Northbourne Court

( 96 ) NORTHBOURNE COURT. BY LORD NORTHBOURNE. JOHN MEECEE, writing to Sylvanus Urban in the Gentleman's Magazine from Deal on 2 September 1802, ohserves of his estate " that you here behold the remains of a once splendid and magnificent palace, after being for a long- succession of centuries past the property and residence of monarchs and nobles, mouldering in decay and ruin, and at last vested in a private individual." The early history of the site is a matter of much obscurity. How far in the sixth century it may have been the abode of monks is uncertaiu, but as tradition ascribes to the path leading from the Church to the adjacent village of Finglesham the name of St. Augustine's Walk, it is not outside the limits of possibility that it may have been a centre established by Augustine himself. Leland mentions in his Itinerary, made in the reign of Henry VIIL, that " About two miles or more from Sandwich for Northburn cummeth a fresch water yn to Sandwich haven. At Northburn was the Palayce or Maner of Edbalde, Ethelbert's sunne. There, but a few years syns [viz., in King Henry VIIL's reign], in breking a side of the walle yn in hawle were found : ii childern's bones that had been mured up as yn burielle yn tyme of the Saxons. Among one of the childem's bones was found a styffe pynne of Latin." Eadbald, King of Kent, was a kind of Saxon (Edipus. He seems, however, under the influence either of penance oi repentance, to have made various provisions for the maintenance of the religious system inaugurated hy his father Ethelbert. The early Saxon kings having embraced Christianity, it seems to have been the object of the early chroniclers to shew their descent from Adam, the father of the human race. This attempt was, it may be presumed, not for purposes of ostentation or flattery, but to prevent the PLAN OF THE SITUATE IN THE PARISHES OF NORTHBOURNE.GREAT MONGEHAM &SHOLDEN. In the COUNTY OF KENT. M" THOMAS W-WAIL OUSfeVLORD NORTHBOVRAE School * FOULME/MX FARM # FULUER SCHOOL MSTEAD BOURN 7- s;hiih*i-;h k OFFICE. W FARM MoiiusUry NORTH JET OLDCHALK Pit BRIDG I ABBEY &{%?& A HO LOCK P*f"J\ "1.7/ p^RO WILKS £„ ^ W > Scale «/' Chains. WC O 1 NORTHBOURNE COURT. 97 relapse of the people who had recently embraced Christianity to their ancient paganism and idolatry. To achieve this they endeavoured to shew both kings and people that "Woden and his kindred deities were only mortals descended from the same common ancestors as themselves * In their religious zeal the foundation of monastic houses formed a prominent part. It is remarkable that in about seventy y.'ars eight important monasteries wei'e founded by the same family. Christ Church and St. Augustine were founded in 598—605, Dover about 620, Folkestone 630, Lyminge 633, Eeculver 669, Minster in Sheppey 670, and Minster in Thanet 675, and also the great foundation at Eochester. In the Codex Diplomaticus their purpose is well set forth in the sentence : " Nobis est aptum semper inquirere qualiter per loca sanctorum, pro animarum remedio aliquid de portione terrae nostras in subsidiis servorum DH devotissima voluntate debeamus of£erre."t It is not improbable that, subsequent to the death of Eadbald, Northbourne may have held a place in the ecclesiastical traditions of that eighth century known as the golden age of English Church history. The stream, the dry bed of which runs through the park, and is only flowing in the winter months, was probably a running brook. The whole of the district now forming the Lydden Valley was nothing hut a marsh. The water-logged condition of the land forced the outlet at a point in the Abbey grounds, marked with a cross in the accompanying Map, and gave a plentiful supply of fish—an almost universal adjunct of a monastic house. The terraced garden of the modern house remains the most striking feature of the past. I t is conjectural whether the terraces are remnants of Saxon times or of a later age. The fountain in the centre is in the form of a Jerusalem cross, and tradition states that an underground passage existed between the ancient monastic buildings and the present parish churoh. * ride Genealogy of Sons of Woden, from the S ^ ^ ^ n l n f f ^ h e There is in the library of Trinity College, Cambridge, a -M^ 0 n , f £ f e £ and genealogy of King Henry VI, whioh goes up tnrougn Brut the irojan ana Jupiter to Noah and Adam. f Archceologia Oantiana, Vol. III. , p. 22. VOT. XXIV. 9 8 NORTHBOURNE COURT. Salmon of Eipple, a monk of Northbourne Monastery about the tenth year of Edward IIL, made considerable improvements and additions to the place, and more particularly built the chapel. The monastery was dissolved in the thirtieth year of Henry VIIL, when it reverted to the Crown. In his thirty-first year the King granted it to Archbishop Cranmer in exchange, and it remained in the possession of the See of Canterbury till Archbishop