William Poyntz, Esquire:
By SIR GEORGE HAYTER.
Born, 1769. Died, 1840. The last male representative of the ancient family of Poyntz. His grandfather, Stephen Poyntz, was in diplomacy, and employed on several foreign missions. He married Anna Maria Mordaunt, cousin of the Earl of Peterborough, and Maid of Honour to Caroline, Queen of George II. To Mr. and Mrs. Poyntz’s care was confided the bringing up, of William, Duke of Cumberland, and a curious picture was painted, according to the taste of the day, in which the Queen presents her son to her ci-devant Maid of Honour, the lady in the garb of Minerva, and the young Prince in the stiff coat and breeches of the period. Mrs. Poyntz’s influence at Court stood her once in good stead, when she pleaded in behalf of Lord Cromartie, under sentence of death in the ’15, in compliance with a touching appeal from his unhappy wife. The letter is now in possession of Mrs. Poyntz’s great grand-daughter, Mary Boyle. Lord Cromartie’s life was spared, though fortune, and title were lost to him. The Queen bestowed as a dowry on Miss Mordaunt, the estate of Midgham, in Berkshire, but the gift is said never to have been paid for, out of the royal purse!
Stephen died in 1750, and was succeeded by his son William, who married a daughter and co-heiress of Kelland Courtenay, Esq., of Painsford, Devon, by Elizabeth Montagu, daughter of Viscount Hinchingbrook. They had issue: William Stephen, the subject of this notice, Montagu Mordaunt, who died early in life, and four daughters; Georgiana, married first to Mr. Fawkner, and afterwards to Lord John Townshend; Louisa, married, as his second wife, to the Hon. George Bridgeman; Isabella, married to her cousin, the Earl of Cork and Orrery; and Carolina, married to his brother Captain, the Hon. Courtenay Boyle. William Poyntz was at one time in the Tenth Hussars, and afterwards Captain of the Midhurst Volunteers. In 1796, he sat in Parliament for St. Albans, and was re-elected in 1802, and 1806. In 1807, he was returned for Callington, and again in 1812-18. He represented Chichester from 1823 to 1826, and Ashburton, from 1831 to 1835; and then sat for Midhurst, till he resigned, and was succeeded by his son-in-law, Captain the Hon. Frederick Spencer. In politics he was a Liberal in the best sense of the word; firm and unwavering in his opinions in favour of progress, but opposed to destruction, and a staunch upholder of the Church.
In 1794, he married the Hon. Elizabeth Browne, only sister, and sole heiress of Viscount Montagu, who was drowned the year before at the Falls of Schaffausen. By her, Mr. Poyntz became possessed of Cowdray Park, in Sussex, and an extensive property, where they resided almost entirely after their marriage. They had two sons drowned in the prime of life, and in the sight of both parents, Mr. Poyntz being in the boat, and his wife looking on from the window of a house at Bognor, where the tragedy took place in 1815. Their three daughters in consequence became co-heiresses: Frances, Lady Clinton; Elizabeth, married to the Hon. Frederick Spencer, who succeeded to the Earldom; and Isabella, Marchioness of Exeter.
In 1830, after a happy union of thirty-six years, Mrs. Poyntz died, deeply and universally regretted; and the widower removed to Hampton Court, after a time, to be nearer his daughters. For some years before his death, he was the cause of great anxiety to his family and friends from being constantly subject to fainting fits, the result, as was afterwards proved, of an accident in the hunting field, in 1833. In one of these seizures he expired suddenly, at his house on Hampton Court Green, beloved and lamented, not only by his surviving children, and his two surviving sisters, but by a large circle of acquaintance, and friends. In every class he was known, and loved for his warm heart, his genial humour, his sparkling wit. He was interred by the side of his wife, in her ancestral chapel in Easebourne Church, adjoining Cowdray Park, where a monument had been already erected to their two sons.
In early life Mr. Poyntz was a friend, and companion of his cousin George, Lord Sandwich, by whose will he was entrusted with the guardianship of the young earl, then only seven years of age. Between the guardian and his ward an affection subsisted, scarcely inferior to that of parent, and child. Lord Sandwich spent many of his holidays at Cowdray, and the friendly relations which subsisted between him, and Mr. Poyntz were never interrupted till the death of the latter, in 1840.
The two families of Poyntz and Browne, (Lord Montagu) are now extinct, in the male line.
