See B. Botfield, Stemmata Botevilliana (1858).
BATH, WILLIAM PULTENEY, 1st Earl of (1684-1764), generally known by the surname of Pulteney, English politician, descended from an ancient family of Leicestershire, was the son of William Pulteney by his first wife, Mary Floyd, and was born in April 1684. The boy was sent to Westminster school, and from it proceeded to Christ Church, Oxford, matriculating the 31st of October 1700. At these institutions he acquired his deep classical knowledge. On leaving Oxford he made the usual tour on the continent. In 1705 he was brought into parliament by Henry Guy (secretary of the treasury, 1679-1688, and June 1691 to February 1695) for the Yorkshire borough of Hedon, and at his death on the 23rd of February 1710 inherited an estate of £500 a year and £40,000 in cash. This seat was held by him without a break until 1734. Throughout the reign of Queen Anne William Pulteney played a prominent part in the struggles of the Whigs, and on the prosecution of Sacheverell he exerted himself with great zeal against that violent divine. When the victorious Tories sent his friend Robert Walpole to the Tower in 1712, Pulteney championed his cause in the House of Commons and with the leading Whigs Visited him in his prison-chamber. He held the post of secretary of war from 1714 to 1717 in the first ministry of George I., and when the committee of secrecy on the Utrecht treaty was formed in April 1715 the list included the flame of William Pulteney. Two years later (6th of July 1716), he became one of the privy council. When Townshend was dismissed, in April 1717, from his post of lord-lieutenant of Ireland, and Walpole resigned his places, they were followed in their retirement by Pulteney. The crash of the South Sea Company restored Walpole to the highest position, but all that he offered to Pulteney was a peerage. The offer was rejected, but in May 1723 Pulteney stooped to accept the lucrative but insignificant post of cofferer of the household. In this obscure position he was content for some time to await the future; but when he found himself neglected he opposed the proposition of Walpole to discharge the debts of the civil list, and in April 1725 was dismissed from his sinecure. From the day of his dismissal to that of his ultimate triumph Pulteney remained in opposition, and, although Sir Robert Walpole attempted in 1730 to conciliate him by the offer of Townshend’s place and of a peerage, all his overtures were spurned. Pulteney’s resentment was not confined to his speeches in parliament. With Bolingbroke he set on foot in December 1726 the well-known periodical called the Craftsman, and in its pages the minister was incessantly denounced for many years. Lord Hervey published an attack on the Craftsman, and Pulteney, either openly or behind the person of Amhurst, its editor, replied to the attack. Whether the question at issue was the civil list, the excise, the income of the prince of Wales, or the state of domestic affairs Pulteney was ready with a pamphlet, and the minister or one of his friends came out with a reply. For his “Proper reply to a late scurrilous libel” (Craftsman, 1731), an answer to “Sedition and defamation displayed,” he was challenged to a duel by Lord Hervey; for another, “An answer to one part of an infamous libel entitled remarks on the Craftsman’s indication of his two honourable patrons,” he was in July 1731 struck off the roll of privy councillors and dismissed from the commission of the peace in several counties. In print Pulteney was inferior to Bolingbroke alone among the antagonists of Walpole, but in parliament, from which St John was excluded, he excelled all his comrades. When the sinking fund was appropriated in 1733 his voice was the foremost in denunciation; when the excise scheme in the same year was stirring popular feeling to its lowest depths the passion of the multitude broke out in his oratory. Through Walpole’s prudent withdrawal of the latter measure the fall, of his ministry was averted. Bolingbroke withdrew to France on the suggestion, it is said, of Pulteney, and the opposition was weakened by the dissensions of the leaders.
From the general election of 1734 until his elevation to the peerage Pulteney sat for Middlesex. For some years after this election the minister’s assailants made little progress in their attack, but in 1738 the troubles with Spain supplied them with the opportunity which they desired. Walpole long argued for peace, but he was feebly supported in his own cabinet, and the frenzy of the people for War knew no bounds. In an evil moment for his own reputation he consented to remain in office and to gratify popular passion with a war against Spain. His downfall was not long deferred. War was declared in 1739; a new parliament was summoned in the summer of 1741, and over the divisions on the election petitions the ministry of Walpole fell to pieces. The task of forming the new administration was after some delay entrusted to Pulteney, who weakly offered the post of first lord of the treasury to that harmless politician the earl of Wilmington, and contented himself with a seat in the cabinet and a peerage thinking that by this action he would preserve his reputation for consistency in disdaining office and yet retain his supremacy in the ministry. At this act popular feeling broke out into open indignation, and from the moment of his elevation to the Upper House Pulteney’s influence dwindled to nothing. Horace Walpole asserts that when Pulteney wished to recall his desire for a peerage it was forced upon him through the ex-minister’s advice by the king, and another chronicler of the times records that when victor and vanquished met in the House of Lords, the one as Lord Orford, the other as the earl of Bath, the remark was made by the exulting Orford: “Here we are, my lord, the two most insignificant fellows in England.” On the 14th of July 1742 Pulteney was created Baron Pulteney of Hedon, Co. York, Viscount Pulteney of Wrington, Co. Somerset, and earl of Bath. On the 20th of February he had been restored to his rank in the privy council. At Wilmington’s death in 1743 he made application to the king for the post of first lord of the treasury, only to find that it had been conferred on Henry Pelham. For two days, 10th-12th February 1746, he was at the head of a ministry, but in “48 hours, three quarters, seven minutes, and eleven seconds” it collapsed. An occasional pamphlet and an infrequent speech were afterwards the sole fruits of Lord Bath’s talents. His praises whilst in retirement have been sung by two bishops, Zachary Pearce and Thomas Newton. He died on the 7th of July 1764, and was buried on the 17th of July in his own vault in Islip chapel, Westminster Abbey. He married on the 27th of December 1714 Anna Maria, daughter and co-heiress of John Gumley of Isleworth, commissary-general to the army who was often satirized by the wits of the day (Notes and Queries, 3rd S. ii. 402-403, iii. 490). She died on the 14th of September 1758, and their only son William died unmarried at Madrid on the 12th of February 1763. Pulteney’s vast fortune came in 1767 to William Johnstone of Dumfries (third son of Sir James Johnstone), who had married Frances, daughter and co-heiress of his cousin, Daniel Pulteney, a bitter antagonist of Walpole in parliament, and had taken the name of Pulteney.
