LINCOLN • BOSTON 400

Theophilus Clinton-Fiennes, the 4th Earl of Lincoln, was arrested and thrown into the Tower of London in 1626 for distributing a pamphlet that incited opposition to the Forced Loan imposed by Charles I. The pamphlet read:

To all English freeholders from a well-wisher of theirs calling on honest men and wise men to openly resist the loan because of the threat it offered to the liberties of the subjects and the future of parliaments.1

Before Theophilus, the Earls of Lincoln were aloof nobles, and one was even reputed to have been mad. Theophilus’ great grandfather, Edward Clinton-Finnes, the 1st Earl of Lincoln, was born 9th Lord Clinton and Saye in 1512 and spent his entire life serving the Tutors from Henry VIII to Elizabeth I. In 1534, he married Elizabeth Blount, the mistress of Henry VIII, who was nearly twice his age. Historian James A. Froude reported she was a most interesting person but old enough to be her boy-husband’s mother.2

In 1632, Edward was invited to join Henry VIII’s entourage to France and later led the fleet that enabled the Duke of Somerset to defeat the Scotts. As a result, he was appointed Lord High Admiral in May 1550.

When the pope excommunicated Queen Elizabeth, Edward again took command of the fleet in May 1570, preventing the French from supplying troops to Scotland. As a result, Queen Elizabeth elevated him to Earl of Lincoln, and he was awarded the Gilbertine Priory at Sempringham, which had been abandoned since Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries.

Henry Clinton, the 2nd Earl of Lincoln, was born in 1539. He inherited his father’s lands and title in January 1585 and became one of England’s most feared and hated lords.3

His wickedness, misery, craft, repugnance to all humanity and perfidious mind is not amongst the heathens to be matched.4

In 1601, Henry incurred the wrath of Queen Elizabeth, who, with the Scottish ambassador, had been invited to his Chelsea home only to be left standing after he fled London to escape creditors.5 The Earl’s oppressive ill-treatment of his tenants resulted in several reprimands by the Privy Council. In 1607, the Inquisitions of Depopulation imposed heavy fines on Henry for purposely enclosing common land and depopulating the village of Tattershall.6

The said Earl hath taken away part of the churchyard and putt it into his mote, so that divers people were digged up, some green and lately buried, and thrown into his mote to fill it up.7

Tattershall Castle

In 1584, Henry’s son, Thomas, married Elizabeth Knyvett.8 Elizabeth was born to a prominent Wiltshire family. Her uncle, Sir Thomas Knyvett, foiled the gunpowder plot in 1605 and was rewarded with a peerage. Later, he built the first residence at the site of 10 Downing Street—the modern-day residence of the Prime Minister of Britain.9⁠

Elizabeth’s sisters married well: Catherine to Richard Rich, the younger brother of the Earl of Warwick, and Frances to Francis Manners, the Earl of Rutland. In 1620, their daughter, Katherine, married the Duke of Buckingham.10

Not long after Lady Elizabeth married into the Clinton family, her parents prevailed on the Privy Council to return her marriage portion that her father-in-law had pilfered.⁠11 Henry was also asked to provide some convenient house where the young lord and lady may live with their children.⁠12 So Elizabeth, her husband, Thomas, and their nine children occupied the Earl’s manor at Sempringham.

Henry relocated to his castle at Tattershall, where he died deep in debt with no friends and was laid to rest on September 29, 1616.

His son, Thomas, then became the 3rd Earl of Lincoln, only to die three years later in January 1619. Over Thomas Clinton’s thirty-five-year marriage to Lady Elizabeth, she bore eighteen children, nine of whom lived to become adults. Each of his five daughters inherited £2,000 as marriage portions, provided they married with their mother’s consent.13 A sixth daughter, Elizabeth, was disowned after she eloped with her father’s manservant.

