A walk in Bath

When you’re travelling and you’ve set up a comfortable base somewhere it is tempting to make short excursions from it, to go off exploring somewhere else. Of course the alternative is to look around you, where you are already. On Tuesday 7 May, still in Bath, we made an effort to explore the city where we were staying.

Charlotte and I first visited the Roman Baths and the museum associated with it. For no extra money we got the company of crowds of French schoolchildren. The Baths I’d seen before; the Museum, was new to me. It says much for how thoroughly I enjoyed it that I didn’t particularly mind the noisy school children.

We tried tasting the pump water. No good. Very healthy, I’m sure, but I think I’m quite healthy enough already without the added 43 minerals in my drinking water.

The New Assembly Rooms, our next destination, was a long walk up a steep hill. Some of my forebears had themselves carried there in sedan chairs. A fine idea, but my normal retinue doesn’t include a pair of chair men, so we had to foot it. Part of the reward for making the ascent was a look at a Gainsborough portrait of one of my relatives, Captain William Wade who, for a time, was the Bath Master of Ceremonies. He was put in the shade, so to speak, by a pair of magnificent chandeliers, said to be insured for many millions of pounds.

After lunch we went to Bath Abbey, where an organ concert was in progress. Listening to this gave me time to sit quietly and gaze about. The fan vaulting and the east window are particularly wonderful.

Then we walked back up the hill to the Circus, to the Crescent and to Portland Place, all marvellous examples of Georgian architecture. 5 Portland Place was built by my (appropriately) 5th great grandfather Philip Champion Crespigny in 1786. He died there in 1803. The steps in front of 5 Portland Place had – and it’s still there – a ramp for the sedan chairs.

Back down to the Assembly Rooms again to visit the Fashion Museum and then on to the Victoria Art Gallery.

We came home via Pulteney Bridge over the River Avon, designed by Robert Adam and built by William Pulteney né Johnstone (1729 – 1805), one of my 7th great uncles. I’m glad he put it there. After all my walking I didn’t want to have to swim.

We bought some Bath buns to have with tea.

 

A spa in Bath and visit to Clifton

We were staying in Bath. One of its attractions is the Thermae Bath Spa, built on the site of the Roman baths, and supplied, as were the Roman baths, by warm spring water.

On Sunday Charlotte and I walked down Widcombe Hill and across the River Avon to the Spa for what we expected would be a nice hot plunge. The spa opens at nine o’clock. We arrived at ten past. This meant a queue – the English queue for everything – and so we stood in line for an hour waiting for a change room.

Why hadn’t we booked? You can’t, except for special treatments. And we couldn’t leave the queue for a cup of coffee because we’d have lost our place.

At £40 each I expected something better, but perhaps the Sunday of a Bank holiday weekend in May was not a good time to go. Oh well, the rooftop pool was fun.

The rooftop pool at the Thermae Bath Spa photographed in 2010 from Bath Abbey – image from Wikipedia; photograph by user:Simple Bob CC by 2.0

The Cross Bath adjacent to the Thermal Bath Spa

Looking down Bath Street toward the South Colonnade entrance of the Grand Pump Room. Bath was almost deserted on the Sunday morning except for the queue at the Thermal Bath Spa.

In the afternoon we drove to look at the Clifton Suspension Bridge (designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, completed after his death) near Bristol.

Nearby in Clifton, we found the house of John James (1808 – 1855), the first husband my 3rd great grandmother Charlotte Dana.

John James divorced Charlotte in 1849. At the time of the 1851 census he was living with his mother, brother, and daughter Constance aged 10, at 24 The Mall, Clifton. They had 4 live-in servants. The house overlooks a pretty garden, where I imagine Constance played.