Parker, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, reconveyed it to the Crown in exchange. The Queen almost immediately after conveyed it to Edward Saunders, where tradition assumes that he resided. This Saunders married Anne, only daughter of Thomas and Elizabeth Lewin. His mother's apparent coheir Thomas, in Philipot's Visitation, is described as " famulus Dominse Eliz. antequain fuit regina Angliae," his wife being "uxor Milonis Pendrath de Northbourne nutrix Eegina. Elizabethse." After the accession of James I. it was granted to Sir Edwin Sandys, second son of Edwin Sandys, Archbishop of Tork, whose monument now exists in Northbourne Church. Eew know the history of this distinguished man. In public life he seems to have been the typical precursor of many others whose lives have embodied the distinguishing qualities of English greatness, not merely at home, but also in Greater Britain beyond the seas—the friend of Hooker, the champion of civil freedom in Parliament, the enterprising colonist. He rebuilt the chapel in the Court grounds, and such fragments as remain bear testimony that the friend of the author of the Ecclesiastical Polity placed his foundation on the continuity of English Church history. On a loose stone in the garden, in contemporary letters Of Sandys' time, there is the following inscription :— Hail, all Hail these reverend walls, and let Imagination's all-creative power Recall their former state and pious use : The crimson altar, with the solemn pomp, The imposing mass, and zealous actors Who oft have knelt and oft have troddea here. Of the mansion built few traces remain beyond a few ruins and outbuildings in the garden of the Court, It was 3? X % \ \7 . n^r>- QUEEN ELIZABETHS GATEWAY. 1 wif 'A mmummntmmmnKiHdi''.. „ ENCAUSTIC TILES, NORTHBOURNE ABBEY. NORTHBOURNE COURT. 99 undoubtedly of a Jacobean character.' A chimney-piece, taken from Northbourne Court, is still extant in the house of Mr. W. 0. Hammond of St. Alban's Court, with an overmantel of a Jacobean character, with stone carving beneath representing the Carden of Eden. Some panels alleged to have been in the mansion were till lately in a cottage at Mongeham. In 1571 Edwin Sandys entered at Merchant Taylors' School, and from thence was elected scholar of Corpus Christi, Oxford; he was subsequently admitted as a student of the Middle Temple.* His tutor at Corpus was Eichard Hooker, and he was a fellow student with G-eorge Cranmer. A long friendship seems to have been entered into by these two youths with Hooker, and they gave him valuable help and advice in the compilation of his Ecclesiastical Polity. It was Hooker's custom to send each book as he completed it to them, and they returned it with suggestions and criticisms. Sandys' notes to the sixth book are printed in Church and Paget's edition of Hooker's works. His representations to his father are said to have led to Hooker's appointment as Master of the Temple, and he was one of Hooker's executors. In 1586 Sandys was elected for Andover. Parliament was dissolved in 1593, and Sandys accompanied his friend Cranmer on a three years' tour on the Continent, visiting France, Italy, and Germany. In 1599 he published the Europce Speculum, which he dedicated to Whitgift. In the preparation of this work Sandys was much aided by his intercourse with Era Paolo Sarpi, by whom it was subsequently translated into Italian. It is a work of great toleration towards every religious seel:—the Eoman Catholics have their virtues—the spirit of freedom as well as of piety emanates from it. It remained for long in manuscript, but was published in 1605 under the title of A MelaUon of the State of Religion. Sandys seems to have disliked its publication, and to have procured an order of the High Commission condemning it to be burnt. An edition seems to have been published, after Sandys' death at The Hague in 1629, under * Vide -Dictionary of National Biography, vol. 1, p. 288. H 2 100 NORTHBOURNE COURT. the title of Europce Speculum, or a View or Survey of the state of Religion in the Western part of the World. On Sandys' return to England he made his way to James VI. in Scotland, and accompanied him to England. He was knighted at the Charter House on 11 May 1603, and was returned on 12 March 1603 to James I.'s first Parliament as member for the Stockbridge Division of Hampshire, and at once took a prominent part in Parliamentary proceedings. He was head of the Commons' Committee appointed to confer with the Lords to abolish the Court of Wards, feudal tenure, and purveyance. This scheme came to nothing through the Lords' opposition. In the same year Sandys opposed the change of the title of the King of England and Scotland to King of Great Britain. He was chief of a Committee to investigate grievances against the great trading companies, and to consider a Bill for throwing trade open —a course he consistently