Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 34.djvu/172

 a son, William, the father of John Lovelace, fourth baron [see under, third ]. The governor of New York must be carefully distinguished from Francis Lovelace (d. 1664), the recorder of Canterbury, and from Colonel Francis, brother of Richard Lovelace the poet [q. v.] 

LOVELACE, JOHN, third of Hurley (1638?–1693), was grandson of Sir Richard Lovelace (1568–1634) of Hurley, Berkshire, who was knighted at Dublin on 5 Aug. 1599, and elevated to the peerage by Charles I on 30 May 1627. His father was John Lovelace, second baron (1616–1670), and his mother, Lady Anne, daughter and eventual heiress of Thomas Wentworth, first earl of Cleveland. It was this ‘Lady Anne’ to whom Richard Lovelace dedicated his ‘Lucasta.’ Of his grandfather, Sir Richard, Fuller says: ‘He was a gentleman of mettal; and in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, making use of letters of mark, had the successe to light on a large remnant of the King of Spain's cloth of silver, I mean his West Indian fleet; wherewith he and his posterity are warmer to this day’ (Worthies, 1811, i. 112). Of the same man, Garrard, in a letter to the Earl of Strafford, dated 3 June 1634, says: ‘Lovelace being my neighbour, born near Windsor, I knew him well, though he was born but to 400l. a year, yet he left to his only son, aged near 20, near 7,000l. a year: All got by a fortunate marriage with a rich citizen's daughter (of which an early example), she was worth to him 50,000l.’ (, Letters and Despatches, ed. Knowles, i. 260; Hist. MSS. Comm. 11th Rep. App. vii. p. 213). His father was a staunch royalist, who signed the declaration in favour of Charles I in June 1642, and joined the king at Oxford in August 1643 (, Hist. v. 346, vii. 174). He came in to compound for delinquency on 24 March 1645, was assessed to pay a fine of 18,373l. 1s. 10d., and after numerous petitions, reviews, abatements, and delays, succeeded in getting his sequestration suspended after payment of about 4,000l. (Cal. Comm. Comp. ii. 1188). He was lord-lieutenant of Berkshire from 1660 to 1668, died at Woodstock 25 Sept. 1670, and was buried at Hurley (, Antiq. of Berkshire, p. 207;, Memorials, 1682, pp. 76, 352; Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1660–1667 passim). Details of some clumsy attempts at intrigue made by him during 1643 and 1644, in which he was the dupe of Sir Harry Vane and other parliament men, are given in Baillie's ‘Correspondence’ (Bannatyne Club, ii. passim).

The son, who was born at Hurley about 1638, was educated at Wadham College, Oxford, whence he matriculated 25 July 1655, was created M.A. 9 Sept. 1661 (, Alumni Oxon. 1500–1714), travelled in France and the Low Countries (cf. Thurloe State Papers, ed. Birch, vi. 151), and represented Berkshire in the House of Commons from 1661 until his father's death in 1670, when he succeeded to the peerage. In 1680 he was greatly affronted by being left out of the commission of the peace for Berkshire (Hist. MSS. Comm. 11th Rep. App. ii. 173). He soon became noted for his sporting propensities, and still more for his violent whiggism. He very probably imbibed some of his political notions from John Owen (1616–1683) [q. v.], the noted independent, who was chaplain at Hurley between 1640 and 1650 (, Queen's Scholars, p. 21). In 1680, during a visit of Monmouth to Oxford, he offered a plate to be run for ‘in Portmeed,’ on which occasion Monmouth himself rode, but was not successful. In July of this year he was made free of the city of Oxford, and, at a banquet in his honour, drank ‘to the confusion of all popish princes’ (, Life and Times, ed. Clarke, ii. 490). He was arrested in 1683 ‘on account of the [Rye House] plot,’ but was discharged on bail. In March 1688 he was summoned before the privy council for telling some constables that they need not obey a Roman catholic justice of the peace (, i. 266, 342). Subjected to a strict examination, he resolutely refused to incriminate himself, and the evidence against him was insufficient. He was dismissed, but before he retired James II exclaimed, in great heat, ‘My lord, this is not the first trick you have played me.’ ‘Sir,’ answered Lovelace, ‘I never played any trick to your majesty or to any other person. Whoever has accused me to your majesty of playing tricks is a liar’ (, 27 Feb. 1688; of same date, quoted by ). At Oxford, after James's interference at Magdalen, he became very popular, and for a time ‘Lord Lovelace's Health’ was a standing toast (letter from Thomas Newey of Christ Church, quoted in Notes and Queries, 3rd ser. p. 263 and n.) Shortly afterwards, admitted into the confidence of those who planned the revolution, Lovelace embraced the cause of William with characteristic