NORTON, Richard (1615-91), of Southwick, Hants.

By the early seventeenth century the Norton family was well established among the Hampshire elite and had a record of sending Members to Parliament. A younger son, Norton’s father was still of sufficient standing in the county to hold the shrievalty twice, and to be returned to Parliament four times in the 1620s, twice as a knight of the shire. Although Sir Daniel Norton† was not an active critic of the early Stuart monarchs, his Calvinism led him to oppose Arminian innovations in the church, and the claims made for the divine right of kings, and one of his daughters married the heir of Sir John Eliot†, arch-defender of and sufferer for the liberties of the subject in the 1628-9 Parliament.48HP Commons 1604-1629. With his friend, kinsman and fellow local puritan, Robert Wallop*, and Edward Tooker of Salisbury, Sir Daniel was a guardian of the young Sir Anthony Ashley Cooper*, who was educated in his household, perhaps by the same tutor who taught the slightly older Richard Norton.49HP Commons 1604-1629; CSP Dom. 1635-6, p. 323; Christie, Life of Shaftesbury, i. 12-13.

After education at Oxford and Gray’s Inn, in November 1634 Richard Norton obtained a pass to travel abroad.50Al. Ox.; G. Inn Admiss. 20; PC2/44, f. 140v. Nothing is known of his travels, but he had returned within two years. On 4 July 1636, still short of attaining his majority and beside Sir Daniel’s deathbed, he married by licence obtained the day before a daughter of Sir Walter Erle*, another prominent critic of Caroline policies.51Hants RO, 5M50/437. By this and by the choice of trustees like Wallop and John Kemp*, Sir Daniel established his young heir securely among like-minded puritan friends and protected him from what had proved negative financial consequences of commitment to the Eliots.52PROB11/173/256; WARD9/163, f. 74v. Land transactions of the later 1630s also drew in future parliamentarians William Jephson* and John Button* (as well as Sir William Uvedale*), while in 1639 a circle of alliance was completed when Richard Norton’s brother-in-law Thomas Erle* married Susanna, daughter of opposition peer William Fiennes†, 1st Viscount Saye and Sele; Susanna’s brother Nathaniel Fiennes I* had married a daughter of Sir John Eliot three years previously.53Hants RO, 5M50/377, 378. In contrast, Sir Daniel’s half-brother, Sir Richard Norton†, a future royalist, was not in evidence.

Public life and military service, 1640-5

Richard Norton was not returned to Parliament at either of the elections of 1640, although the fact that early in October 1640 he became a freeman of Portsmouth, the town his father had twice represented, hints at some long term political ambition.54Portsmouth RO, CE1/5, p. 39; Portsmouth Recs. ed. East, 352. He had been a burgess at Southampton since the age of 19, and was soon to be added to the Hampshire commission of the peace and named as a subsidy commissioner for the county.55Southampton RO, SC 3/1/1, f. 201v; C231/5, p. 431; SR. On 21 June 1642, by which time he was a deputy lieutenant, he was – like Wallop and Button – among the nucleus of activists who implemented Parliament’s Militia Ordinance.56LJ v. 156b.

For the duration of the first civil war Norton served Parliament primarily in the field. In August 1642 he signed the warrant for the arrest of the controversial Hampshire royalist Jeremy Brett and was among the combined brigade of horse and foot under Sir William Waller* which laid siege to Portsmouth, earning honourable mention in various accounts; in September he reported to John Pym* and Parliament’s commander-in-chief Robert Devereux, 3rd earl of Essex, news of its surrender.57I.o.W. RO, NBC45/16a, pp. 437-8; HMC Portland, i. 61; HMC 10th Rep. vi. 148-9; BHO, Cromwell Assoc. database; Hall and Barber, ‘Norton’s Horse’, 227; Exceeding joyfull newes (1642); A relation from Portsmouth (1642, E.116.15); An exact relation of foureteen dayes passages (1642, E.112.34). When on 28 November the king offered a pardon to his rebellious subjects in Hampshire, Norton was singled out with Sir William Waller* and Sir Thomas Jervoise* for exemption.58His Maiesties two proclamations (1642), 4 (E.129.11). By this time, with the valuable and sustained assistance of Richard Maijor*, Norton was engaged in raising his own regiment of horse; by the following summer it was at full strength.59BHO, Cromwell Assoc. database; Hall and Barber, ‘Norton’s Horse’, 228, 230; Add. 24860, ff. 9, 42, 45.