1851 English census Class: HO107; Piece: 1952; Folio: 383;Page: 33; GSU roll: 87352 retrieved through ancestry.com

24 The Mall Clifton

The Mall Gardens, Clifton , Gloucestershire

G is for Gainsborough

Captain William Wade by Thomas Gainsborough. Image retrieved through https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/captain-william-wade-40008

William Wade, born about 1733, was the great nephew of Field-Marshal George Wade (1673 – 1748), best remembered as the builder of military roads in Scotland and as a long-time member of Parliament for Bath. William Wade, sometimes incorrectly stated to be one of the illegitimate sons of the Field Marshall, is named in George Wade’s 1747 will as the son of George Wade’s nephew Major Wade.

I am distantly related to William Wade: he was the father-in-law of my fifth great uncle Philip Champion Crespigny.

William Wade was educated at the Westminster School and then had a career in the army.

In December 1760 he married Catherine Gore, daughter of Henry Gore of Leatherhead, Surrey. William and Catherine had at least four children, three daughters and a son.

In April 1769, William Wade, at that time holding the rank of Captain, was elected Master of Ceremonies at Bath. Beau Nash (1674 – 1761) was his most notable predecessor in the position. Nash’s place there was unofficial but he met visitors to Bath, encouraged them to subscribe to the Assembly Rooms and kept the peace by enforcing the rules there. Nash made money by sharing in the receipts from the subscriptions and the benefit balls. By the time Wade was appointed, the position was by the election of subscribers of the Assembly Rooms and a salary was paid to the holder of the position from the proceeds of the benefit balls.

Female intrepidity, or the battle of the belles on ye election of a King of Bath. May 1769. Etching. Credit: Wellcome Collection. CC BY 4.0. Image retrieved from https://wellcomecollection.org/works/qkyn4etc

The season at Bath ran from October to May. Patronised by the Prince of Wales, Brighton also became a fashionable summer resort, known for sea bathing. Since the social seasons of Bath and Brighton did not overlap, Wade was able to occupy positions in both places; he held the post of Master of Ceremonies at Brighton from 1767.

At Bath, the Lower Assembly Rooms were built in the early 1700s. The Upper Assembly Rooms, which had four rooms: the Ball Room, the Tea or Concert Room, the Octagon Room (which links the rooms together), and the Card Room, were built between 1769 and 1771. William Wade presided over the ball conducted to open the new Rooms.

The Octagon Room began life as a card room, where people gathered at tables to play whist and other games of chance. At the centre of the room is a particularly spectacular Whitefriars crystal chandelier, the largest in the building. It was made in 1771 and has 48 lights, originally candles.

Octagon Room, Bath Assembly Rooms photographed by Glitzy queen00 at English Wikipedia (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Octagon_Room.jpg), CC BY-SA 3.0

Chandelier in the Octagon Room, Bath Assembly Rooms. Photograph by Heather Cowper who blogs at www.heatheronhertravels.com/ retrieved from Wikimedia Commons, originally uploaded to https://www.flickr.com/photos/heatheronhertravels/4547807786 CC by 2.0

In 1771 Thomas Gainsborough, then living in the Circus at Bath, painted a portrait of Captain William Wade as a present to the new Assembly Rooms. This picture of the first Master of Ceremonies at the Assembly Rooms was hung in the Octagon Room, and hangs there again today. The portrait includes his badge of office, a gold medal enamelled blue worn on an indigo ribbon.

In 1777 Captain Wade was named in divorce proceedings between John Campbell Hooke Esq and Elizabeth Eustatia Campbell Hooke nee Bassett.

Wade lost the position of Master of Ceremonies at Bath as a consequence of the scandal but continued as Master of Ceremonies at Brighton.

Henry Gore, the father of Catherine Wade nee Gore, died in 1777. He left his estates to his son-in-law William and daughter Catherine. These estates included the Mansion at Leatherhead, Surrey, 47 miles north of Brighton and close to one of the main routes from London to Brighton. William Wade would have found the residence conveniently close to Brighton for his duties there.

Following the death of Catherine Wade nee Gore on 26 April 1787 William Wade married Elizabeth Eustatia Bassett, a ‘single woman’, by licence on 30 June 1787. They had already had a daughter together, Georgina Dennison Bassett Wade, who was born in 1783 or possibly as early as 1777. (The index of her death in 1863 said she was 86 when she died and thus born 1777; the census of 1851 gives her age as 68 and thus born 1783.) Georgina was mentioned in her father’s will.