Thomas Clinton’s eldest surviving son, Theophilus, inherited his father’s title and estates—provided he settled debts totaling £20,000 within five years.14

Knowing her son was too inexperienced to resolve this debt, Lady Elizabeth sought the help of John Preston, who often stopped at Sempringham whenever he visited Cotton in Boston. With the aid of his dear friend, Lord Saye, Preston secured the services of Thomas Dudley to steward the Earl of Lincoln’s inheritance.15 Dudley’s biographer, Cotton Mather, recounts:

The grandfather of this present Earle was called Henry, who being a bad husband had left his heirs under great entanglements, and his son, named Thomas, had never been able to wind out of that labyrinth of debts contracted by his father, so that all the difficultys were now devolved upon Theophilus, the grandchild, who was persuaded therefore to entertain Mr. Dudley as his Steward to manage his whole estate, who though it were so involved with many great debts, amounting to near twenty thousand pounds, yet his prudent, careful & faithful management of the demesne16 of that family, he in a few years found means to discharge all those great debts.17

Late in 1619, Thomas Dudley, his pregnant wife, Dorothy, sons Thomas and Samuel, ages fifteen and twelve, and daughter Anne, age eight, entered the Sempringham household of Lady Elizabeth, who educated Dudley’s children along with her four youngest.

Henry Clinton, the 2nd Earl of Lincoln, was born in 1539. He inherited his father’s lands and title in January 1585 and became one of England’s most feared and hated lords.3

His wickedness, misery, craft, repugnance to all humanity and perfidious mind is not amongst the heathens to be matched.4

The said Earl hath taken away part of the churchyard and putt it into his mote, so that divers people were digged up, some green and lately buried, and thrown into his mote to fill it up.7

Henry relocated to his castle at Tattershall, where he died deep in debt with no friends and was laid to rest on September 29, 1616.

Thomas Clinton’s eldest surviving son, Theophilus, inherited his father’s title and estates—provided he settled debts totaling £20,000 within five years.14

Dudley’s daughter, Anne, benefited from having access to education and the library at Sempringham. Later, she became America’s first female poet. When it came time for Thomas and Samuel Dudley to enter university, they matriculated at Emmanuel College, Cambridge—no doubt through the efforts of Cotton and Preston.

Although the Earl of Lincoln’s estates extended over three counties, Dudley resolved his £20,000 debt within a few years by increasing rents and leasing fallow land. Dudley later reflected:

I found the estate of the Earl of Lincoln so much and so much in debt, which I have discharged, and have revised the rents so many hundreds per annum. God will, I trust, bless me and mine.18

Mather relates that the young Earl was so impressed by Dudley that:

He would never, after his acquaintance with him, do any business of the moment without Mr. Dudley’s counsel or advice.19

Having resolved the Earl’s debts, Dudley desired to associate more closely with John Cotton and, in July 1624, moved his family to a rented home in Boston.20

Two developments made the move possible: the Earl spent much of his time in London at Parliament and the Gray’s Inn at the Inns of Court; secondly, Simon Bradstreet Bradstreet had been hired to help Dudley two years earlier and was then capable of managing the Earl’s estate.21

Later, Bradstreet married Dudley’s daughter, Anne, and together with Dudley, joined the Massachusetts Bay Company. Both families sailed to New England in 1630 with the Winthrop Fleet.

Though Dudley was living in Boston, the Earl continued to require his services and, in November 1624, summoned him to London in response to a request from James I for a troop of three hundred horsemen to support his son-in-law, Frederick V, the dispossessed Elector Palatine, in the Thirty Years’ War.22 Dudley stopped at Cambridge on his way south to confer with John Preston.23

Towards the latter end of King James’ reign, when there was a press for soldiers to go over to Germany with Count Mansfeld for the recovery of the Palatinate, when the matter was first motioned, the Earl of Lincoln, who was zealously affected toward the Protestant interest, was strongly inclined to have gone over with the said Earl or Count, and should have been a Colonel in the expedition, yet resolving not to go without Mr. Dudley’s advice and company; and therefore he sent down to Boston, in Lincolnshire, where Mr. Dudley sojourned, to come forthwith to London, to order matters for this enterprise, and to be ready to accompany him therein. Mr. Dudley knew knot how to refuse to wait upon his lordship, yet thought it best, as well for himself as for the Earl, to take the best counsell he could, in a concern so high nature, not being unmindful of what Solomon said, with good advice make war. Therefore he resolved himself, in his passing up to London,24 to take Cambridge in his way, that he might advise with Dr. Preston about the design, who was a great statesman as well as a great divine, at least was conceived very well to understand the intrigues of the state in that juncture; and he altogether dissuaded Mr. Dudley, or the Earl, from having anything to do in that expedition, laying before them the grounds of his apprehensions on which he foresaw the sad events of the whole, as did really soon after come to pass. Dr. Preston, by reason of his frequent intercourse with the Earl of Lincoln’s family, was free to discover to Mr. Dudley all he knew, and he improved it thoroughly to take off the earl’s mind from the enterprise.25