From the spring of 1643 Norton was also regularly included in ordinances for assessment and other purposes, having replaced Jervoise (in theory at least) on the committee for Hampshire, the substitution perhaps a sign of Norton’s militancy and Jervoise’s caution.60CJ iii. 36a, 48a. Norton’s forces appear to have supplied the muscle behind implementation of parliamentarian orders in the area and to have been around Southampton that June, but by 12 July, when the Commons ordered the committee at Portsmouth to instruct him to march to the assistance of Waller’s army in Wiltshire, his regiment already seems to have been on the move westwards.61Hall and Barber, ‘Norton’s Horse’, 230; CJ iii. 163b. Still a few miles distant when Waller suffered his disastrous defeat at Roundway Down on 14 July, Norton’s regiment seems to have escaped the fighting and beaten a hasty retreat.62Hall and Barber, ‘Norton’s Horse’, 230. The royalist newspaper Mercurius Aulicus described him as ‘the great incendiary’ of Hampshire, but asserted that he was prone to cowardice.63Mercurius Aulicus no. 29 (16-22 July 1643), 381 (E.63.2). Appointed on 25 July cavalry commander in the county under its (essentially civilian) lord lieutenant, Norton failed in an attempt to capture Basing, earning further scorn from Aulicus: having ‘hoped to find much spoil and little opposition (for to say truth he is a very valiant gentleman where he meets with no resistance)’, he was driven back by royalist forces, ‘plaguing and plundering all the country as they passed along’.64CJ iii. 177b; LJ vi. 8a; A Declaration and Ordinance 25 Julii 1643 (1643), 8; Mercurius Aulicus no. 31 (30 July-5 Aug. 1643), 416 (E.65.13); Hall and Barber, ‘Norton’s Horse’, 231. While it was conceded that Norton was ‘a man of as religious purposes’ as his father-in-law, Sir Walter Erle, he was also ‘one that knows as well how to run away’; he had ‘done such wonders of late days’, but was still under the domineering influence of his mother.65Mercurius Aulicus no. 33 (13-19 Aug. 1643), 441, 444. Edward Hyde*, on the other hand, spoke of ‘the known courage of Norton’ in reference to the following year.66Clarendon, History, iii. 413; Hall and Barber, ‘Norton’s Horse’, 239.

Among parliamentarians too Norton was probably a controversial figure. It seems that when in the autumn Parliament debated as a matter of urgency ‘the better securing’ of the key garrison of Portsmouth, Norton’s name was mooted but rejected (28 Oct.); John Fielder* was appointed interim governor while Wallop, Jervoise, Richard Whithed I* and John Lisle* (representing different local perspectives) conferred on the matter with Philip Wharton, 4th Baron Wharton.67Add. 18778, f. 77; CJ iii. 293a. However, Norton’s regiment had apparently acquitted itself reasonably well at the first battle of Newbury in September, and from its subsequent quarters at Southampton, where its presence came to reassure local partisans, achieved on 11 December a notable victory over royalist forces at Romsey; prisoners taken included Norton’s own younger brother Edward.68Hall and Barber, ‘Norton’s Horse’, 232. By a week later, when Richard Norton wrote to Speaker William Lenthall* to report the success, he had been made governor of Southampton and had imposed a vow and protestation upon its inhabitants, ‘which himself and most of the town had taken cheerfully’. He acknowledged that ‘some devilish spirits there are that have refused it’, but threatened to ‘pare their nails’.69CJ iii. 347b; Harl. 165, f. 251v; Bodl. Nalson VIII.138; HMC Portland, i. 164; Z. Grey, An Examination of the Hist. of the Puritans (1737), iii. app. pp. 2-4. The reading of the letter in the Commons on 20 December was accompanied by a commendation of the victory by the militant John Lisle and five days later a £300 advance on the funding for the garrison requested by Norton was ordered.70Harl. 165, f. 251v; CJ iii. 353a. However, having nominated him as sheriff of Hampshire on 30 December, the Commons withdrew assent to the appointment when it was rejected by the Lords on 17 January 1644.71CJ iii. 354b, 370b; LJ vi. 381b; Harl. 165, f. 279v; Add. 18779, ff. 37v, 46v. That this decision was also overturned at some point underlines its contentiousness.