William Wade’s son, Henry Gore Wade, died at sea in 1814. William’s three daughters by Catherine Gore shared in the estate. One of the daughters, Emilia, married Philip Champion Crespigny (1765 – 1851). Philip and Emilia lived in the Mansion at Leatherhead after Henry Gore Wade’s death. Emilia died in 1832.

In his role of Master of Ceremonies at Bath he would possibly have met my 5th great grandfather Philip Champion Crespigny (1738 – 1803), who built his house there in 1786.

Related posts

• Philip de Crespigny in the French Revolution
• Deaths at sea

Sources and further reading

• Dodgson, Stephen. “THE BABE OF TANGIER: AN ENQUIRY INTO THE LIFE AND CIRCLE OF GENERAL GEORGE WADE.” Journal of the Society for Army Historical Research, vol. 82, no. 330, 2004, pp. 109–131. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/44231055.
• Sloman, Susan Legouix, ‘The Immaculate Capt. Wade’, Gainsborough’s House Review 1993/4 (1994): 46 – 62 retrieved through University of Melbourne library
• John Eglin (2005). The Imaginary Autocrat: Beau Nash and the Invention of Bath. Profile Books. pp. 241-2. Retrieved through Google books.
• THE GENTLEMAN’S MAGAZINE, AND HIFTORICAL CHRONICLE. VOLUME XXXIX. 1769 p. 213.
• ‘The borough of Brighton’, in A History of the County of Sussex: Volume 7, the Rape of Lewes, ed. L F Salzman (London, 1940), pp. 244-263. British History Online http://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/sussex/vol7/pp244-263 [accessed 19 March 2019].
• Rendell, Mike. “The Bath Adonis – a Man in a Gorgeous Waistcoat – and a Penchant for Married Women…” Georgian Gentlemen, Mike Rendell, 10 Feb. 2019, mikerendell.com/the-bath-adonis-a-man-in-a-gorgeous-waistcoat-and-a-penchant-for-married-women/.
• Trials for Adultery, Or, The History of Divorces. The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd. pp. 26–35. Republished by the Lawbook Exchange in 2006 and viewed through Google Books
• https://www.fashionmuseum.co.uk/works-art
• https://thebathmagazine.co.uk/let-me-entertain-you/
• https://thebathmagazine.co.uk/thomas-gainsborough-making-ugly-people-beautiful/

Philip Champion de Crespigny (1738 – 1803)

Philip Champion de Crespigny (1738 – 1803) was my fifth great grandfather (5*great).

Philip Champion de Crespigny (1738–1803), MP by John Opie; Oil on canvas, 47 x 36 cm Collection: Kelmarsh Hall. Image retrieved from http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/yourpaintings/paintings/philip-champion-de-crespigny-17381803-mp-49154

Philip was the fifth of seven children of Philip (1704-1765) and his wife Anne née Fonnereau.  He was born on 1 April at his father’s house at Doctors Commons in London. He was christened on 11 April at St Benets, Pauls Wharf. Philip senior was Marshall of the Court of Admiralty and Secretary of the French Hospital.

Extract from 18th century plan of Plan of Baynards Castle Ward & Faringdon Ward Within retrieved from http://www.londonancestor.com/maps/baynards.htm

In 1741 the family moved to Denmark Hill, Camberwell where Philip senior had taken a lease of a house and sixteen acres.