A history of the affair—written in 1706—recounts that Count Ernst von Mansfeldt visited London three times in 1624 to lobby James I for support of the Protestant cause in the Thirty Years’ War. James allocated six regiments (12,000 soldiers) to von Mansfeldt, along with six colonels to lead them and two troops of horses—one from the Earl of Lincoln, who was reportedly in command.

The French were charged with transporting the men and horses to Calais. However, upon reconsidering France’s position, the French Queen reneged on permission for Mansfeldt to land at Calais to avoid provoking her brother, King Philip IV of Spain.26

Mansfeldt was forced to sail with his Army into Zealand. There the soldiers lay at the Ramkins a long time in their Ships, not suffered to land.27 For the States, not dreaming of such a Body of Men, could not determine suddenly what to do with them, besides, the Inland Waters being frozen, Provisions would grow short for their own Army, much more for them. The Ships, stuffed and pestred with Men, wanting Meat and all manner of Necessaries, such a Stench and Pestilence grew among them, that they were thrown into the Sea by multitudes; so that many Hundreds (if I may not Thousands) beaten upon Shores, had their Bowels eaten out with Dogs and Swine, to the Horror of the Beholders. Those Bodies that drove up near those Towns where the English were, had great Pits made for them, wherein (being thrown by heaps) they were covered with Earth; but upon those Shores where they were neglected, (as they were in many parts of Holland), a great Contagion followed: and of Mansfeldt’s Twelve thousand Men, scarce the Moiety28 landed.29

Although James succeeded in confining England’s war effort to Count von Mansfeld’s misguided attempt to free the Palatinate, the expedition contravened Parliament’s desire to avoid committing troops on the continent. Mansfeld’s efforts were doomed from the start as James demanded that they not attack the Spanish.30

Dudley and Preston likely saved the Earl of Lincoln’s life by dissuading him from participating in Mansfeldt’s ill-fated expedition.

Later, Dudley again saved the Earl when he committed the faux pas of failing to kneel before the Elector Palatine at court in the Hague.31

At another time, when the Earl of Lincoln (who it seems was wont to be very quick in his motions sometimes) understood that there was like to be a brave fight at the Hague, in Holland, by reason of an interview of some great princes that were then to be present. No body was able to direct in the expedition so well as Mr. Dudley, who on the sudden he judged could so order all matters belonging to the Earls retinue, that in two days’ time they might go from the Earles Castle of Sempringham, to the Hague, in Holland, to be present at that great solemnity.32When they came there, the Earl his spirits arose to such an height that he would by no means address himself to court the Count Palatine upon the knees, although he had been crowned King of Bohemia. Mr. Dudley began now to think that the Earls last error was worse than his first; however, he was forced to find out the best way, he could to excuse it, which he did to the Palsgraves satisfaction.33

Six years later, Charles I desperately needed funds to support his uncle, Christian IV of Denmark, in the Thirty Years’ War, but was forced to suspend Parliament to thwart Buckingham’s impeachment.

Later, when Charles learned that his uncle had been defeated at the Battle of Lutter, Charles imposed a forced loan on England to obtain the needed funds and swore:

He would render his uncle every assistance, even at the risk of his own crown and hazarding his life.34

Ironically, Charles’ words proved prophetic when he lost both his crown and his life when Cromwell’s Rump Parliament beheaded him outside the Banqueting House at Whitehall.35

The Earl of Lincoln refused to comply with the Forced Loan and was confined to the Tower of London.