As sheriff, Norton was committed to prosecuting the war within Hampshire. Alongside his petitions to Parliament for extra money and resources for the county and its forces was reporting of his successes against royalists, most notably – apart from his creditable contribution to the victory at Cheriton in March – the important role played by his troops in the early summer at the siege of Basing House.72CJ iii. 361a, 493a, 538a; Harl. 166, ff. 42v, 68v, 76; Halland and Barber, ‘Norton’s Horse’, 233-4; Newes from Southampton (1644, E.33.1); A Great Victory Obtained by Colonel Norton (1644, E.50.13); A Description of the Siege of Basing Castle (1644), 2-3 (E.27.5). But a conflict between the priorities of Norton and his friends on the county committee, and the exigencies of conducting the war nationally, as specifically reflected in the orders given to regional commander Sir William Waller, periodically came to a head, and although an ally on the Committee of Both Kingdoms, in the shape of Robert Wallop, helped to stall the reallocation of Norton’s troops, at least at first, it could not be prevented altogether.73CSP Dom. 1644, pp. 135, 136, 147, 149, 186, 202, 213, 218, 221, 226, 226, 238-9, 269, 272, 274, 278-9, 280, 286, 288-9, 297, 306-7, 309, 325, 327-8, 345, 348, 336, 342, 349, 352, 495, 469-7, 498, 516, 523; 1644-5, pp. 12, 285, 290; Ludlow, Mems. i. 94-5, 104; Halland and Barber, ‘Norton’s Horse’, 236. In November 1644, when the lifting of the siege of Basing was ordered to allow troops to be sent elsewhere, Norton and other parliamentarians in the county informed the Committee of Both Kingdoms that ‘our country is ruined by it, but we must submit our private to the public good’.74Harl. 166, ff. 166, 142a; CSP Dom. 1644-5, pp. 231, 234, 242, 278. Norton spent December and early January in Wiltshire before returning to Hampshire, fighting numerous skirmishes ultimately for little military gain, but Lisle and Sir Walter Erle addressed pay for his regiment in the Commons and Norton himself apparently made another friend serving in the spring of 1645 with Oliver Cromwell*.75Halland and Barber, ‘Norton’s Horse’, 237-8; CJ iv. 14a, 20a, 39a; CSP Dom. 1644-5, p. 290.

Norton probably supported efforts to reform the army from late 1644, being among those who gave evidence against the earl of Manchester.76CSP Dom. 1644-5, pp. 147, 159-60. On 10 May 1645 he was approved as governor of Portsmouth, for the garrison of which he was awarded substantial amounts of money (24 June, 5 Aug.), although he regarded such funds as insufficient.77LJ vii. 364a, 365a, 453a, 526a; CJ iv. 137b, 139b, 156a; Add. 18780, f. 17v, 18v; HMC Laing, i. 215. While diligent at his post, he also spent some time in London, deploying his contacts on the CBK (Wallop and even Lord Saye) and the threat of his resignation and mutiny among his men to pressurise the powers in Westminster and Whitehall for additional supplies, while Lisle and Richard Whithed I, a longstanding ally of Norton in Portsmouth affairs, advanced related interests in the Commons.78HMC 6th Rep. 58; CSP Dom. 1644-5, pp. 510, 515, 560; 1645-7, pp. 10-11, 18-19, 28, 40, 75, 77; HMC Portland, i. 242, 274; Add. 24860, f. 127; Add. 18780, f. 123; HMC 10th Rep. vi. 163; CJ iv. 168b, 173b, 220b. He also manoeuvred to secure the appointment as the new governor of Southampton of his former subordinate John St Barbe* rather than Edward Hooper*, stigmatising the latter as ‘a man of all England I least suspected that he should be proposed’, with a record of disinclination for action.79Add. 24860, f. 113. At first Hooper appeared to have prevailed, not least, according to Norton, because some regarded St Barbe as being ‘too near me’ and prefered ‘a stranger’ to his place-man, but eventually Hooper declined the post and Norton’s wishes triumphed.80Add. 24860, ff. 116, 125.

Norton was to the fore in dealing with the threat posed by the clubmen. Having met the ‘club commissioners’ in July 1645, he was convinced that their purposes were ‘principally self preservation from plunder and unauthorised levies of money’, and were based neither on ‘any principle’ nor on the ‘counsel or encouragement of our adverse party’. This led him to hope that the reduction of garrisons in the county would help resolve the situation.81Add. 24860, f. 133. Directed in September by the CBK to put down protest in other south eastern counties, he altered his view, however.82CJ iv. 279b; Add. 18780, f. 123; CSP Dom. 1645, pp. 131-2, 146. As he readied his troops to counter clubmen across the Hampshire-Sussex border, he reported that they represented ‘the last and most devilish plot that the enemies of God and good men have left them’; he hoped to hang the ringleaders.83CSP Dom. 1645-7, pp. 147-8, 151-3; HMC 10th Rep. vi. 163.

