The Stately Homes of England

by Llewellynn Frederick William Jewitt; S. C. Hall

The Front View.

James I., in the third year of his reign, exchanged Hatfield for the house, manor, and park of Theobalds, with his minister, Sir Robert Cecil, afterwards created Earl of Salisbury, whose descendant, the Marquis of Salisbury, is the present owner, the estates passing in regular succession from that time to the present day, and continuing to be the principal residence of that noble family, about whom we now give some details.

The family of Cecil is one of considerable antiquity, and many of its members have distinguished themselves both in statesmanship, in the field, and in the arena of literature. The greatness of the family was laid by Sir William Cecil, the friend and adviser of Queen Elizabeth before she came to the throne, and her first chief Secretary of State. “This distinguished statesman,” says Sir Robert Naunton, “was the son of a younger brother of the Cecills of Hertfordshire, a family of my own knowledge, though now private, yet of no mean antiquity, who, being exposed and sent to the city, as poor gentlemen used to do their sons, became to be a rich man on London Bridge, and purchased (estates) in Lincolnshire where this man was born.” First he became Secretary to the Protector Somerset, and afterwards, on the accession of Elizabeth, he was appointed Secretary of State. In 1561 he was made President of the Court of Wards. His great talent and assiduity won for him much regard at court, where he was treated with great favour. In 1571 he was created Lord Burleigh, and continued to maintain his distinguished position in the state till his death. He resided chiefly at Theobalds, where he often had the honour of entertaining his sovereign, who was “sene in as great royalty, and served as bountifully and magnificently, as at anie other tyme or place, all at his lordship’s chardge,” &c. The events in the life of this statesman are so closely associated with the history of England itself in the stirring times in which he lived, that they are too well known to need more than a passing notice. After being mixed up in every affair of state from some time before the accession of Elizabeth, having taken part in all the proceedings connected with the unfortunate Mary Queen of Scots, and with his own hand drawn up her death-warrant, and after having for forty years mainly directed the councils of the “Virgin Queen,” Sir William Cecil, now Lord Burleigh, died on the 4th of August, 1598, in the seventh-eighth year of his age, to the great grief of Elizabeth, who is said to have wept bitter tears at his death.

The eldest son of Lord Treasurer Burleigh succeeded him in his title, which has since been augmented by the Earldom and Marquisate of Exeter; while his youngest son, Sir Robert Cecil, inherited much of his father’s talent and wisdom, “with a more subtle policy and a superior capacity for state intrigue.” For certain secret services to James, during the life of Elizabeth, he was raised by the king to the peerage. In 1604 he was created Viscount Cranborne, and, in the year following, he was made Earl of Salisbury. After filling the office of sole Secretary of State, he succeeded, on the death of the Earl of Dorset, to the high post of Lord Treasurer. “Shrewd, subtle, and penetrating,” he discharged his duties with great ability, and while attending to the interests of his country, forgot not his own, having, “by various methods,” increased his inheritance to a very ample extent.

The Garden Front of Hatfield House.