Philip’s older brother Claude (1734 – 1818) was educated at Eton and it is likely that Philip was also. (http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1754-1790/member/crespigny-philip-champion-1803 )

In 1759 at the age of twenty-one, Philip became an advocate at Doctors’ Commons and was King’s Proctor from 1768  to 1784.  (http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1754-1790/member/crespigny-philip-champion-1803 )  

A proctor was a legal practitioner in the ecclesiastical and admiralty courts. A King’s Proctor acted in all causes concerning the King. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proctor) Doctors’ Commons, also called the College of Civilians, was a society of lawyers practising civil law in London. The proctors, who were also associated with Doctors’ Commons, were like present-day common law solicitors. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctors%27_Commons)

Marriages and children

Philip married four times. On 24 November 1762 Philip married Sarah Cocksedge in Norfolk. They married by licence; this licence was issued on 11 November.  Sarah and Philip had four children:

• Thomas (1763 1799)
• Philip (1765 – 1851)
• Jane (1766 – 1785)
• Anne (1768 – 1844)

Sarah died in April 1768 and was buried at St Marylebone on 13 April 1768. (‘Marylebone’, The Environs of London: volume 3: County of Middlesex (1795), pp. 242-279. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=45438 Date accessed: 27 January 2014.)

Sarah was the daughter of Thomas Henry and Lydia Cocksedge. In 1764 title of Tottington manor passed to Philip as husband of Sarah.(Deeds of messuage held by Norfolk Record Office http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/a2a/records.aspx?cat=153-wls&cid=23-19#23-19) Philip probably sold his Norfolk holdings in 1772 as recorded in a private act of Parliament: Philip Champion Crespigny’s estate: sale of hereditaments in Weeting (Norfolk) and purchase and settling others. (http://www.legislation.gov.uk/cy/changes/chron-tables/private/17)

Philip’s second marriage was to Betsy Hodges in about 1771.  Betsy was the widow of George Borradale whom she had married in 1765 (Parish Records Collection – marriage 1765 Hodges Borradale) Philip and Betsy had one son, Charles (1772 – 1774) who was christened 1 June 1772 in St Giles, Camberwell, and buried 21 October 1774 in the Church of St Albans. Betsy died in 1772, probably not long after giving birth to her son.  She was buried at St Marylebone on 22 May 1772.

Betsy Hodges (d.1772), Second Wife of Philip Champion de Crespigny by George Romney(circle of) Oil on canvas, 75 x 62 cm Collection: Kelmarsh Hall retrieved from http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/yourpaintings/paintings/betsy-hodges-d-1772-second-wife-of-philip-champion-de-cres49163

Philip’s third marriage was to Clarissa, daughter of James Brook of Rathbone Place. They married on 1 July 1774 at St Marylebone by licence with the consent of her father. She was a minor, of the parish of St Marylebone. Philip was recorded as an Esquire of Walton upon Thames, County of Surry, widower. He signed his name PC Crespigny. The witnesses were James Brooke and Hester Brooke.

The Gentleman’s Magazine London, England July, 1774 retrieved from http://theoldentimes.com/crespignybrooke74uk.html

 Clarissa and Philip had four children:

• Clarissa (about 1775 – 1836) who married Edward Toker
• Maria (1776 – 1858) who married John Horsley
• Harry (1777 – ?) baptised 14 August 1777 at Walton-upon-Thames, Surrey and presumably died young
• Fanny (1779 – 1865)

Clarissa and her children were painted in 1780 by George Romney.  Romney’s diary notes that the painting was oval and he charged fifty pounds.  In 1780 Horace Walpole apparently noted George Romney’s “rise to fashion”. (http://www.npg.org.uk/whatson/exhibitions/2002/george-romney/biography.php)

Clarissa Champion de Crespigny and her children by George Romney. The painting was last sold in 1986 from a private seller to a private buyer through the London dealers Leger Galleries.  This image is from a reproduction of the painting and came from Alex Kidson, Research Fellow of the Romney Society.

Clarissa died in 1782 and was buried at St Marylebone on 22 May. She was about twenty-seven years old. A short biographical piece about her father refers to her as an amiable and accomplished lady who died in the prime of her life.

Smith, Thomas. (2013). A Topographical and Historical Account of the Parish of St. Mary-Le-Bone, Comprising a Copious Description of Its Public Buildings, Antiquities, Schools, Charitable Endowments, Sources of Public Amusement, &c. London: Forgotten Books. (Original work published 1833)retrieved from http://www.forgottenbooks.org/books/A_Topographical_and_Historical_Account_of_the_Parish_of_St_1000735867 The same obituary appeared elsewhere, for example in the Hampshire Chronicle of 2 November 1807.