Recruiter MP, 1645-8

It was presumably on the basis of his staunch military record and his administrative experience, as well as by means of his Independent-leaning friends in the county and at Westminster, that Norton was elected a knight of the shire for Hampshire on 21 November 1645 to replace Robert Wallop’s father, Sir Henry Wallop*, who had died three years earlier.84CJ iv. 320a, 337a; C231/6, p. 30; Return of Members, i. 493. His presence in the House was first recorded on 31 December, when he took the Covenant.85CJ iv. 393a. Between then and 22 July 1646, when he obtained leave to go into the country, he received three committee appointments, two dealing with private petitions from Wiltshire MP Sir John Danvers* (12 Jan) and Sussex commander George Wither (18 May), and one to determine what were to be defined as ‘scandalous offences’ in the ordinance to curb them (3 June).86CJ iv. 403b, 550a, 563b, 623b. His stance on religious issues appears to have been Erastian. In March he relayed to Richard Maijor the news from Parliament that ‘we are now struggling for life about the Presbytery’. He approved Parliament’s declaration against the jure divino nature of Presbyterianism, and the decision of the Lords to declare the London Presbyterian petition a breach of privilege, alerted to the ‘nature of our brethren who would enforce all to submit to the Presbytery as they would have it established’, and hoped that Parliament’s resistance to such pressure would ‘produce a good effect in the city, and a little dash the wicked designs of some who I fear do endeavour to divide us’.87Add. 24860, f. 149. During this period Norton’s chief focus remained the needs of Portsmouth, however: he twice reported to the Commons the requirements of the garrison (Jan., 19 June), carried to the Lords an ordinance awarding £2,000 (15 Jan.), and otherwise occasionally appeared in the record in this connection.88CJ iv. 403b, 407b, 571b, 581a, 607b; LJ viii. 106a, 205a; SP46/108, f. 53.

Back at Westminster by 15 October 1646, Norton, who was added to the committee for privileges (16 Dec.), began to appear more frequently in the record and to display more interest in matters of national concern, albeit mainly military or religious.89CJ iv. 15a. As regards the latter, his committee nominations included those to consider the controversial book by the Independent preacher William Dell (12 Dec.), complaints about unlicensed preaching (31 Dec.) and the ordinance for the visitation of Oxford University (13 Jan. 1647).90CJ v. 10b, 35a, 51b. His membership of the committee drafting an ordinance confirming Dr Thomas Temple, previously ejected by the Westminster Assembly, in a new living, seems of a piece with his distaste for Presbyterian clericalism (13 Jan.).91CJ v. 52a; Al. Ox. With Maijor and John Hildesley*, in April Norton was responsible for appointing an Independent minister, Nathaniel Robinson, to the living of St Lawrence, Southampton.92Speed, Hist. Southampton, ed. Aubrey, 175-7; Calamy Revised, 413.

As previously, the Journal was punctuated with references to payments for the Portsmouth garrison (30 Nov. 1646, 18 Jan. 1647), but this time Norton was also appointed to investigate the claims of others to arrears, including to the committee for soldiers’ pay with regard to petitioning by the officers of Sir Edward Massie* (25 Dec.), and also to a committee on a naval matter (9 Jan. 1647).93CJ iv. 694b, 731b; v. 28b, 47a, 56b. Norton’s stance in the political conflict over disbanding the army and sending troops to Ireland is somewhat difficult to fathom. His associates in 1646 and 1647 included leading Presbyterians William Jephson (a friend from the 1630s) and Sir Philip Percivalle*, but his nomination on 2 April 1647 to the committee for the ordinance reforming the London militia cannot be taken as an indication that he shared their stance on it, since the committee’s composition was rather mixed.94HMC Egmont, i. 300, ii. 466, 469; CJ v. 132b, 169a, 188b. His inclusion on the committee for the safety of London in the face of the perceived threat from the New Model (11 June) is more suggestive, but even this was not the exclusive preserve of political Presbyterians, and Norton’s trip to Hampshire with Whithed in May to implement Parliament’s instructions to reassure the inhabitants of Portsmouth and Petersfield that mutineering sailors would be removed, may well have enhanced his appreciation of civilian anxieties.95CJ v. 207b. Perhaps more significant were his partnerships as a teller with Warwickshire activist William Purefoy* against Hampshire Presbyterian Sir William Lewis*, successfully opposing changes to the Warwickshire county committee (16 Nov. 1646), and with John Lisle for the sizeable majority who expressed their hostility towards the Scots by declining to consider whether to allow James Maxwell to go to Newcastle (12 Jan. 1647).96CJ iv. 722b; v. 50a.

After his nomination to the London safety committee on 11 June there is no sign of Norton at Westminster for two and half months. It is conceivable that during the Presbyterian coup and its overthrow by the New Model he retreated to Hampshire, either to avoid commitment to either side, or to protect local interests and the Portsmouth garrison from what might ensue. When he was next visible on 25 September, it was as a teller for the majority who opposed the impeachment of Alderman John Bide for his part in the coup, but this could just as well have arisen from a moderate’s desire for reconciliation as from Presbyterian partisanship.97CJ v. 317b. Added to a committee for the accounts of officers who had been paid off (1 Oct.), he was recorded as absent but excused at a call of the House on 9 October, and when he reappeared on 16 November it was as a teller with Sir Arthur Hesilrige* (who had been an opponent on 25 September) for the majority in favour of discussing the motion that Carisbrooke Castle was the safest place to lodge Charles I, against the wishes of radicals like Henry Marten*.98CJ v. 322a, 330a, 360a.

