The Boscawens were among the few Cornish gentlemen in the western division, who took what may now be called the liberal side in the Civil War, and they continued to oppose the arbitrary principles of the faction, having at its head the two last brothers of the house of Stuart—and assisted in the glorious Revolution which secured us from civil and religious despotism, by placing the Prince of Orange on our vacant throne.
Hugh Boscawen married Margaret Clinton, eventually coheiress of the Earl of Lincoln, by whom he had a numerous family, all of whom died before him, with the exception of Bridget, married to Hugh Fortescue, ancestor of Earl Fortescue; and with this lady, Mr. Hals states that Mr. Boscawen gave lands and money to the value of a hundred thousand pounds; he died in 1701, and was succeeded by his relation of the same name. This gentleman is understood to have possessed very considerable talents, and powers of exerting them. He continued ably to support the Revolution government, and brought to it a powerful aid arising from the peculiar feature which distinguished Cornwall up to the year 1832.
In 1714, on the German accession, hopes, fears, expectation, and party violence, burst forth with all the fury that had driven them into action thirty years before. Vigorous proceedings were therefore demanded, and may be justified by the exhortation at Salamis, Νυν ὑπερ παντων Αγων.
Yet in moments of cool reflection, and at the distance of a hundred and twenty years from this agitated period, one cannot refrain from thinking that Mr. Boscawen was carried beyond the limits of duty to his country, or zeal for his associates embarked in the same cause, when he undertook and executed the task of arresting his countrymen, and probably his former friends, on the suspicion of their entertaining opinions more favourable than his own to monarchical power, and to what in modern phrase might perhaps be termed conservative principles.
Sir Richard Vyvyan was seized at Trelowarren, conveyed by water to Pendennis Castle, and from thence to the Tower. Mr. Basset, of Tehidy, would also have been arrested if he had not left his house; and other proceedings were taken of equal violence.
These acts, however necessary at the time, produced their moral effects of creating feuds and permanent irritations, so that while the principal agent was admired by one party, and received the reward of an hereditary seat in parliament, as was industriously propagated, in return for these services, the opposite party detested his name, and usually joined to it an epithet drawn from the inferior apparitors of the common law.
This gentleman, created Viscount Falmouth in 1720, married Charlotte, daughter and coheir of Charles Godfrey, Esq. and his wife Charlotte Churchill, sister of the great Duke of Marlborough. They had a very numerous family; the eldest son, Hugh Boscawen, succeeded of course to his father’s estate and hereditary seat in parliament; very little is remembered about him. He is believed to have been kind and benevolent in private life, and the Editor is anxious to avail himself of this opportunity for acknowledging an act of generous and feeling liberality exercised by this gentleman to the benefit of a near relation, about fourscore years ago. In ability he probably fell much below the usual standard of his family, for he is known to have been cajoled into marrying a kept mistress; and idle tales are circulated of his mistaking
“Optat ephippia Bos” for the Latin of his own name, and Horace Walpole for the Roman poet. It is probable these mistakes never literally happened, but such anecdotes are usually characteristic of the individual; if however they really were made, the credit of the family has been amply redeemed by a nephew, who has given to the public one of the best translations of Horace extant in any language.
Of his various brothers very little also is known or remembered, excepting of one, and that one is Admiral Boscawen, the glory not of Cornwall but of his country, the Nelson of his time.
Edward Boscawen went early to sea, expecting (as the Editor has heard from one to whom he related the circumstances) to be advanced almost immediately through family interest and connection to the station of a Lieutenant; when the order was suddenly made for subjecting all midshipmen to a service of six years at the least. “To this order,” he was accustomed to say, “I owe all my knowledge of seamanship, and to this order the British Fleet is mainly indebted for the superior knowledge and skill of its officers.”