John Gardiner

“ When governor of Gibraltar, the queen of Spain sent him the Cross of Charles III, which the regulations of the service forbade his wearing. Gardiner married, on 11 Oct. 1816, Caroline Mary, eldest daughter of Sir John Macleod, adjutant-general royal artillery, and granddaughter on the maternal side of the fourth Marquis of Lothian, by whom he had one son, the present lieutenant-general and honorary general, Henry Lynedoch Gardiner, C.B., retired royal artillery, equerry in ordinary to the queen, and one daughter. Gardiner died at Melbourne Lodge, Claremont, 26 June 1864, aged 83. ”

“ His body was interred under Trinity church and his funeral was attended by most of the citizens. The shipping displayed its colors at half-mast, and much respect was shown by the people. Dr. Gardiner had always been philanthropic and a benefit to mankind. He seems to have been identified in church work wherever he lived and from the following extract appears to have been a member of King's chapel, while residing in Boston: "April 3, 1740.—Rec'd of Mr. Sylvester Gardiner Sixteen Pounds Two Shills, in full for wine for the Chapple for the year past. John Hancock." ”

“ To none will we sell or deny or delay right or justice." It was a good security if it could be maintained, but it would avail nothing against a king who was willing and able to use force to set up the old tyranny once more. In the first place John must dismiss all his foreign mercenaries. So little, however, was John trusted that it was thought necessary in the second place to establish (p. 184) a body of twenty-five—twenty-four barons and the Mayor of London—which was to guard against any attempt of the king to break his word. ”

“ Bishop Gardiner recovered the Manor of Merdon, with his liberty, on Queen Mary’s accession. Then it was that Philip of Spain rode through one of these villages, probably Otterbourne, soaked through with rain, on his way to his ill-starred marriage with Mary.
Gardiner was no persecutor, and Sternhold’s widow lived on at Slackstede. On his death, Queen Mary gave the diocese to John White, the same who preached to Elizabeth on a living dog being better than a dead lion. ”

“ It was probably in consequence of his pleading that Wriothesley restored the manor, but when Gardiner was illegally deposed by the regency of Edward VI. on 14th February 1550, John Poynet, a considerable scholar, but a man of disgraceful life, obtained the appointment to the see, by alienating various estates to the Seymour family, and Merdon was resumed by the Crown. It was then granted to Sir Philip Hobby who had been one of King Henry’s privy councillors, and had been sent on an embassy to Portugal, attended by ten gentlemen of his own retinue, wearing velvet coats with chains of gold. ”

“ Gardiner, but from time to time have reseived much kindness of him and from him, not onely by counsell and advise in our prosperitie, but in our great extremytie, when wee wee were almost swallowed upp of our enemies, then wee say he apeared to us not onely as a friend, but as a father, in giveinge us his monie and goods, wherby wee defended ourselves, and ransomd my daughter and friends, and wee say and know that by his meanes we had great comfort and reliefe from the most honarable of the English nation heare about us ”

“ Gardiner has lately published the first two volumes of his history of the Civil War, and it is to be hoped that he will not stop until he reaches the accession of William and Mary. Indeed, such books as his ought never to stop. ”

“ He connects the attack on the Queen with Gardiner's disgrace; and Gardiner's disgrace only followed on the discovery of Lord Surrey's designs upon the regency in the ensuing December. ↑ The body of the Council certainly were acting with Gardiner. Larimer's examiners were Wriothesley, Norfolk, Essex, Sir John Gage, Sir Anthony Browne, Sir Anthony Wingfield, the Bishops of Durham and Winchester, and, strange to say, Lord Russell. On the other side were only the small but powerful minority, composed of Cranmer, Lord Parr, Lord Hertford, and Lord Lisle.—See State Papers, vol. i. p. ”

“ Later in the year the news that an excuse had been found for driving the Lutheran clergy out of Bohemia had deeply exasperated him, and his exasperation had been increased by the transference of the electorate, by which the Protestants were left in a hopeless minority in the Electoral House. But the idea of making war upon the Emperor, and unsettling what yet remained as a security for peace, was altogether so displeasing to John George that it is doubtful whether anything short of absolute necessity would have driven him to war. ”