Ordered on 23 December to go to Hampshire to expedite the collection of assessments, he was not visible again at Westminster until mid-May.99CJ v. 400b. In the interim he was an intermediary in negotiations which eventually led to the marriage between Richard Cromwell* and a daughter of Richard Maijor. Correspondence from Oliver Cromwell is revealing both of a very cordial relationship after their service together and of Cromwell’s exasperation at ‘an idle fellow’, who neglected his responsibilities (or perhaps also failed to give consistent support to the Independents) at Westminster. Cromwell had heard

you are a man of great business, therefore I say no more: if it be a favour to the House of Commons to enjoy you, what is it to me? But, in good earnest, when will you ... be a little honest, and attend your charge? Surely some expect it, especially the good fellows who chose you.100Abbott, Writings and Speeches, i. 585, 590-2.

When Norton reappeared in the Commons on 18 May 1648, it was as a teller with Whithed in favour of prolonging the bail of the Catholic delinquent (and his antagonist at the siege of Basing House) John Paulet, 5th marquess of Winchester, a move that was defeated by hardliners.101CJ v. 564a. On the other hand, on 17 June he was a teller for the majority against obliging newly commissioned officers to take the Covenant, thwarting a Presbyterian initiative.102CJ v. 604a. That on the basis of such slight visible activity in the chamber or committee work – a nomination to address the very parochial question of the bishop of Winchester’s lease of Farnham manor (20 June) being his first since the previous October – Norton should be able to marshal fellow MPs into the lobby, indicates a well-connected individual who represented a significant body of opinion.103CJ v. 608a. That opinion appears to have been religiously tolerant and politically conciliatory.

Some time before 12 April 1648, when his mother Dame Honor Norton made her will, Norton’s wife Anne died.104PROB11/219/404. At a date unknown, but before mid-November that year, Norton remarried, to Elizabeth, daughter of his old connection Viscount Saye. As Saye’s position shifted towards negotiation with the king on the Isle of Wight, so, it seems, did Norton’s.105Mercurius Militaris no. 5 (14-21 Nov. 1648), 35 (E.473.8). On 10 July Norton was given leave to go into the country; although not stated in the Journal, his presence was required to help quell royalist insurgency.106CJ v. 630a. Acknowledging his report of the 18th from Portsmouth and his role in routing ‘distempered seamen’, the Derby House Committee observed ‘how great consequence it is to the affairs of the navy that the town be in safety’ and extorted him to remain in post.107SP21/24, f. 253. Norton had perhaps returned to Parliament by 11 August, when he was nominated to the committee to oversee the safety of Hampshire, and he was certainly present in the chamber on 3 October when, with Thomas Groves*, another moderate, he was teller for a narrow majority in a division over the Coventry militia, but he had had sufficient opportunity to observe developments at Newport at close quarters.108CJ v. 667a; vi. 42b; CSP Dom. 1648-9, p. 241. On 21 November it was reported in the radical press that Saye, one of the treaty commissioners, had returned from the Isle of Wight ‘a professed babe of court’, and that he had proposed himself as lord treasurer, his son Nathaniel Fiennes as secretary of state, and ‘his son-in-law Norton of the bedchamber’.109Mercurius Militaris no. 5, 35. On 25 November Norton was once more despatched to Hampshire to oversee assessments, but it was reported that on 2 December, ‘Dick Norton’, apparently appreciating, as arch-Presbyterian William Prynne* did not, the complex reality of the army threat to the treaty, moved in spite of threatened military duress to continue debating the king’s latest response to propositions while MPs were still free to do so.110CJ vi. 88a, 93a; Mercurius Pragmaticus no. 36-7 (5-12 Dec. 1648), sig. Ccc2v (E.476.2).

Pride’s Purge and the Rump

The motion was defeated, and four days later the army purged Parliament of its opponents. Although just over a decade later he was listed among those who had been secluded, when he had every reason to wish to be numbered with them, his name does not figure on the lists of victims compiled at the time.111A Full Declaration (1660), 55 (E.1013.22); Underdown, Pride’s Purge, 381. However, there is every likelihood he was an opponent of the regicide. In the months that followed he cemented his ties among those who occupied the political centre ground in Hampshire and beyond. His royalist brother Edward was, not unnaturally, a party to the settlements made on the marriages of himself and Elizabeth Fiennes, and his daughter Sarah and Richard Whithed’s son Henry Whithed† (from September 1652), while Norton in turn was a party to that for Nathaniel Fiennes and Frances Whithed in 1653.112Hants RO, 5M50/3385, 439, 1886, 2013-20. In June 1650 the Commons permitted one Mr May, Richard Norton’s brother-in-law, to visit him ‘as he pleases, notwithstanding the order against delinquents moved more than five miles from their abode’.113CJ vi. 428a. Oliver Cromwell, who following the accomplishment of his son Richard’s marriage to Dorothy Maijor in May 1649 remained apprised of the doings of this circle, seems to have sought the return of ‘idle Dick Norton’ to the Rump Parliament, perhaps as early as September 1650; he may also have considered appointing Norton to a military command in Ireland.114Abbott, Writings and Speeches, ii. 8, 236, 328; Ludlow, Mems. i. 247. Norton appeared in January 1651 on a list of those who might be readmitted, and although in April he was named as a possible royalist conspirator – an offence for which his uncle Sir Richard Norton had been arrested the previous December – the case seems have been dismissed by the council of state in May.115Salt Lib. MS 454 (Swynfen MS), no. 6; Abbott, Writings and Speeches, ii. 328; HMC Portland, i. 582; CSP Dom. 1650, p. 487; 1651, pp. 200, 227. Cromwell explained to Lord Wharton on 27 August his perspective that Norton and others had ‘helped one another to stumble at the dispensations of God, and to reason [them]selves out of his service’.116Abbott, Writings and Speeches, ii. 453.