Thomas Dudley supported the Earl’s opposition to the Force Loan and served as his local proxy to organize resistance in the Boston area, unaware that events would eventually spiral out of control into civil war,

The Forced Loan impacted the lives of many in the Boston area, including three of Dudley’s closest associates, who were key to establishing the Massachusetts Bay Company.

• Isaac Johnson – the primary investor in the Massachusetts Bay Company and the husband of Lady Arbella, the sister of the Earl of Lincoln.

• John Humphrey – treasurer of the Dorchester Company and later husband Lady Susan, sister of the Earl of Lincoln.

• Richard Bellingham- Boston’s Town Recorder and Member of Parliament for Boston, Lincolnshire.

In 1627, Thomas Dudley and his family were forced to return to Sempringham when the Earl of Warwick needed a steward for his stepmother, Lady Frances Wray, and appropriated Simon Bradstreet.

Lady Elizabeth and Lady Bridget welcomed Dudley’s return to Sempringham, as they relied on him heavily during the Earl of Lincoln’s confinement in the Tower of London. Lady Elizabeth, in particular, had become dependent on Dudley to bridge relations with her son after he severed ties with her in 1622.

The Earl’s wife, Lady Bridget, also relied heavily on Dudley during her husband’s imprisonment. Later, Dudley corresponded with Lady Bridget from Massachusetts.

To Lady Bridget, Countess of Lincoln, 3 March 1631

Touching the plantation which wee here have begun, it fell out thus: About the yeare 1627 some friends beeing togeather in Lincolnshire, fell into some discourse about New England, and the plantinge of the gospell there; and after some deliberation wee imparted our reasons by letters and messages to some in London and the west country⁠ where it was likewise deliberately thought uppon, and at length with often negotiation soe ripened that in the year 1628, wee procured a patent from his Majesty⁠ for our planting.36

The Earl was released from the Tower of London in March 1628.37

During the English Civil Wars, Theophilus was made colonel of a Foot Regiment in the Parliamentary Army and became Parliament’s Resident Commissioner assigned to the Scottish Army in December 1645.

Lady Bridget, the Earl’s wife, died sometime before 1644, and in 1647, Theophilus married his cousin, Elizabeth Gorges, daughter of his aunt, Elizabeth Clinton, and Sir Arthur Gorges.38

That same year, Theophilus was elected the Speaker of the House of Lords and, in December 1660, was made Commissioner for the Colonies.39

Theophilus died in London in 1667. His only son, Edward, predated him in death, so Theophius’ estate passed to his grandson (also Edward), who died at Tattershall in 1692, ending the Clinton line.40

1 Winship, M. P., Godly Republicanism: Puritans, Pilgrims, and a City on a Hill. (Harvard University Press, 2012). P 190-191

2 Froude, James, History of England from the fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth, Vols. I-III, London: J.W. Parker and Sons, 1863

3 Hall, John, An Elizabethan Assassin: Theodore Paleologus: Seducer, Spy and Killer. The History Press. (2015)

4 Gorges, Raymond, and Frederick Brown. The Story of a Family Through Eleven Centuries, Illustrated by Portraits and Pedigrees. Grace Gorges (private printing). Boston: D.P. Updike, The Merrymount Press, 1944. P 64 [Note: This quote is from Sir Arthur Gorges’ comments to Robert Cecile regarding a letter sent to him by Henry Clinton, 2nd Earl of Lincoln. Arthur Gorges married Elizabeth Clinton, Henry Clinton’s daughter, in 1597.]

5 Thrush, Andrew, and John P Ferris. The House of Commons Members Database (1604-1629). Vol. 1, London: The Institute of Historical Research, 2010. Clinton, Sir Henry (d.1616) of Tattershall, Lincs. by N.M. Fuidge

6 Gould, J D. “The Inquisition of Depopulation of 1607 in Lincolnshire.” The English Historical Review LXVII, no. CCLXIV (1952)

7 “Tattershall Castle, Lincolnshire; a Historical & Descriptive Survey by the Late Marquis Curzon of Kedleston, K. G., and H. Avray Tipping.,” 1929. P 136

8 Sometime after 21 September 1584, the Earl of Huntington wrote that he hoped the match between Clinton and Knyvett would soon be settled. As a result, Elizabeth Knyvett must have been born around 1570 and was fourteen when betrothed to Thomas Clinton.From- Travitsky, Betty S. “Clinton [Née Knevitt], Elizabeth, Countess of Lincoln (1574?–1630?), Noblewoman and Writer.” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford: Oxford University Press, January 28, 2015.

