darley’. But then Bellingham had a change of heart, and by the autumn he was backing the Scots and the radical Cumberland pamphleteer John Musgrave in their allegations that Barwis, Lawson and their faction were protecting delinquents and stirring up anti-Scottish feeling. In September and again in November, Bellingham wrote to Musgrave, urging him to advise with his uncle Raphe Assheton I and Sir Thomas Widdrington* in the matter and declaring his willingness to assist the region’s ‘well-affected’ in seeking the removal of ‘such that pretend one thing and doth another ... for the Lord He knows too many we have at this day remaining in Westmorland and Cumberland’. Bellingham may also have tried to use his position on the Northern Association committee at York – of which he was an active member – to further the campaign against the Barwis-Lawson faction.20Bodl. Nalson IV, ff. 204, 214, 240, 246, 261; V, ff. 35, 97, 99; Musgrave, A Word to the Wise, 6, 11-12; Musgrave, Yet Another Word to the Wise (1646), 28 (E.355.25). He had evidently resumed his military career by the autumn of 1645, when he was serving as a lieutenant-colonel in one of the parliamentarian regiments in the north-west.21Musgrave, A Word to the Wise, 6, 11.

Bellingham was returned as a ‘recruiter’ for Westmorland early in 1646 in place of his father.22Supra, ‘Westmorland’. His election probably owed more to the strength of his family’s interest in the county than to his own as one of its leading parliamentarian gentlemen. He was only 22 years old at the time of his election, prompting John Musgrave to denounce him as ‘so young as he hath not any hair of [sic] his face’. As this unflattering description suggests, Musgrave quickly became disillusioned with Bellingham following the latter’s election. ‘When he came into the House’, claimed Musgrave, ‘he promised fairly but now begins to tread in his father’s track’.23J. Musgrave, A Fourth Word to the Wise (1647), 18 (E.391.9). In particular, Musgrave charged Bellingham with failure to stand by him once at Westminster (Musgrave having been imprisoned a few months earlier for contempt of parliamentary authority) and with refusing to inform the Commons how the Barwis-Lawson faction had packed the committee of accounts for Westmorland and Cumberland with delinquents.24Musgrave, A Fourth Word to the Wise, 17-18.

In fact, there is little evidence to suggest that Bellingham attended the House with sufficient regularity to make an effective partisan in any cause. His first mention in the Commons Journal after his election in January was not until 24 June 1646, when he took the Covenant.25CJ iv. 586a. On 9 July, he was granted leave of absence and seems to have remained away from Parliament until at least 9 October 1647, when he was declared absent at the call of the House.26CJ iv. 610a; v. 330b. His nomination on 23 December 1647 as a commissioner for Westmorland to supervise the collection of the county’s assessment suggests that he was seen as trustworthy by the Commons and the Independents (Barwis was assigned this same task for Cumberland).27CJ v. 400b. A similar construction can be put upon his appointment on 25 April 1648 to employ his best endeavours in Westmorland for the preservation of the county in its allegiance to Parliament.28CJ v. 544b. Bellingham proved decidedly the wrong choice for this assignment, however, for at some point during the summer of 1648, he and his father threw in their lot with Sir Philip Musgrave* and the Scottish Engagers under James Hamilton, 1st duke of Hamilton. Bellingham’s reasons for defecting to the king’s party are not clear. His kinsmen, the Asshetons, remained loyal to Parliament, while his father justified his involvement with the Engagers purely out of a desire to preserve his estate from plunder.29SP23/197, p. 438. James, however, offered no such excuse.

Declared absent at the call of the House on 26 September, Bellingham was not excused, on the grounds that he was ‘doing ill services’ in the north.30Worcester Coll. Oxf. Clarke ms CXIV, f. 88; CJ vi. 34a. He remained in arms against Parliament until 9 October 1648, when he was among a large number of Sir Philip Musgrave’s officers who surrendered at Appleby Castle (contradicting a report that Bellingham and his father had taken ship for the Isle of Man late in September).31Alnwick, X.II.3, box 7, j: W. Penington to Hugh Potter*, 6 Oct. 1648; Lancs. Civil War Tracts, 275. Although his political record would have identified him as an enemy of the New Model army and their political allies, there seems no contemporary evidence to confirm that he was among those Members secluded at Pride’s Purge in December.32Underdown, Pride’s Purge, 367. He petitioned to compound in May 1649 and was fined at a third of his estate – that is, £200.33SP23/111, p. 101; CCC 1136-7.

Bellingham died on 26 October 1650, a few days after his father, and probably of the same sickness.34SP23/253, f. 100; CCC 1137. His place and date of burial are not known. He died childless and, by a nuncupative will, left all his estate to his wife.35PROB11/216, f. 187.