Following the submission of Norton’s case to the committee for readmitting members on 17 October 1651, on a report from John Lisle that he had satisfied the necessary conditions he was given permission to attend the Commons on 26 November.117CJ vii. 29b, 44a. His attendance proved characteristically spasmodic. Of his ten committee nominations before the dissolution of the Rump, those concerning public business consisted of: two related to law reform (26 Dec. 1651; 12 Nov. 1652) one to the establishment of a high court of justice (1 Jan. 1652); and, least surprisingly, three related to the army and navy (26 Dec. 1651; 13 Aug., 4 Nov. 1652).118CJ vii. 58a, 58b, 62a, 164b, 210a, 215a. Of four nominations to consider private or individual petitions, two concerned connections of the Fiennes family (Sir Peter Temple*, 3 Feb. 1652; and James Temple*, 27 Jan. 1653), and one the widow of Sir Edward Hungerford* (18 Feb. 1653), a cause drawing in numerous interested gentry from south central England.119CJ vii. 79b, 93a, 251a, 260b. Norton’s military and naval expertise, probably regarded as useful during the Dutch war, may provide one explanation for his election to the council of state in November 1652. In the months which followed, however, he attended only 24 of a possible 121 meetings, naval matters probably consituting his over-riding concern.120CJ vii. 220a-b; CSP Dom. 1652-3, pp. 49, 63, 128, 137, 173.

1650s Parliaments

Norton plausibly owed his membership of the Nominated Parliament of 1653 to Cromwell’s influence rather than to the recommendation of one of the gathered congregations; he was awarded lodgings in Whitehall.121CSP Dom. 1653-4, p. 3. He received just two committee nominations, but they were important ones – Irish affairs (9 July) and the Army Committee (20 July).122CJ vii. 283b, 287b. Added to the council of state on 14 July, he attended a little under a third of the 75 meetings in July and August, when his interest was again dominated by naval matters and Anglo-Dutch relations.123CJ vii. 284b; CSP Dom. 1653-4, pp. 25, 26, 44, 52-3, 216-17. Although he attended only one meeting in September and October, he was appointed a commissioner to meet with the deputies from the United Provinces in late October, and he was re-elected to the council on 1 November.124CSP Dom. 1653-4, p. 223; CJ vii. 344a.

In the 1654 Parliament Norton once again sat for Hampshire. This time his committee appointments were slightly more varied, requiring in addition to review of the army and navy (26 Sept.), consideration of legal process for debtors (15 Sept.), the ordinance for the ejection of scandalous ministers (25 Sept.) and the corn trade (6 Oct.).125CJ vii. 368a, 370a, 370b, 374b. Like his brother-in-law, the recently rehabilitated and very active Nathaniel Fiennes, he probably supported the bill for the recognition of the government and the settlement of the government as a protectorate: on 24 November he was a teller with Jephson in a division on the issue, against two men who were probably opposed to the Cromwellian regime.126CJ vii. 370a, 390a. Presumably in recognition of his friendship with Cromwell, Norton was also named on one occasion (18 Sept.) to attend the Protector to seek approval for a draft declaration.127CJ vii. 368b. After 24 November, however, he made only one further appearance in the Journal – on 15 January 1655, when he was added, in connection with a particular petition, to the committee addressing the status of ordinances passed since the dissolution of the Rump.128CJ vii. 415b.

His support for the regime was also evident after the dissolution of Parliament, when he was involved in security measures in the aftermath of Penruddock’s rising.129CSP Dom. 1655, pp. 92-3. Other matters of local importance were also referred to his consideration, and before the end of October 1655 he was restored to his position as governor of Portsmouth.130CSP Dom. 1655, pp. 222, 391; 1655-6, p. 106. In November he was added to the non-parliamentary trade committee, and after the appointment of the major generals, Cromwell wrote to Norton – in a tone that seems a mite defensive (especially since he also enquired if Saye were staying with his son-in-law) – hoping his old friend would assist William Goffe* in his duties in Hampshire by lending his ‘countenance’: Goffe was ‘honest, so is his business, whosoever says to the contrary’.131CSP Dom. 1655-6, p. 1; Add. 4476, f. 244; Abbott, Writings and Speeches, iv. 25; HMC 3rd Rep. 195. In this, however, Norton declined to oblige, informing Goffe

I wish you prosperity in so good a work as securing the peace of the country which we shall all have reason to be thankful for. Could my presence be of any advantage I should venture to disappoint other expectations, but in this work I see no need of interest.132TSP iv. 239.