Philip’s fourth marriage was in 1783 to Dorothy Scott (1765 – 1837), daughter of Richard Scott of Betton Strange Hall near Shrewsbury. (London Magazine vol 52 pg 103 1783)

Jonathan Scott (1754 – 1829), one of Dorothy’s brothers,  was an early translator of what was then called ‘The Arabian Nights Entertainment’, better known now as ‘The 1001 Nights’. (http://shrewsburylocalhistory.org.uk/scott.htm)

Dorothy and Philip had four children

• George (1783 – 1813) killed in Spain
• Eliza (1784 – 1831) who married the first Lord Vivian having eloped to Gretna Green (Ancestry.com. Gretna Green, Scotland, Marriage Registers, 1794-1895 [database on-line].)
•  Charles Fox (1785 – 1875) my fourth great grandfather
• Dorothea (1800 – 1800) born and died in Bath (I am not sure where I have the information for this child, I am unable to find any records associated with her and it seems surprising that she was born so many years after her siblings, though her mother did have a child after 1804 following her second marriage).

After Philip’s death Dorothy married again to Sir John Keane (1757 – 1829) and had a son, George Michael Keane.

Dorothy’s portrait was painted by George Romney in 1790 with Romney’s diary noting “1790 Wed 17 March Mrs Chrspaney at 1/2 pt 2”. He charge forty-two pounds for the oil on canvas. Dorothy’s great grandson George Harrison Champion de Crespigny (1863 – 1945) sold the painting through Christies on 27 April 1901 for ₤5,880-00. (“HIGH PRICES FOR PICTURES AND ENGRAVINGS.” Otago Witness 3 July 1901: 75. Papers Past — Otago Witness. National Library of New Zealand. Web. 27 Jan. 2014. <http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=OW19010703.2.234.1>) The painting is now in the John Howard McFadden Collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. (http://www.philamuseum.org/collections/permanent/103821.html)

Portrait of Mrs. Champion de Crespigny [née Dorothy Scott] from http://www.philamuseum.org/collections/permanent/103821.html

 Parliamentary career

In 1774 Crespigny was returned on the Fonnereau interest at Sudbury after a contest, but lost his seat on petition. (Drummond, Mary M. “CRESPIGNY, Philip Champion (d.1803), of Burwood, Nr. Cobham, Surr.” The History of Parliament: The House of Commons 1754-1790, 1964. Member Biographies from The History of Parliament Online. Web. 28 Jan. 2014. <http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1754-1790/member/crespigny-philip-champion-1803>.)

Philip’s mother was  the daughter of Claude Fonnereau, a wealthy merchant. Her brother,and thus Philip’s uncle,  Thomas Fonnereau (1699 – 1779) was returned for Sudbury in 1741 and sat for that consituency until 1768. Several of those years were in conjunction with Thomas Walpole who was a business connection. Thomas later sat for Aldeburgh from 1773 until his death in 1779. (Namier, Sir Lewis. “FONNEREAU, Thomas (1699-1779), of Ipswich, Suff.” The History of Parliament: The House of Commons 1754-1790, 1964. Web. 28 Jan. 2014. <http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1754-1790/member/fonnereau-thomas-1699-1779>.) (Thomas Fonnereau. (2013, December 23). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 01:03, January 28, 2014, from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Thomas_Fonnereau&oldid=587412088)

In 1780 Philip was returned unopposed at Aldeburgh on the Fonnereau interest, and at Sudbury after a contest. He held both seats until 1781 when he lost Sudbury on petition, and continued to sit for Aldeburgh until 1790.

Only one speech is recorded from Philip when he spoke in 1781 against the bill for excluding contractors from the House of Commons.

