“The King had made him a Knight of the Garter on Jan. 12, 1651; but he does not appear to have received the insignia until ten years later. By a warrant of April 10, 1661, the King ordered Lord Sandwich, Master of the Great Wardrobe, to give Newcastle ‘18 yards of blue velvet for an upper robe, 10 yards of crimson velvet for an under robe or surcoat, together with 16 yards of white taffata to line them both’. The King also ordered Sir Gilbert Talbot, Master of the Jewels, to give him a collar of gold, ‘containing the usual number of garters,’ ‘likewise one rich George on horseback’. After the Restoration, his Majesty made him one of the Gentlemen of his Bed-Chamber.”
Lady Newcastle says that her husband “at last” borrowed enough money to redeem her out of pawn; or rather nearly enough; for even then the amount he sent over was £400 short, and she had to borrow that sum from a Sir John Shaw, in Antwerp, to make it up. After sundry adventures, she sailed for England in a Dutch man-of-war. When she had joined her husband, she was rather disappointed at finding him in circumstances which she did not consider befitting his rank. “After I was safely arrived at London, I found my Lord in Lodgings; I cannot call them unhandsome; but yet they were not fit for a Person of his Rank and Quality, nor of the capacity to contain all his Family: Neither did I find my Lord’s Condition such as I expected.”
Some historians hint that her ladyship found herself mocked and derided by the gay ladies and the flippant gallants at the licentious Court of Charles II, where she felt out of her element, and that this was her chief reason for wishing to retire to Welbeck. She continues: “Wherefore out of some passion I desir’d him to leave the Town, and retire into the countrey; but my Lord gently reproved me for my rashness and impatience”.
She got her way, however, before long; and Newcastle obtained the King’s leave to retire to Welbeck. The only account we have of his financial affairs, after the Restoration, is that of his wife; therefore, part of it shall be given here; although even that part is wearisome, lengthy, and far from lucid; indeed it may be skipped without serious loss.[145]
[145] A Cavalier in Exile, p. 88 seq.
Newcastle “kissed His Majesty’s hand, and went the next day into Nottinghamshire, to his Manor-house call’d Welbeck; but when he came there, and began to examine his Estate, and how it had been ordered in the time of his Banishment, he knew not whether he had left any thing of it for himself, or not, till by his prudence and wisdom he inform’d himself the best he could, examining those that had most knowledge therein. Some Lands, he found, could be recover’d no further then for his life, and some not at all: Some had been in the Rebels hands, which he could not recover, but by His Highness the Duke of York’s favour, to whom His Majesty had given all the Estates of those that were condemned and executed for murdering his Royal Father of blessed memory, which by the Law were forfeited to His Majesty; whereof His Highness graciously restor’d my Lord so much of the Land that formerly had been his, as amounted to 730£ a year. And though my Lord’s Children had their Claims granted, and bought out the life of my Lord, their Father, which came near upon the third part, yet my Lord received nothing for himself out of his own Estate, for the space of eighteen years, viz., During the time from the first entring into Warr, which was June 11, 1642, till his return out of Banishment, May 28, 1660; for though his Son Henry, now Earl of Ogle, and his eldest Daughter, the now Lady Cheiny, did all what lay in their power to relieve my Lord their Father, and sent him some supplies of moneys at several times when he was in banishment; yet that was of their own, rather then out of my Lord’s Estate; for the Lady Cheiny sold some few Jewels which my Lord, her Father, had left her, and some Chamber-Plate which she had from her Grandmother, and sent over the money to my Lord, besides 1000£ of her Portion: And the now Earl of Ogle did at several times supply my Lord, his Father, with such moneys as he had partly obtained upon Credit, and partly made by his Marriage.
“After my Lord had begun to view those Ruines that were nearest, and tried the Law to keep or recover what formerly was his, (which certainly shew’d no favour to him, besides that the Act of Oblivion proved a great hinderance and obstruction to those his designs, as it did no less to all the Royal Party) and had settled so much of his Estate as possibly he could, he cast up the Summ of his Debts, and set out several parts of Land for the payment of them, or of some of them (for some of his Lands could not be easily sold, being entailed)....”
From this we learn that, so soon as he was able, Newcastle sold property to pay the large debts which he incurred during his sixteen years of exile. With cumulative interest their amount must have been very great.
“His two Houses Welbeck and Bolsover he found much out of repair, and this later half pull’d down, no furniture or any necessary Goods were left in them, but some few Hangings and Pictures, which had been saved by the care and industry of his Eldest Daughter the Lady Cheiny,[146] and were bought over again after the death of his eldest Son Charles, Lord Mansfield; for they being given to him, and he leaving some debts to be paid after his death, My Lord sent to his other Son Henry, now Earl of Ogle, to endeavour for so much Credit, that the said Hangings and Pictures (which my Lord esteemed very much, the Pictures being drawn by Van Dyke) might be saved; which he also did, and My Lord hath paid the debt since his return.”