Pulteney’s eloquence was keen and incisive, sparkling with vivacity and with allusions drawn from the literature of his own country and of Rome. Of business he was never fond, and the loss in 1734 of his trusted friend John Merrill, who had supplied the qualities which he lacked, was feelingly lamented by him in a letter to Swift. His chief weakness was a passion for money. Lord Bath has left no trace of the possession of practical statesmanship.
Bibliography.—Wm. Coxe’s Memoirs of Sir Robert Walpole (1816), and of Henry Pelham (1829); John Morley’s Walpole (1889); Walter Sichel’s Bolingbroke (1901-1902); A. Ballantyne’s Carteret (1887); Eng. Hist. Rev. iv. 749-753, and the general political memoirs of the time.
(W. P. C.)
BATH, a city, municipal, county and parliamentary borough, and health resort of Somersetshire, England, on the Great Western, Midland, and Somerset & Dorset railways, 107½ m. W. by S. of London. Pop. (1901) 49,839. Its terraces and crescents, built mostly of grey freestone, cover the slopes and heights of the abrupt hills which rise like an amphitheatre above the winding valley of the river Avon. The climate is pleasant, and the city, standing amidst fine scenery, itself possesses a number of beautiful walks and gardens. Jointly with Wells, it is an episcopal see of the Church of England. The abbey church of St Peter and St Paul occupies the site of earlier Saxon and Norman churches, founded in connexion with a 7th-century convent, which was transferred for a time to a body of secular canons, and from about 970 until the Dissolution, to Benedictine monks. The present cruciform building dates from the 15th century, being a singularly pure and ornate example of late Perpendicular work. From the number of its windows, it has been called “The Lantern of the West,” and especially noteworthy is the great west window, with seven lights, and flanking turrets on which are carved figures of the angels ascending and descending on Jacob’s Ladder. Within are the tombs of James Quin, the actor, with an epitaph by Garrick; Richard Nash; Thomas Malthus the economist; William Broome the poet, and many others. Some of the monuments are the work of Bacon, Flaxman and Chantrey. Slight traces of the previous Norman building remain. There are many other churches and chapels in Bath, the oldest being that of St Thomas of Canterbury, and one of the most interesting St Swithin’s, which contains the tombs of Christopher Anstey and Madame d’Arblay. Among educational institutions may be mentioned the free grammar school, founded by Edward VI., the Wesleyan College, originally established at Bristol by John Wesley, and the Roman Catholic College. The hospital of St John was founded in the 12th century. The public buildings include a guild hall, assembly rooms, Jubilee hall, art gallery and library, museum, literary and scientific institute, and theatres. In the populous suburb of Twerton (pop. 11,098), there are lias quarries, and bricks and woollen cloths are manufactured. The parliamentary borough returns two members. The city is governed by a mayor, 14 aldermen and 42 councillors. Area, 3382 acres.
The mineral springs supply several distinct establishments. The temperature varies in the different springs from 117° to 120° F, and the specific gravity of the hot baths is 1.002. The principal substances in solution are calcium and sodium sulphates, and sodium and magnesium chlorides. Traces of radium have been revealed, and the gases contain argon and helium. The waters are very beneficial in cases of rheumatism, gout, neuralgia, sciatica, diseases of the liver, and cutaneous and scrofulous affections. The highest archaeological interest, moreover, attaches to the baths in view of the magnificent Roman remains testifying to the early recognition of the value of the waters. It may here be noted that two distinct legends ascribe the foundation of Bath to a British king Bladud. According to Geoffrey of Monmouth this monarch gave its healing power to the water by his spells. According to a later version, he was banished as a leper, and made the discovery leading to his cure, and to the origin of Bath, whilst wandering as a swineherd in 863 B.C. This, at least, is the date inscribed on a statue of Bladud placed in the Pump Room in 1699. There is, however, no real evidence of a British settlement. By the Romans Bath was named Aquae Sulis, the name indicating the dedication to a British goddess Sul or Sulis, whom the Romans considered the counterpart of Minerva. There were a temple of the goddess and a few houses for priests, officials and visitors, besides the large baths, and the place was apparently walled; but it did not contain a large resident population. Many relics have been disinterred, such as altars, inscriptions, fragments of stone carvings and figures, Samian ware, and others. The chief buildings were apparently grouped near the later abbey churchyard, and included, besides two temples, a magnificent bath, discovered when the duke of Kingston pulled down the old priory in 1755 to form the Kingston Baths. Successive excavations have rendered accessible a remarkable series of remains, including several baths, a sudarium, and conduits. The main bath still receives its water (now for the purpose of cooling) through the original conduit. The fragmentary colonnade surrounding this magnificent relic still supports the street and buildings beneath which it lies, the Roman foundations having been left untouched. The remains of the bath and of the temple are among the most striking Roman antiquities in western Europe.