Extract from the debate in the House of Commons (Debrett, ii. 296.) retrieved from Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. The Parliamentary Register: Or, History of the Proceedings and Debates of the House of Commons. Vol. 2. page 296.: J. Debrett, 1781. Google Books. 2007. Web. 28 Jan. 2014. <http://books.google.com.au/books?id=1-kMAAAAYAAJ>.

The exclusion of contractors from the House of Commons was first introduced in 1779 and was part of political reform receiving an impetus from the American Revolution. The bill finally passed at the end of 1782 and it placed on the exclusion list anybody who had a contract with the treasury, the navy, the victualling office, the master-general, or the board of ordinance, …  Before this reform, “the fact that a man had a contract with the Government laid him under the necessity of receiving orders from the Treasury as to his political conduct.”  George III was said to turn all government expenditures to political account and “maintained a corps of subservient members in the House of Commons”. Vast sums were disbursed to contractors for the navy and army between 1770 and 1782 which some asserted were an abuse of the contract process and designed to buy political support. (Porritt, Edward. The Unreformed House of Commons. : Cambridge UP, 1963. Google Books. CUP Archive. Web. 29 Jan. 2014. <books.google.com.au/books?id=57c8AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA219>. pages 219-220)

 Philip supported the administration of Lord North who was prime-minister from 1770-1782 and who later served in a coalition, the Fox-North coalition, with Charles James Fox in 1783. Philip named his youngest son, Charles James Fox Champion de crespigny,  after Charles James Fox.

Houses

Philip died in his house at 5 Portland Place, Bath.  The house is one of ten symmetrical terrace houses built in 1786 by John Eveleigh. Number 5 is the largest house in the terrace and was built for P. C. Crespigny. 

Portland Place, Bath image from Google street view http://goo.gl/maps/seYvj. Number 5 is the house centred on the triangular pediment.  It has five windows across and a central front door. Its neighbours’ front doors are aligned either to the left or the right. To the front of the house is a ramp which was provided for easier access by sedan chairs.

The house together with number 4 was converted into a school from 1875 until 1994. In 1994 both houses were converted to flats. The house, together with its neighbours, is Grade II heritage listed.  (“List Entry: 1-10, PORTLAND PLACE.” National Heritage Protection Plan. English Heritage, 15 Oct. 2010. Web. 29 Jan. 2014. <http://list.english-heritage.org.uk/resultsingle.aspx?uid=1394403>.)

Philip de Crespigny leased Hintleham Hall near Ipswich in Suffolk. His children George, Eliza, and Charles were born there between 1783 and 1785. In 1785 his daughter Jane died at Hintlesham Hall. At that time Hintlesham Hall was owned by Richard Lloyd, a political lawyer who became Solicitor-General.(http://www.hintleshamhall.co.uk/history.html)

In 1794 Philip de Crespigny bought Talyllyn  House and the Manor of Llangasty Talyllyn in Breconshire together with 2000 acres for £1600. In the advertisement for the sale the house was described as “a good old stone built and slated Mansion House… to which the present Proprietor meant to have added a regular Building” While owned by the de Crespignys, the house and outbuildings were extensively remodelled.  From 1810 the estate was leased as a farm. It was sold in 1838 by Philip’s son Charles Fox de Crespigny. Philip and his son Charles both served as High Sheriff of Brecknockshire or Breconshire, Philip in 1796 and Charles in 1812. The house was destroyed in the nineteenth century. (“History of the Farm.” Tŷ-Mawr. Tŷ-Mawr Lime Ltd, n.d. Web. 29 Jan. 2014. <http://www.lime.org.uk/history-of-the-farm/>.)

Tal-y-llyn: St. Mary’s church and the hamlet at the end of the lake, photograph about 1885. Image retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tal-y-llyn,_Gwynedd

Other land purchases by Philip include Creeting All Saints in Surrey bought from the Bridgeman family. (http://forebears.co.uk/england/suffolk/creeting-st-olave)

Freemason

Philip was a Freemason. In 1781 he was Grand Steward for Somerset House Lodge. (http://www.phoenixmasonry.org/prestonian_lectures_volume_3.htm)