advocated. Iu Eebruary 1605 he introduced a Bill for the better establishment of true religion. This was rejected in the Commons after some mutilation in the House of Lords. In Eebruary 1607 he advocated the concession of limited privileges to the post nati, and argued against the claim of the Crown that the personal union of the two kingdoms involved the admission of Scots to the rights and privileges of Englishmen. In the following June he urged that all prisoners should be allowed the benefit of counsel, a proposition which Hobart declared to be an attempt " to shake the corner-stone of the law." In the same Session Sandys carried a motion for the regular keeping of the Journals of the House of Commons, which had not been done before. In April 1610 he was placed on a Committee to consider the " great contract" for commuting the King's feudal rights for an annual grant. In 1613 Bacon reported to the King that Sandys had deserted the opposition—and probably to confirm this he was offered a moiety of the manor of Northbourne, Kent. When Parliament met the following April, Sandys seemed to have been returned both for Eochester and Hindon, and maintained his previous position. He at once opposed the demands for Supply, and suggested that the grievances which NORTHBOURNE COURT! 101 had been presented to the last Parliament should be referred to the Committee on Petitions. He was the moving spirit on a Committee appointed to consider impositions, and in bringing up its report delivered a remarkable speech, in which he maintained that the origin of every monarchy was in election, that the people gave its consent to the King's authority on the express understanding that there were certain reciprocal conditions which neither King nor people could violate with impunity, and that a King who pretended to rule by any other title, such as that of conquest, might be dethroned whenever there was force sufficient to overthrow him.* The enunciation of this principle, the germs of which Sandys derived from Hooker, and which subsequently became the cardinal Whig dogma, was naturally obnoxious to the King. On the dissolution Sandys was summoned before Council to answer for his speeches. He was dismissed " without taint or touch," but was ordered not to leave London without permission, and to give bonds for his appearance whenever called upon .t Por six years no Parliament met, and meanwhile Sandys turned his attention to Colonial affairs. He was a member of the East India Company before August 1614, when he requested the admission of Theodore Gulston, who had saved his life. He took an active part in its proceedings.! In 1615 he was admitted a member of the Somers Islands Company, and the Sandys tribe in that group was named after him; but the Virginia Company chiefly occupied his time and attention. In 1617 he was chosen to assist Sir T. Smythe, the Treasurer, in the management of the Company. In this capacity he warmly supported the request of the Leyden exiles to be allowed to settle on the Company's domains. In 1617 he addressed a letter to Eobinson and Brinston expressing satisfaction with the " Seven Articles " in which the exiles stated their political views.§ It was largely owing to his influence that a patent was granted them. Meanwhile Smythe's administration, coupled with Argyll's arbitrary * Commons' Journal, vol. i., p. 498. f Dictionary of National Biograplty. t Calendar of State Papers: East Indies and Japan, 1614—1630. § Neale's Virginia Company. 102 NORTHBOURNE COURT. measures, threatened to ruin the infant Colony, and created a feeling of discontent in the governing body of the Company. In 1619 a combination of parties resulted in the almost unanimous election of Sandys to the Treasurership, but the ascendancy of Sandys and his party dates from the beginning of the year, and bis tenure of the Treasurership made 1619 a date to be remembered in the history of English colonization.* He instituted a rigorous system of accounts, which convicted Smythe of incompetence, if not worse. Teardley was sent to replace Argyll as Governor, and in May Sandys procured the appointment of a Committee to settle a form of government for the Colony, to appoint officers and magistrates, aud to define the functions and duties of the Virginia Company. Acting on the Company's instructions Yeardley summoned an assembly of burgesses, which met in the Church at Jamestown in 1619. It was the first representative assembly summoned in America. The English House of Commons was its model, and an account of its deliberations is preserved amongst the Colonial State Papers in the Eecord Office. In June Sandys obtained the Company's sanction for the establishment of a Missionary College at Henrico. Ten thousand acres were allotted for its maintenance, but the project was subsequently abandoned.f Sandys also carried out the transhipment of a number of men and