George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham
| His Grace
The Duke of Buckingham | ||
 | ||
| Background information | ||
| Father: | George Villiers, 1st Duke of Buckingham | |
| Mother: | Katherine Villiers, Duchess of Buckingham, Baroness de Ros | |
| Birthdate: | Jan 30, 1628 | |
| Date of death: | Apr 16, 1687 - age 58 | |
| Spouse(s): | Mary (Fairfax) Villiers, Duchess of Buckingham | |
George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham, 20th Baron de Ros, KG, PC, FRS [Note 1](30 January 1628 – 16 April 1687) was an English statesman and poet.
Life
Early life
- Wikipedia article: Villiers family
George was the son of George Villiers, 1st Duke of Buckingham, favorite of James I and Charles I, and his wife Katherine Manners. He was only seven months old when his father was assassinated at Portsmouth by the renegade officer John Felton. Subsequently, he was brought up in the royal household of Charles I, together with his younger brother Francis and the King's own children, the future Charles II and James II. He was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he obtained the degree of Master of Arts in 1642. For a time he was taught geometry by Thomas Hobbes. During this time he was also acquainted with George Aglionby, whose influence he later accredited with persuading him to follow the English King in the Civil War.
Involvement in the English Civil War
In the Civil War he fought for the King, and took part in Prince Rupert of the Rhine's attack on Lichfield Close in April 1643.
Under the care of the Earl of Northumberland, George and his brother traveled abroad and lived in Florence and Rome. When the Second English Civil War broke out they joined Royalists under the command of Henry Rich, 1st Earl of Holland in Surrey, in July 1648.
Holland scraped together a small force of 600 men and appointed Buckingham as his General of the Horse. This force was scattered after a minor engagement near Kingston upon Thames in which Buckingham's brother Francis was killed. Buckingham himself escaped after an heroic stand against six Roundhead opponents, his back against an oak tree, which became the stuff of Cavalier legend. After another doomed combat at St Neots the Duke succeeded in escaping to the Netherlands.
Exile with Charles II
Because of his participation in the rebellion, his lands, which had been restored to him in 1647 on account of his youth, were confiscated and given to his future father-in-law, Thomas, Lord Fairfax. On 19 September 1649, Charles II conferred on him the Order of the Garter (KG) and admitted him to his Privy Council on 6 April 1650.
In opposition to Hyde, Buckingham supported the alliance with the Scottish Presbyterians, accompanied Charles to Scotland in June, and allied himself with the Marquess of Argyll, dissuading Charles from joining the Royalist plot of October 1650, and being suspected of betraying the plan to the covenanting leaders. That May, he had been appointed general of the eastern association in England, and was sent to raise forces abroad; the following year, he was chosen to lead the projected movement in Lancashire and to command the Scottish royalists. He fought alongside Charles at the Battle of Worcester on 3 September 1651, but escaped alone to Rotterdam in October.
His subsequent negotiations with Oliver Cromwell's government, and his readiness to sacrifice the interests of the church, separated him from the rest of Charles's advisers and diminished his influence. His estrangement from the royal family was completed by his audacious courtship of the king's widowed sister Mary, Princess of Orange, and by a money dispute with Charles.
Return and imprisonment
In 1657, he returned to England, and on 15 September married Mary, daughter of Anne and Thomas Fairfax, 3rd Lord Fairfax of Cameron, who had fallen in love with him although the banns of her intended marriage with Philip Stanhope, 2nd Earl of Chesterfield were being called in church. Buckingham was soon suspected of organizing a Presbyterian plot against the government. An order was issued for his arrest on 9 October, despite Fairfax's interest with Cromwell. He was placed under house arrest at York House in April 1658, escaped, and was rearrested on 18 August. He was then imprisoned in the Tower of London until his mother and father-in-law negotiated his release on 23 February 1659. He was freed after promising not to assist the enemies of the government, and on Fairfax's security of £20,000. He joined Fairfax in his march against General John Lambert in January 1660, and afterwards claimed to have gained Fairfax to the cause of the Restoration.
After the Restoration
The returning King Charles at first received Buckingham (who met him at his landing at Dover) coldly, but Buckingham was soon back in favor. He was appointed a Gentleman of the Bedchamber, carried the Sovereign's Orb at the coronation on 23 April 1661, and was made Lord Lieutenant of the West Riding of Yorkshire on 21 September. The same year, he accompanied Princess Henrietta to Paris to marry the Duke of Orleans, but made such shameless advances to her that he was recalled. On 28 April 1662 he was admitted to the Privy Council. His confiscated estates, amounting to £26,000 a year, were restored to him, and he was said to be the king's richest subject. He helped suppress the projected insurrection in Yorkshire in 1663, went to sea in the Second Anglo-Dutch War in 1665, and took measures to resist the Dutch or French invasion in June 1666.