9 Parkinson, C N. Gunpowder, Treason and Plot, London: Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1976. [Note: On the evening of the 26th of October 1605, the Catholic Lord Monteagle received an anonymous letter warning him to stay away from Parliament during the opening, and to “retyre youre self into yowre contee whence yow maye expect the event in safti for … they shall receyve a terrible blowe this parleament”. Monteagle’s letter was shown to King James. The King ordered Knyvet to conduct a search of the cellars underneath Parliament, which he carried out with Edmund Doubleday in the early hours of November 5th. Guy Fawkes was found by Knyvett leaving the cellar, shortly after midnight, and arrested. Inside, the barrels of gunpowder were discovered hidden under piles of firewood and coal.]

10 Katherine Manners was selected by the formidably ambitious Mary Villers to marry her son, George Villiers. However, Manners was a strict Roman Catholic, and the King refused to allow Villiers to marry her (almost the only occasion when he did not give the Villiers family whatever they asked for). In addition to this, the Earl of Rutland refused to accept the Countess of Buckingham’s demands for his daughter’s dowry. Manners converted to Protestantism, to satisfy the Villiers family, which almost caused her father to call off the marriage. Invited to visit the Countess of Buckingham, Katherine was forced to spend the night due to an attack of illness. Believing his daughter’s honor to be compromised, the Earl of Rutland refused to receive her back and demanded that George Villiers marry her immediately. At this, Villiers refused to marry her, but did a few weeks later, on 16 May 1620. from Katherine Villiers, Duchess of Buckingham, Wikipedia

11 A ‘marriage portion’ is property (usually money) given to a woman at her marriage. Also called a Vide Dowry.

12 Travitsky, ‘Clinton, Elizabeth, Countess of Lincoln’

13 Thrush, Andrew, and John P. Ferris. The House of Commons Members Database (1604-1629). Vol. 1, London: The Institute of Historical Research, 2010. (Clinton, alias Fiennes, Thomas, Lord Clinton (c1568-1619) of Tattershall, Lincs. by Paula Watson & Rosemary Sgroi)

14 $5.7 million in today’s dollars. In order to convert British currency of former generations to present-day American dollars; L. E. Davis and J. R. T. Hughes, “A Dollar-Sterling Exchange, 1803-1895,” Economic History Review, 2nd ser. 13:1 (August 1960): 52-78; Douglas Jay, Sterling: Its Use and Misuse, a Plea for Moderation (London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1985), esp. “Appendix: The Purchasing Power of the Pound Sterling 1264-1983.”; John J. McCusker, How Much is that in Real Money?: A Historical Price Index for Use as a Deflator of Money Values in the Economy of the United States, reprinted from Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society (101:2 [Oct. 1991]), Worcester, MA: American Antiquarian Society, 1992.

15 N. H. Keeble, ‘Bradstreet, Anne (1612/13–1672)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edition, May 2014. [Note: Keeble said, “On the recommendation of William Fiennes, first Viscount Saye, and Sele, in 1619, he (Dudley) became steward to Fiennes’s future son-in-law Theophilus Clinton, fourth earl of Lincoln (c.1600–1667) at Sempringham, Lincolnshire.”]

16 A demensne is land attached to a manor and retained for the owner’s use. The lands of an estate.

17 Mather, Cotton. The Life of Mr. T. Dudley, Several Times Governor of the Colony of Massachusetts. Edited by Charles Deane, Cambridge: John Wilson and Son, 1870.

18 Jones, Augustine. The Life and Work of Thomas Dudley the Second Governor of Massachusetts, Cambridge, MA: Houghton, Mifflin and Co., 1900. P 40-41

19 Mather, C., The Life of Mr. T. Dudley.

20 Note: Dudley moved to Boston five years after becoming steward to the Earl of Lincoln and not nine or ten as stated by Mather.