After taking a prominent part in the affairs of state during Elizabeth’s reign, he was the one who, on her death-bed, succeeded in inducing her to name her successor. Cecil, who was then her Secretary, approached her bed with the lord-keeper and the lord-admiral, and begged the dying Queen to name her successor, when she started and said, “I told you my seat had been the seat of kings; I will have no rascal to succeed me!”—when Cecil boldly asked her what she meant by “no rascal?”—to which she replied, a king should succeed her, and who could that be but her cousin of Scotland? and she begged to be no more troubled. Nevertheless, some hours later Cecil again “besought her, if she would have the King of Scots to succeed her, she would show a sign unto them, whereat, suddenly heaving herself up in her bed, she held both her hands joined together over her head in manner of a crown. Then she sank down, fell into a doze, and at three o’clock in the morning died in a stupor.” Five hours after her death, Cecil proclaimed James of Scotland, King of England, Scotland, France, and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, &c., and thus at once secured the country against conflicting claimants to the crown. Soon afterwards he received the new monarch at Theobalds, who a few days later rewarded him by important offices, and by creating him Baron Cecil and afterwards Viscount Cranborne and Earl of Salisbury. From the moment of James’s accession, through all the troublous times of the gunpowder plot, and all the matters relating to Lady Arabella Stuart, to Sir Walter Raleigh, and others, down to 1612, Cecil’s was one of the most prominent names in the kingdom. In that year “he died, worn out and wretched, at Marlborough, on his way back to court.” In his last moments he said, “Ease and pleasure quake to hear of death; but my life, full of cares and miseries, desireth to be dissolved.” It was this nobleman who exchanged his mansion of Theobalds, with the king, for Hatfield. On his death, his title and estates descended to his only son, William Cecil, who became second Earl of Salisbury; and, dying in 1688, was succeeded by James Cecil, as third Earl of Salisbury. The fourth Earl of Salisbury, also named James, died in 1694, and his great grandson, James Cecil, the seventh Earl, was created Marquis of Salisbury by George III., in 1789. This nobleman had succeeded his father in 1780. He married the Lady Mary Amelia Hill, second daughter of the Marquis of Downshire, by whom he had issue a son, who succeeded him, and two daughters. He died in 1823, and was succeeded, as second Marquis of Salisbury, by his only son, James Brownlow Williams Cecil, Viscount Cranborne, who was born in 1791. His lordship married, first, in 1821, Frances Mary Gascoigne, daughter and heiress of Bamber Gascoigne, Esq., and assumed the surname of Gascoigne-Cecil. By this marriage he had issue three sons, Lord James Emilius William Evelyn Gascoigne-Cecil (who died during the lifetime of his father), Lord Robert Arthur Talbot Gascoigne-Cecil, the present Marquis, and Lord Eustace Brownlow Henry Gascoigne-Cecil, M.P.; and two daughters, the Lady Mildred Arabella Charlotte Henrietta, married to A. J. B. Beresford Hope, M.P., and the Lady Blanche Mary Harriet, married to the late J. M. Balfour, Esq. The marquis married secondly, in 1847, the Lady Mary Catherine Sackville-West, daughter of Earl Delawarr, by whom he had issue three sons and two daughters, Lords Sackville Arthur, Arthur, and Lionel; and Ladies Mary Isabella (married to the Earl of Galloway), and Margaret Elizabeth. His lordship died in 1868, and his widow, the Marchioness of Salisbury, was re-married, in 1870, to the present Earl of Derby. He was succeeded by his son, the present peer.

Robert Arthur Talbot Gascoigne-Cecil, third Marquis and sixth Earl of Salisbury, Viscount Cranborne, and Baron Cecil, Chancellor of the University of Oxford, was born in 1830, was educated at Eton and at Christ Church, Oxford (B.A., 1850, M.A. and Fellow of All Souls’ College, 1853), and in 1853 was returned to parliament as M.P. for Stamford, for which place he sat until, in 1868, he succeeded to the title. In 1866-7 he held the office of Secretary of State for India, and still holds many important local appointments. In 1857 his lordship married Georgina, daughter of Sir Edward Hall Alderson, Baron of the Court of Exchequer, by whom he has issue living four sons, viz., James Edward Hubert, Viscount Cranborne, born 1861; Rupert William Ernest, born 1863; Algernon Edward Robert, born 1864, and another born 1869; and two daughters, Beatrix, born in 1858, and Gwendolen, born in 1860. His lordship is patron of eight livings in Hertfordshire, Dorsetshire, and Essex. The arms of the Marquis of Salisbury are quarterly, first and fourth Cecil, viz., barry of ten, argent and azure, over all six escutcheons, three, two and one, sable, each charged with a lion rampant, argent, a crescent, gules, for difference; second and third Gascoigne, viz., argent, on a pale, sable, a conger’s head, erased and erect, or, charged with an ermine spot. Crests, first, on a wreath six arrows in saltire, or, barbed and feathered, argent, banded, gules, buckled and garnished, or, surmounted by a morion or steel cap, proper (Cecil); second, on a wreath a conger’s head erased and erect, or, charged with an ermine spot (Gascoigne). Supporters, two lions, ermine.

Hatfield House is of vast extent; it is of brick, with stone dressings. It was built between the years 1605 and 1611 by Robert Cecil, first Earl of Salisbury. After being suffered to fall into decay, it was restored and beautified by the sixth earl, about the middle of the last century.[38] In 1835, a great part of the west wing was destroyed by fire (in which the Dowager Marchioness of Salisbury perished), little being left of that part of the house besides the outer walls. On this disaster occurring, occasion was taken to effect a general reparation of the entire building. The house is built in the form of a half H, comprising a centre and two wings, the hollow part being turned towards the south. The centre is a magnificent example of the Palladian style, and, although of mixed architecture, presents, in its totality, a design of great richness and beauty.