The manor of Clopton was granted to John de Clopton by Peter de Montfort, in 1236, while Henry the Third was king, and the family of Clopton dwelt there for more than five hundred years. The Cloptons of Warwickshire and those of Suffolk are of the same family, and at Long Melford, in Suffolk, may be found many memorials of it. The famous Sir Hugh,—who built New Place in 1490, restored the Guild chapel, glazed the chancel of Stratford church, reared much of Clopton House, where he was visited by Henry the Seventh, and placed the bridge across the Avon at Stratford, where it still stands,—died in London, in 1496, and was buried at St. Margaret's, Lothbury. Joyce, or Jocasa, Clopton, born in 1558, became a lady-in-waiting to Queen Elizabeth, and afterwards to Queen Anne, wife of James the First, and ultimately married George Carew, created Earl of Totnes and Baron of Clopton. Carew, born in 1557, was the son of a Dean of Exeter, and he became the English commander-in-chief in Ireland, in the time of Elizabeth. King James ennobled him, with the title of Baron Clopton, in 1605, and Charles the First made him Earl of Totnes, in 1625. The Earl and his Countess are buried in Stratford church, where their marble effigies, recumbent in the Clopton pew, are among the finest monuments of that hallowed place. The Countess died in 1636, leaving no children, and the Earl thereupon caused all the estates that he had acquired by marriage with her to be restored to the Clopton family. Sir John Clopton, born in 1638, married the daughter and co-heiress of Sir Edward Walker, owner of Clopton in the time of Charles the Second, and it is interesting to remember that by him was built the well-known house at Stratford, formerly called the Shoulder of Mutton,[6] but more recently designated the Swan's Nest. Mention is made of a Sir John Clopton by whom the well in which Lady Margaret drowned herself was enclosed; it is still called Lady Margaret's Well; a stone, at the back of it, is inscribed "S. J. C. 1686." Sir John died in 1692, leaving a son, Sir Hugh, who died in 1751, aged eighty. The last Clopton in the direct line was Frances, born in 1718, who married Mr. Parthenwicke, and died in 1792.
CLOPTON HOUSE
Clopton House is of much antiquity, but it has undergone many changes. The north and west sides of the present edifice were built in the time of Henry the Seventh. The building was originally surrounded with a moat.[7] A part of the original structure remains at the back,—a porchway entrance, once accessible across the moat, and an oriel window at the right of that entrance. Over the front window are displayed the arms of Clopton,—an eagle, perched upon a tun, bearing a shield; and in the gable appear the arms of Walker, with the motto, Loyauté mon honneur. Sir Edward Walker was Lord of Clopton soon after the Restoration, and by him the entrance to the house, which used to be where the dining-room now is, was transferred to its present position. It was Walker who carried to Charles the Second, in Holland, in 1649, the news of the execution of his father. A portrait of the knight, by Dobson, hangs on the staircase wall at Clopton, where he died in 1677, aged sixty-five. He was Garter-king-at-arms. His remains are buried in Stratford church, with an epitaph over them by Dugdale. Mr. Ward owned the estate about 1840, and under his direction many changes were made in the old building,—sixty workmen having been employed upon it for six months. The present drawing-room and conservatory were built by Mr. Ward, and by him the whole structure was "modernised." There are wild stories that autographs and other relics of Shakespeare once existed at Clopton, and were consumed there, in a bon-fire. A stone in the grounds marks the grave of a silver eagle, that was starved to death, through the negligence of a gamekeeper, November 25, 1795. There are twenty-six notable portraits in the main hall of Clopton, one of them being that of Oliver Cromwell's mother, and another probably that of the unfortunate and unhappy Arabella Stuart,—only child of the fifth Earl of Lennox,—who died, at the Tower of London, in 1615.
Warwickshire swarmed with conspirators while the Gunpowder Plot was in progress. The Lion Inn at Dunchurch was the chief tryst of the captains who were to lead their forces and capture the Princess Elizabeth and seize the throne and the country, after the expected explosion,—which never came. And when the game was up and Fawkes in captivity, it was through Warwickshire that the "racing and chasing" were fleetest and wildest, till the desperate scramble for life and safety went down in blood at Hewel Grange. Various houses associated with that plot are still extant in this neighbourhood, and when the scene shifts to London and to Garnet's Tyburn gallows, it is easily possible for the patient antiquarian to tread in almost every footprint of that great conspiracy.
Warwick Castle, from the Mound.
Since Irish ruffians began to toss dynamite about in public buildings it has been deemed essential to take especial precaution against the danger of explosion in such places as the Houses of Parliament, Westminster Abbey, and the Tower of London. Much more damage[46] than the newspapers recorded was done by the explosions that occurred some time ago in the Tower and the Palace. At present you cannot enter even into Palace Yard unless connected with the public business or authorised by an order; and if you visit the Tower without a special permit you will be restricted to a few sights and places. I was fortunately the bearer of the card of the Lord Chamberlain, on a recent prowl through the Tower, and therefore was favoured by the beef-eaters who pervade that structure. Those damp and gloomy dungeons were displayed wherein so many Jews perished miserably in the reign of Edward the First; and Little Ease was shown,—the cell in which for several months Guy Fawkes was incarcerated, during Cecil's wily investigation of the Gunpowder Plot. A part of the rear wall has been removed, affording access to the adjacent dungeon; but originally the cell did not give room for a man to lie down in it, and scarce gave room for him to stand upright. The massive door, of ribbed and iron-bound oak, still solid, though worn, would make an impressive picture. A poor, stealthy cat was crawling about in those subterranean dens of darkness and horror, and was left locked in there when we emerged. In St. Peter's, on the green,—that little cemetery so eloquently described by Macaulay,—they came, some time ago, upon the coffins of Lovat, Kilmarnock, and Balmerino, the Scotch lords who perished upon the block for their complicity with the rising for the Pretender, in 1745-47. The coffins were much decayed. The plates were removed, and these may now be viewed, in a glass case on the church wall, over against the spot where those unfortunate gentlemen were buried.[8] One is of lead and is in the form of a large open scroll. The other two are oval in shape, large, and made of pewter. Much royal and noble dust is heaped together beneath the stones of the chancel,—Anne Boleyn, Catherine Howard, Lady Jane Grey, Margaret, Duchess of Salisbury, the Duke of Monmouth, the Earl of Northumberland, Essex, Overbury, Thomas Cromwell, and many more. The body of the infamous and execrable Jeffreys was once buried there, but it has been removed.
Warwick Castle, from the River.