21 Gray’s Inn is one of the Inns of Court that functioned as a ‘3rd university’ (after Oxford and Cambridge) to provide legal education to nobles and aspiring barristers. According to Wilfred Prest in The Rise of the Barristers, roughly twenty percent of barristers followed in the footsteps of their fathers in the 17th century. The Inns of Court had a monopoly on legal training up until the 19th century as until then the only law taught in English universities was ecclesiastical canon law. The four institutions comprising the Inns of Court are the Inner Temple, the Middle Temple, Lincoln’s Inn, and Gray’s Inn.

22 Fredrick V, Elector Palatine, married Elizabeth Stuart, sister of James I. Fredrick led the Protestant Union at the outbreak of the Thirty Years’ War.

23 Jones, The Life and Work of Thomas Dudley the Second Governor of Massachusetts.

24 It is obvious that Cotton Mather had little understanding of the geography of England as Boston is north of London, so Dudley would not have “resolved himself, in his passing up to London” but rather in passing down to London. Cambridge is approximately halfway between Boston and London to the south.

25 Mather, The Life of Mr. T. Dudley, Several Times Governor of the Colony of Massachusetts. P 214-215

26 Under the influence of her companion, Marie de Rohan-Montbazon, the queen let herself be drawn into political opposition to Richelieu and became embroiled in several intrigues against his policies.

27 In: Van Strien, C D. British Travellers in Holland During the Stuart Period, Brill, 1993, page 30 states: “At eighteen leagues from Antwerp we came to the isle of Walcheren and pass by a block-house called Ramekins and then entered a strait channel which Brough us to Middleburg.

28 The lesser share or part, which in this case means “less than half”

29 Wilson, Arthur. “The Life and Reign of James, the First King of Great Britain.” In A Complete History of England, London, 1706. P 789

30 Brenner, Merchants and Revolution. P 255

31 Frederick V, Elector Palatine, was a German Calvinist who married Elizabeth Stuart—sister to Charles I and daughter of James I of England. He is known as the “Winter King” because he reigned as King of Bohemia from the 4th of November 1619 until the Battle of White Mountain, where forces of the Holy Roman Empire defeated him on the 8th of November 1620. He fled with his family to the Dutch Republic, where he lived in exile at The Hague until his death.

32 Dudley, Joseph. “The Life of Mr. Thomas Dudley.” Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society XI (n.d.). (Note: Joseph Dudley incorrectly assumed that the Earl of Lincoln was living at Sempringham when, in fact, his mother, the Dowager Countess, Lady Elizabeth, occupied Sempringham. The Earl and his wife moved to Tattershall soon after their marriage in 1623.)

33 The Palsgraves (during the Middle Ages) referred to the lord of a palatinate who exercised sovereign powers over his lands.

34 Cust, Richard. Charles I: a Political Life, London: Routledge, 2014.

35 “May 1649: An Act Declaring and Constituting the People of England to be a Commonwealth and Free-State.” Firth, C.H & Rait, R.S., eds. (1911), P 122

36 The Massachusetts Bay Company’s Royal Charter was issued on the 3rd of March 1628 in the Old Style Calendar in use at the time Thomas Dudley wrote to Lady Bridge, the Countess of Lincoln. The Old Style Calendar began the New Year on Lady Day, March 25th, and did not change to January 1st until the New Style Calendar was implemented in 1752. Dudley’s reference to some “in London and the West Country” refers to two sets of stakeholders in what became the Massachusetts Bay Company: a group of London merchants under Matthew Cradock’s leadership and what remained of the Dorchester Company under the leadership of Rev. John White and John Humphrey, who at the time was living in Boston and became friends with Thomas Dudley and Isaac Johnson, husband of Lady Arbella, sister of the Earl of Lincoln.

37 F. Hill, F., Tudor and Stuart Lincoln. (Cambridge University Press, 1956).

38 Burke’s Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage, 107th edition, 3 volumes C. Mosley, editor, (Wilmington, Delaware, Genealogical Books Ltd, (2003)

39 Burke’s Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage, 107th edition, 3 volumes.

40 Allen, T. The History of the County of Lincoln. vol. I (John Saunders, Jr., 1833).

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