women for the Colony, secured the exclusion from England of foreign tobacco in the interests of the Virginia trade, and introduced other various manufactures into the Colony. These measures resulted in a marked increase in the population and prosperity of Virginia, and when Sandys' term of office as Treasurer expired in May 1620 the Company was anxious to re-elect him.J At the quarterly meeting of the Company on that date a message arrived from the King demanding the re-election of one of four candidates whom he named. The Company, alarmed at this infringement of their charter, asked Sandys to return to office temporarily, and sent a deputation to James to remonstrate. The King replied that it was the seminary for a seditious Parliament, * Gardiner, vol. iii., p. 161. f Holmes' American Annals, vol. i., p. 157. X Dictionary of National Biography, vol. 1., p. 289. NORTHBOURNE COURT. 10 3 that Sandys was his greatest enemy, and concluded with the remark, " Choose the devil if yon like, but not Sir Edwin Sandys." Sandys accordingly withdrew his candidature, and on 28 June his friend William Wriothesley, third Lord Southampton, whom Sandys is said to have converted from Popery, was elected Treasurer, and Nicholas Earrer his Deputy. Both were staunch adherents of the Sandys party, and Sandys himself was given authority to sign receipts and transact other business for the Company. During the frequent absences of Southampton he took the leading part in the proceedings of the Company, and in Eebruary 1620-21 he prepared, with Selden's assistance, a new patent whereby the title of the chief official was to be changed from Treasurer to Governor. On 28 June following he laid before the Company "Propositions considerable for the better managing of the business of the Company and advancing of the plantation of Virginia." These reforms, however, were soon forgotten in the struggle for existence which the Company had to wage against its internal and external enemies. Sandys' position as leader of the popular party in Parliament alienated the support of the Court. He was suspected of harbouring designs of establishing a Eepublican and Puritan state in America, of which he and his friends would have complete control. At the same time the Spanish Government viewed the growth of Virginia with apprehension. Gondotnar was perpetually intriguing against it, and James's anxiety to conclude the Spanish match inclined him to give ear to the Spanish Ambassador's complaints. Warwick, who had a personal grievance against Sandys,* seems to have lent himself to these intrigues, and Sandys vigorously attacked him and his party before the Company. The Warwick party replied with a comprehensive indictment of Sandys' administration. They charged him with malversation of the Company's funds, transmission of false news, and suppression of the truth concerning the miserable state to which his measures were said to have reduced the Colonists.f On 16 June 1621 Sandys was imprisoned in the Tower with * See Historical Manuscripts' Commission Highth Report, Appendix ii., p. 5. t Ibid. 104 NORTHBOURNE COURT. Selden, whom he had consulted with a view to frustrating the intrigues against the Company. The House of Commons concluded that Sandys' imprisonment was due to his speeches in Parliament; the Government maintained—and the contention was partially true—that it wa,s due to other matters, and Eerrar especially states that the Virginian business was the cause.* The explanation was not believed, and on 16 July James found it politic to release Sandys and the other prisoners. Two years later (13 May 1623) Warwick complained of Sandys' conduct of Virginian affairs, and the Privy Council ordered him to be confined to his house. Soon afterwards Commissioners were appointed by the King to inquire into the state of the Colony. The Sandys party was generally supported by the settlers, but in July the Attorney- and Solicitor-Generals recommended the King to take the Government of the Colony into his own hands. The Company now sought the aid of Parliament. Its petition was favourably received, and a Committee was appointed to consider it. In May 1624 Sandys accused Gondomar in Parliament of seeking to destroy the Company and its plantation, and charged the Commissioners with extreme partiality, stating that on the day when he was to have been examined on his conduct as Treasurer he was ordered by the King to go into the country. A few days later James forbade Parliament to meddle in the matter, on the ground that the Privy Council was dealing with it. The case of the King's Charter came before the Bench in July, aud on the 24th the Court declared it null aud void. The Government of the Colony was assumed by the Crown, but the representative and other institutions established by Sandys remained to become a model for other American colonies. Sandys meanwhile had resumed his Parliamentary career. On 9 January 1620-21 he was returned for the borough of Sandwich. Early in the Session it was voted to petition the King on the breach of the privilege of free speech committed by the summons of Sandys before the Privy Council to * Peckard's Life of Ferrar, p. 110. NORTHBOURNE COURT. 