Goffe himself admitted that Norton had ‘a few scruples’, but perhaps further encouragement from Cromwell persuaded Norton to attend Goffe, and he evidently agreed to be nominated by the council as one of the commissioners for the security of the commonwealth in Hampshire.133TSP iv. 238, 329, 363. Goffe noted his presence at sessions of the peace in January 1656, and that March found him ‘zealous’ about encouraging measures for the reformation of manners.134TSP iv. 408, 582; CSP Dom. 1655-6, p. 381.

Thereafter, however, Goffe began to doubt Norton’s loyalty. In July he expressed concern that, as foreman of the grand jury, Norton had selected former royalists, and those who had been decimated, to serve on it. Among others of the ‘honest party’, Richard Cromwell*, Goffe claimed, was ‘very apprehensive of design in the foreman’. With regard to forthcoming elections, a particular worry that the grand jury should ‘have so great a sway in the choice of Parliament men as it is thought by some they will’, led Goffe to propose Norton and Cromwell ‘debate and agree their men before the day of choice, and [then] certainly they would carry without dispute’.135TSP v. 215. As to Goffe’s own pretensions, on 21 August the major-general reported that Norton had not thought ‘fit to put my name into any of the lists’ of potential candidates, although he had offered a sop: ‘I were better not be named than receive a baffle’ [rejection], and that if the sheriff would accept it, Norton would ‘endeavour for Portsmouth’ on Goffe’s behalf.136TSP v. 329. This may have been, and been seen as, a rather empty promise: in a letter of early September Goffe appeared to suggest that Norton, like Richard Cromwell, was not yet awake to the machinations of those in the county opposed to the regime.137TSP v. 397.

Norton himself was once again returned for the county to the 1656 Parliament. In its first week he was nominated the committees for privileges and for Irish affairs, but his only other appointment came in the brief second session – on university business (22 Jan. 1658).138CJ vii. 424a, 427a, 581b. He made no other visible contribution to proceedings.

By February-March 1658 correspondence between exiled royalists James Butler, 1st marquess of Ormond and Sir Edward Hyde* reveals that they considered Norton as among potential sympathisers to be cultivated; Sir John Arundel was reported to have approached him.139CCSP iv. 9, 24, 25, 28; Carte, Orig. Letters and Papers, ii. 125-6, 128. But at this point, if overtures were indeed made, Norton was unresponsive, or at least devious. On 8 March he wrote to John Thurloe* from Portsmouth, explaining previous silence by a disinclination to present ‘frivolous reports’ and presenting his ‘apprehensions’ (the ‘particulars’ of which he forbore to ‘trouble’ the secretary of state with) ‘that there is some intentions of troubles to come upon us’; he prayed that ‘the Lord divert them’, although the tone does not entirely exclude the possibility that Norton was covering his back.140TSP vi. 856; CSP Dom. 1658-9, p. 93. The royalists too soon came to find Norton a doubtful prospect. In particular, concluding that he would not act without support from Lord Saye, Ormond was wary of working with either man, perhaps partly because of their perceived determination to negotiate along the lines of the terms offered to Charles I at the Newport treaty; with Nathaniel Fiennes at the apex of the protectorate regime, he ‘did not think it prudence to put myself in the power of Lord Speaker Fiennes’ father and brother-in-law’.141Carte, Orig. Letters and Papers, ii. 130, 133-4; CCSP iv. 29; Carte, Life of Ormond, iii. 663-4; Bodl. Carte 57, ff. 248-9.

Norton was returned for a fifth time for his county to the 1659 Parliament. He was named to only two committees – for privileges (28 Jan.) and to investigate the alleged assault on Major-general William Packer (4 Mar.) – and played no recorded part in debates.142CJ vii. 594b, 610a. From an assembly where there were many covert royalists to pass on intelligence, Hyde heard in February that Norton had retreated from his support for the royal cause.143CCSP iv. 149