“ The rectorial tithe of Hursley having been given to St. Elizabeth’s College, and apparently some rights over Merdon, the Chancellor Wriothesley obtained that, on the confiscation of monastic property, the manor should be granted to him. Stephen Gardiner had been bishop since 1531, a man who, though he had consented to the king’s assumption of the royal supremacy, grieved over the fact as an error all his life. He appeared at the bar of the House of Commons and pleaded the rights of his See, to which Merdon had belonged for 1300 years. ”

“ On the same day, the 7th, something was definitely heard of the proceedings of the other plotters, who had either gathered at Dunchurch for the hunting-match, or had fled from London to join them, and a proclamation was issued for the arrest of Percy, Catesby, Rokewood, Thomas Winter, Edward [35] Grant, John and Christopher Wright, and Catesby’s servant, Robert Ashfield. They were charged with assembling in troops in the counties of Warwick and Worcester, breaking into stables and seizing horses. [36] Fawkes, too, was on that day subjected to a fourth examination. ”

“ Before proceeding further, it will be well to remind my readers what the so-called traditional story is—or, rather, the story which has been told by writers who have in the present century availed themselves of the manuscript treasures now at our disposal, and which are for the most part in the Public Record Office. With this object, I cannot do better than borrow the succinct narrative of the Edinburgh Reviewer. [11]
Early in 1604, the three men, Robert Catesby, John Wright, and Thomas Winter, meeting in a house at Lambeth, resolved on a Powder Plot, though, of course, only in outline. ”

“ The other three, who made up the original five, were Percy, Catesby, and John Wright. It was Gerard who had given them the Sacrament. [74] The other conspirators were Sir Everard Digby, Robert Keyes, Christopher Wright, Thomas [75] Grant, Francis Tresham, Robert Winter, and Ambrose Rokewood. The very order in which the names come [Pg 45] perhaps shows that the Government had as yet a very hazy idea of the details of the conspiracy. The names of those who actually worked in the mine are scattered at hap-hazard amongst those of the men who merely countenanced the plot from a distance. ”

“ Robert Winter’s name substituted for, 73
Wright, Henry, an informer, 173, 174
Wright, John, killed at Holbeche, 46, 47
Footnotes:
[1] London: Osgood, McIlvaine & Co., 1897.
[2] Gerard, p. 48.
[3] Ib. p. 51, note 2.
[4] Goodman, i. 102.
[5] Gerard, pp. 46, 47.
[6] Gerard, p. 159.
[7] I imagine that the notes in Roman type proceed from Wood’s correspondent, and that Fulman’s marginal questions are omitted; but Father Gerard is not clear on this.
[8] I.e., the second Earl.
[9] ? this.
[10] Athenæ, iii. 902.
[11] Edin. Review, January 1897, p. 192. ”

“ His servility said bluffly, "Now with any other man I should be on equal terms, but I frankly acknowledge that it is a different matter with you." So the men who had more sheep in the present, or who possessed greater credit as the beautiful result of sheep in the past, were inclined to think Gardiner a good sort, even if his grandfather had come out to New South Wales in a ship with soldiers. For that is the satiric colonial euphemism for a convict.
But, all the same, he was a beast, and as mean as mud to those who were down, who couldn't get up, or who were obviously of no use to him. ”

“ Beetle-browed, swarthy of complexion, hook-nosed, and harsh of feature, Gardiner, notwithstanding his forbidding looks and stern, searching glances, which seemed to read the hearts of those he looked upon, and inspired more dread than love, had a countenance replete with intelligence, while his imperious looks and manner, untamed by reverse of fortune, showed the confidence he felt in his own mental powers and resources. ”

“ In the course of his progress through France he received orders from Henry to send back his secretary Gardiner, or, as he was called at court, Master Stevens, for fresh instructions; to which he was obliged to reply that he positively could not spare him as he was the only instrument he had in advancing the king’s “secret matter.” Next year Gardiner, still in the service of Wolsey, was sent by him to Italy along with Edward Fox, provost of King’s College, Cambridge, to promote the same business with the pope. ”