He was, however, debarred from high office by the influence of Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon, the Chancellor. Buckingham now plotted to effect the Chancellor's ruin. He organized parties in both Houses of Parliament to support the Importation Act 1667 prohibiting the import of Irish cattle, partly to oppose Clarendon and partly to thwart the Duke of Ormonde. Having asserted during the debates that "whoever was against the bill had either an Irish interest or an Irish understanding", he was challenged to a duel by Ormonde's son Lord Ossory. Buckingham avoided the encounter, and Ossory was sent to the Tower. A short time afterward, during a conference between the two Houses on 19 December, he came to blows with the Marquess of Dorchester: Buckingham pulled off the marquess's periwig, and Dorchester also "had much of the duke's hair in his hand." According to Clarendon, no misdemeanour so flagrant had ever before offended the dignity of the House of Lords. The offending peers were both sent to the Tower, but were released after apologising; and Buckingham vented his spite by raising a claim to the title of Baron Ros, held by Dorchester's son-in-law. His opposition to the government had lost him the king's favor, and he was now accused of treasonable intrigues, and of having cast the king's horoscope. His arrest was ordered on 25 February 1667, and he was dismissed from all his offices. He avoided capture till 27 June, when he gave himself up and was imprisoned in the Tower.
Character
Buckingham was one of the archetypal Restoration rakes, part of the "Merry Gang" of courtiers whose other members included John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester, Sir Charles Sedley, Charles Sackville, 6th Earl of Dorset, and the playwrights William Wycherley and George Etherege. Following the tone set by the monarch himself, these men distinguished themselves in drinking, sex, and witty conversation. Buckingham is often judged ostentatious, licentious, and unscrupulous, the "Alcibiades of the seventeenth century." But even his critics agree that he was good-humored, good-natured, generous, an unsurpassed mimic, and the leader of fashion. His good looks and amusing wit made him irresistible to his contemporaries, in spite of his moral faults and even crimes. A contemporary observer at the Court of Charles II found him: "Courteous, affable, generous, magnanimous...he is adored by the people....On the other hand he is an atheist, blasphemer, violent, cruel and infamous for his licentiousness, in which he is so wrapped up that there is no sex, nor age, nor condition of persons who are spared from it". His portrait has been drawn by Burnet, Count Hamilton in the Memoires de Grammont, John Dryden, Alexander Pope in the Epistle to Lord Bathurst, and Sir Walter Scott in Peveril of the Peak. John Reresby calls him "the first gentleman of person and wit I think I ever saw", and Gilbert Burnet bears the same testimony. Dean Lockier, after alluding to his unrivalled skill in riding, dancing and fencing, adds, "When he came into the presence-chamber it was impossible for you not to follow him with your eye as he went along, he moved so gracefully". Racing and hunting were his favourite sports, and his name long survived in the hunting songs of Yorkshire.
The Duke was the patron of Abraham Cowley, Thomas Sprat, Matthew Clifford and William Wycherley. He dabbled in chemistry, and according to Thomas Burnet, "he thought he was very near the finding of the philosopher's stone." He set up the Vauxhall glassworks at Lambeth, the productions of which were praised by John Evelyn; and he spent much money, according to his biographer Brian Fairfax, in building Substructiones Insanae.[Note 2] John Dryden described him under the character of Zimri in celebrated lines in the poem Absalom and Achitophel (to which Buckingham replied in Poetical Reflections on a late Poem ... by a Person of Honour, 1682):
A man so various that he seemed to be/Not one, but all mankind's epitome;/Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong,/Was everything by starts and nothing long;/But, in the course of one revolving moon/Was chymist, fiddler, statesman and buffoon../..Beggar'd by fools, whom still he found too late,/He had his jest, but they had his estate.
Buckingham, however, cannot with any truth be called "mankind's epitome". On the contrary, the distinguishing features of his life are incompleteness, aimlessness, imperfection, insignificance, neglected talent, and wasted opportunity. "He saw and approved the best", says Brian Fairfax, "but did too often deteriorate sequi (Latin > "follow the worst")". He is more severely but more justly judged by himself. In light-hearted moments he wrote "Methinks, I see the wanton houres flee, And as they passe, turne back and laugh at me", but his last recorded words, "O! what a prodigal have I been of that most valuable of all possessions—Time!" express with exact truth the fundamental flaw of his character and career, of which he had at last become conscious.
Notes
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