Suspected royalist, 1659-60

The fall of the protectorate of Richard Cromwell, regarded as Norton’s friend, appears to have altered royalist perceptions. Early in May hopes were raised that Norton was looking for a safe way in which to assist Charles, that his position of power at Portsmouth might be exploited, and even that Richard Cromwell would join him in conspiracy.144CCSP iv. 194, 200, 204; Clarendon SP, iii. 469-71; Mordaunt, Letter Book, 11, 15. However, alert to potential danger, in its first few days the restored Rump dismissed Norton as governor of Portsmouth; Nathaniel Whetham I* arrived there on 12 May to replace him.145CJ vii. 653a-b. According to the Memoirs of Edmund Ludlowe II*, who had served with Norton in Wiltshire in 1644-5, the latter informed him in a letter ‘soon after’ that he was ‘much disturbed’ by this and by suspicions as to his loyalty, and protested that he would be satisfied with ‘the settlement of an equal commonwealth’.146Ludlow, Mems. ii. 81. But as royalists awaited an opportune moment to approach him, Norton does not appear to have taken his seat in the Rump.147HMC 10th Rep. vi. 203. On 30 September he was fined £100 for failure to appear at a call of the House.148CJ vii. 790a.

In the meantime Norton had been ordered by the council of state to surrender to Sir Henry Mildmay* his offices in Holt and Woolmer forests, a loss hardly likely to endear the new regime to him.149CSP Dom. 1658-9, pp. 355, 361; 1659-60, p. 28. Unlike Wallop, he refused to support Sir Arthur Hesilrige*, Harbert Morley* and Valentine Wauton* when they secured Portsmouth for the civilian republicans in December, thereby facilitating the reassembly of the Rump at the end of the year.150Whitelocke, Diary, 548-9; Mercurius Politicus no. 602 (29 Dec. 1659-5 Jan. 1660), 994-5 (E.773. 39). When that body proved difficult to manage, and indeed hostile to radicals like Ludlowe, the latter recalled that ‘Colonel Norton in some passion saith to me, “You see into what a condition you have brought us”’. Ludlowe, according to his manuscript, retorted that his own ‘conscience did not accuse me in having been wanting in my duty for the preventing thereof’, but Norton allegedly ‘intimated’ that he should make sure he had a horse ready to flee from imminent danger of retribution.151Ludlowe, Voyce, 121.

That Norton was on occasion capable of forthright comment on the political situation, and had deeply-felt views, is apparently confirmed by a letter of 18 February 1660 from Dr William Denton to Sir Ralph Verney*. Denton had heard that when General George Moncke* had offered to ‘procure’ the readmission of the secluded Members to Parliament ‘if they would only promise not to bring in the king’, the response of ‘Dick Norton’ had been to tell Moncke ‘that freedom of Parliament was the just right and interest of the nation, and if they thought it fit to bring in the Turk, they ought not to be imposed on the contrary’.152Mems. of the Verney Fam. iii. 462. Three days later the secluded Members were readmitted and Norton reappeared in the Commons, being named that day to a committee regarding the creation of a new council of state.153CJ vii. 847b. Two days later he was a teller for the ensuing elections, and was himself chosen for the council, partaking of what Ludlowe termed its ‘vast powers’.154CJ vii. 849a-b. Thereafter, however, the only other mention of Norton in the Journal before the dissolution of Parliament in mid-March, was his nomination to the commission for the custody of the New Forest.155CJ vii. 856b.

Restoration

By 19 April Norton had been reinstalled as governor of Portsmouth, and he was apparently zealous in quelling the activities of ‘some fanatics’ in the neighbourhood.156CSP Dom. 1659-60, p. 548; CCSP iv. 623, 656, 671; Whitelocke, Diary, 587. Returned to the Convention for both Portsmouth and Hampshire, he opted to represent the county, and then sat in Parliament for one or the other for the next three decades, albeit as a relatively inconspicuous Member.157Portsmouth RO, PE1/1; CE1/7, pp. 138, 146; HP Commons 1660-1690; HP Commons 1690-1715. He also remained a powerful, and rather more active, figure within the county.158Add. 33278, f. 56; HMC 7th Rep. 420 Norton was said to have ‘made his peace’ with the royalists through the offices of Colonel William Legge†, a kinsman by marriage, but for all that he sought thereafter to avoid taking obvious political stances, was listed as a friend by Lord Wharton, and later allied with his childhood companion Anthony Ashley Cooper, now 1st earl of Shaftesbury, whom he reportedly told in 1676 that ‘the Church of England is the greatest schismatical church in the world’.159Evelyn Diary ed. De Beer, iv. 474; HMC 4th Rep. 231; Add. 41803, f. 335; Add. 41823, f. 116v; HMC Dartmouth, iii. 135. Reckoned by many to be a Presbyterian in religion, he sheltered an ejected minister in his house.160HMC Dartmouth, iii. 142; Calamy Revised, 370, 443; ‘Urian Oakes’, Oxford DNB.

Norton died in May 1691.161Luttrell, Brief Relation, ii. 238. Although none of his own sons sat in Parliament, his son-in-law (Sir) John St Barbe† (son of his former lieutenant) sat in 1681 and his grandson Richard Norton† sat for Hampshire from 1693 to 1700.162HP Commons 1660-1690; HP Commons 1690-1715.