105 answer for his speeches in June 1614, but the matter went no further.* In the discussion over Eloyd's casef Sandys alone urged moderation. On 29 May he drew attention to the spread of Catholicism, stating that "our religion is rooted out of Bohemia and Germany; it will soon be rooted out of Erance." J In the following September the Kiug proposed to get rid of him by sending him as Commissioner to Ireland, a proposal which was renewed on the eve of the new Parliament of Eebruary 1623-4, when be was elected for Kent. " Sandys," wrote Chamberlain, " obtained his election by urging down his rivals, Sir Nicholas Tufton aud Sir Dudley Diggs, as Papist and Eoyalist, but he will fail, being already Commissioner for Ireland, and therefore incapable of election, and his Majesty will be but the more incensed against him."§ Nevertheless, he took his seat, having made his peace, according to the same authority, by a promise of all manner of conformity. || On 12 April he made a speech attacking Middlesex, and in May he and Coke brought the Commons' charges against the Lord Treasurer before the House of Lords. Sandys had throughout held relations with Buckingham, and, according to Chamberlain, some thought him a " favourite." Perhaps for this reason he was defeated for Kent in May 1625, but found a seat at Penryn. During the Session he drew up with Pym a petition against the recusants. He was again defeated for Kent in January, but in 1625-6 sat for Penryn. In March 1627-8 Buckingham's recommendation failed to secure his return for Sandwich j in that Parliament he had no seat. His last years were devoted to the affairs of the East India Company. He died in October 1629, and was buried in Northbourne Church, where a monument, with no inscription, was erected over his grave. He bequeathed £1500 to the University of Oxford to found a metaphysical lecture, but the bequest was not carried out. A fine but anonymous portrait of Sandys, pre- * Hallam's Constitutional History, vol.i., pp. 363,364; Hatsall's Precedents, vol. i., p. 133. t See Floyd, Edward. % Gardiner, vol. iv., p. 127. § Calendar of State Papers, 11 January 1623-4. || Ibid., p. 156. 106 NORTHBOURNE COURT. served at Hanley, was engraved by G. Powle for Nash's Worcestershire. Hasted describes his monument in Northbourne Church in the following terms :— " This monument was erected in his lifetime, but he who erected this sumptuous monument and added the provisional blank tablet and escutcheons on it, with a thought of securing to himself and his posteri ty a kind of immor tal i ty, left not one behind him of all his numerous children who h ad the least veneration for him or respect for his memory, bot h tablet and escutcheons remaining a blank at this time, 1800 A.D. " The omission was subsequently rectified by the epitaph inscribed seventy years ago, and now reproduced :— Infra tumulatus jacet EUVINUS SANDYS DE NORTH-BOURNE eques aurat: EDVINI SANDYS Archiepiscopi Ehorac: Filius natu secundus, nee tali Patre indignus : Vir si quis alius animse dotibus ornatissimus in literis proeclarus : Europse Speculum conscripsit: In senatu veraB Libertatis (non jam minium grassantis Licentise) Pautor acerrimus extitit: Hoc inarmor sibi sobolique adhuc superstes posuerat. Bxcessit E vivis A.D. MDCXXIX. Mt. suae LXVIII. Epitaphium per duo ssecuia prsetermissum inscripsit et monumentum refecit generis et nominis Hseres EDVINTJS SANDYS (cognomine Lumsdaine de Lumsdaine in agro Bervicensi jure uxoris notatus) De Hardres Mag. cum Stelliug in hoc com. Eector. Anno salutis Humause MDCCCXXX. This was written and inscribed by Sandys' distinguished successor, the well-known antiquarian, Edwin Sandys, the author of Consuetudines Kancice. Of Sandys' children, the most known was Edwin, a leader in the Parliamentary Army. He died after wounds received in the Bat t le of Worcester. The Eoyal i s ts published statements that he repented of his adoption of the Par• i ! "ii ilfiii '.] : : i l l Mi tr>mwiHmmtntimtMtmmmn SAHDYS MONUMENT IN NORTHBOURNE CHU NORTHBOURNE COURT. 107 liamentary cause, to which he published replies. His son Eichard was also a Colonel in the Parliamentary Army, and in 1647 became Governor of the Bermuda Company. The estate subsequently passed into the hands of his grandson Sir E. Sandys, and was entailed on his four daughters. In 1798 the whole property was purchased by a Mr. W. Wyborn, who sold it to Mr. Pet t Hannan, who was succeeded by his nephew Mr. C. Hannan. The Abbey grounds became the property of Mr. Turner of Dover. They have subsequently been reunited by the compiler of these Notes.