LORD HALIFAX AND MRS. CATHERINE BARTON.
(Vol. viii., p 429.)
Your Correspondent Prof. De Morgan has so ingeniously analysed the facts, which he already possesses, bearing on the connexion of Sir Isaac Newton's niece with Lord Halifax, and her designation in the Biographia Britannica, that I am tempted to furnish him with some additional evidence. This question of Mrs. Catherine Barton's widowhood has often been canvassed by that portion of her relatives who do not possess the custody of Sir Isaac Newton's private letters.
The Montagues had a residence in the village of Bregstock in Northamptonshire, where the Bartons lived. The Bartons were a family of good descent, and had long been lessees of the crown with the Montagues for lands near Braystock.
There were several Colonel Bartons, whose respective ages and relationship can best be
exhibited by a short pedigree. Thomas Barton had two sons, Thomas and Robert.
Robert (born in 1630, and who died in 1693) married Hannah Smith, Newton's half-sister, by whom he had Hannah (born 1678), Catherine (born 1679, died 1739), Colonel Robert (born 1684).
Thomas (born in 1619, died in 1704) married Alice Palmer, by whom he had Thomas, who married Mary Dale, by whom he had Thomas (d. s. p.), Colonel Matthew (born 1672), Colonel Noel (born 1674, died 1714). Thomas had a second son, Geoffrey, who married Elizabeth ——, by whom he had Charles (born 1700), Cutts (born 1706), Catherine (born 1709), Montague (born 1717), and others.
In a family paper written by a granddaughter of Colonel Noel Barton, at her mother's dictation, it is stated that Colonel Matthew married a relative of Sir Isaac Newton, and was Comptroller of the Mint; but this paper is not very correct in its other statements.
On the other hand, a connexion of the family who signs himself H. in an old number of the Gentleman's Magazine, says of Newton:
"He had a half-sister, who had a daughter, to whom he gave the best of educations, the famous witty Miss Barton, who married Mr. Conduit of the Mint."
Mr. Conduit writes, that his wife lived twenty years before and after her marriage with Sir Issac.
I had always thought that Catherine Barton's brother Robert had died too early to attain the rank of Colonel. In the British Museum, in the Register, there is an account of a sermon preached at the funeral of Robert Barton in the year 1703. I could not find the sermon.
The famous Duchess of Marlborough thus satirises Mouse Montague:
"He was a frightful figure, and yet pretended to be a lover; and followed several beauties, who laughed at him for it."
It is worth mentioning that Colonel Noel Barton died in London in 1714, while in attendance on his patron Lord Gainsborough, soon after he had been appointed Governor of the Leeward Islands. This was the year before Lord Halifax's Life was written, and possibly might have been the cause of the designation "Widow" being applied to Catherine Barton by mistake. Whatever the connexion of this lady with Lord Halifax may have been, it does not seem to have given any offence to her relatives. You will observe that Geoffrey Barton names his sons Charles and Montague, and his daughter Catherine. Charles afterwards received the rectory of St. Andrew's Holborn from the family of Montague; and Cutts was Dean of Bristol under Bishop Montague. And Montague obtained preferment from Mr. Conduit. Neither the family of Montague, nor that of Barton, seem to have thought the connexion discreditable. Moreover, the births of these children of Geoffrey Barton, a clergyman, occurred at the very period when the name of Catherine should have been most distasteful, had the intimacy been dishonourable.
Mr. Conduit died in the year 1738, and Mrs. Conduit in the year 1739; and Catherine Conduit did not become Lady Lymington till 1740. Probably both Mr. and Mrs. Conduit made wills. Have they been examined at Doctors' Commons?
J. W. J.