“ On 12 Nov. 1650 the council of state issued an order permitting him to come to London for nine days on taking the engagement (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1650) . He died at Cuddesdon, where he was buried 15 Oct. 1652.
Gardiner married Rebecca Child, by whom he had many children. Two of his sons were slain in the civil wars within a few weeks of each other. The elder, Thomas, a captain of horse in the royalist army, was knighted by the king at Oxford as he sat at dinner on his reporting Prince Rupert's success at Newark, March 1643, and lost his life near Oxford at the end of July 1645. ”

“ All his life long his enemies accused him of dissimulation and hypocrisy for acts like these, but it was precisely this quality which raised him to eminence. Had he not been purchasable, he could hardly have survived as an Anglican bishop; an enthusiast like Fisher would have ended on Tower Hill.
Perhaps more fully than any other prelate of his time, Gardiner represented the faction of Henry and Norfolk; he was as orthodox as he could be and yet prosper. He hated Cromwell and all "gospellers," and he loved power and splendour and office. ”

“ One so anxious, as Gardiner must have been at that time, to keep foreign domination out of England could never have advocated the marriage of his sovereign with “Spanish Philip,” nor, indeed, have been likely to call the latter’s father
“That wisest monarch, most devout of Christians,
Potent of captains, fortunate of men.” But, of course, the poet stands to his colors. Having selected Gardiner for the villain par excellence, he makes him welcome even foreign domination in the person of a bigoted prince, who, he knows, will imbrue his hands in the blood of heretics. ”

“ Gardiner, his good mother, dated from Paris the 25th of January following, that is 1719-20, in answer to one in which she had warned him to expect such trials: "I have (says he) already met with them, and am obliged to fight, and to dispute every inch of ground. But all thanks and praise to the great Captain of my salvation. He fights for me, and then it is no wonder that I come off more than conqueror:" by which last expression I suppose he meant to insinuate that he was strengthened and established, rather than overborne, by this opposition. ”

“ You DO live. You ARE what you long to be. That ideal you're always trying to grasp—don't you know why you can't grasp it, Pauline? Because it's your own self, your own image reflected as in a mirror."
He broke off abruptly, acutely conscious that he was leaning far over the barrier between them. There was a distant shout, from vigorous, boyish lungs. Gardiner, mad with the joy of healthy seven, came running and jumping across the field to land with a leap astride the hillock, scattering wisps of hay over his mother and Scarborough. ”

“ Gardiner had lived all his life too close to nature to escape the call of the spring. If his work had been out of doors, in the garden or the farm, he might have come through better; but he was in the printing room; always hot and stuffy with glue, and his exercise was limited to the five minutes' walk to and fro. He lost his sleep, and in the long vigils he was tormented by visions of Rochehaut. ”

“ Gardiner was a foreign member of the Accademia di Santa Cecilia and attended one of its meetings in Rome; he was also corresponding member of the Institut historique de France. His popularity among all classes was due to his exuberant high spirits, kindness, and brilliant conversational powers. At the age of eighty-three he was still in vigorous bodily health, with bright, unclouded intellect. He died after a week's illness at Leicester, 16 Nov. 1853, and was buried in the new cemetery. His portrait by Miss M. A. Hull was published by Messrs. Allen of Leicester. ”

“ The chief points in Gardiner's life must be taken from the Rev. Dr. Doddridge's "Some remarkable passages in the Life of the Hon. Colonel James Gardiner, who was slain at the battle of Prestonpans, September 21, 1745." He was the son of Captain Patrick Gardiner, of Torwood Head, Linlithgowshire, and was born 10 January, 1687. At the early age of 14 he bore an ensign's commission in a Scotch Regiment in the Dutch service until 1702, when he received an Ensign's commission from Queen Anne. At the age of 19, in the battle of Ramillies, he received a wound in his mouth by a musket ball. ”