Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 38.djvu/401

Rh to her opinion, he took Monmouth with him to Holland in the following January. He was again in Holland with the king in 1692, but whether he continued with him during the campaign is doubtful. The statement that he commanded the royal horse guards (the blues) at the battle of Steinkirk (, i. 96) is erroneous; at that date Monmouth was not an officer of the regiment, and the regiment itself was in England (, Historical Record of the Royal Regiment of Horse Guards, pp. 71-3). Monmouth had meantime conceived some pique against the king, and in December strongly supported the motion for an inquiry into the conduct of the war; on its rejection he was one of the eighteen peers, 'the bitterest whigs and the bitterest tories,' who signed the protest (, vi. 310). This ended his confidential friendship with the king; and in February 1693-4, consequent, it was said, on his advocacy of the bill for triennial parliaments, he was suspended from his post of gentleman of the bedchamber, his regiment of foot was given to his brother Henry, and he ceased to be summoned to the meetings of the privy council. All this increased his bitterness against the king's ministers. In January 1694-5 he supported Nottingham's motion for the consideration of the state of the nation ; and a few weeks later was one of the joint committee appointed to consider the charges of receiving bribes which had been made against the Duke of Leeds, lord president of the council (ib. vii. 182 et seq.) The court now tried to appease him. In April he was again gentleman of the bedchamber, and continued in attendance on the king during the year. But he had not forgiven his enemies, and on the arrest of Sir John Fenwick (1645?-1697) [q. v.] in November 1696, he encouraged him in vain efforts to charge the ministers, Marlborough, Russell, Shrewsbury, and others with complicity in the plot, and suggested ways of emphasising or confirming the accusations, especially against Shrewsbury and Marlborough. The Earl of Carlisle, Lady Mary Fenwick's brother, brought Monmouth's conduct to the notice of the lords. By a very large majority they resolved that he had devised some papers found in Fenwick's possession, which had been concocted so as to incriminate the ministers, and that he ' had spoken undutiful words of the king.' He was ordered to the Tower; 'was turned out of all his places, and his name was struck out of the council-book' (ib. vii. 399). The persons charged by Fenwick were, undoubtedly, in treasonable correspondence with King James, and Monmouth had suggested new witnesses and incriminating interrogations. It does not appear that he himself, or even his enemies, considered that he was dishonoured by the resolutions of the house, and after an imprisonment of three months he was released, 30 March 1697. By the death of his uncle on 19 June 1697 he became Earl of Peterborough, and made up his quarrel with Marlborough and Godolphin. But he continued to wage war against Russell, now Earl of Orford; and took an active part in the motion for the impeachment of Lord Somers, which was managed in the House of Commons by his eldest son, John, lord Mordaunt, now just of age and member for Chippenham. His quarrel with Somers, however, was shortlived ; and in 1702 he was, it is said, collaborating with him in an English version of the `Olynthiacs' and 'Philippics' of Demosthenes, for which he translated the first of the three `Olynthiacs.'

On the accession of Anne, Peterborough, through the influence of the Duchess of Marlborough, was again in favour at court. He was reappointed lord-lieutenant of Northamptonshire, and in December 1702 was appointed Captain-general and Governor of Jamaica and Admiral and Commander-in-chief of the ships of war employed on that station,' with the immediate prospect of active service against the Spanish settlements in the West Indies. It was intended that the expedition should consist of a combined English and Dutch force; but when the Dutch found that they could not spare the requisite number of men, Peterborough declined Godolphin's proposal to go alone. The English force was of inadequate strength. He was no worker of miracles, he said; and he had no wish to go to the other world loaded with empty titles (, Life of Locke, p. 242). His commission was therefore cancelled ; and except that he vehemently opposed and assisted in rejecting the Bill for preventing Occasional Conformity, in December 1703, he led a comparatively private life till, in the beginning of 1705, he was offered the command of the expeditionary army to Spain. On 31 March he was appointed general and commander-in-chief of the forces in the fleet, and on 1 May was granted a further commission as admiral and commander-in-chief of the fleet, jointly with Sir Clowdisley Shovell [q. v.] The two were named 'joint admirals and chief-commanders of the fleet,' `and in case of death, or in the absence or inability of either of you, the other of you' was to act as `admiral and chief-commander.' Peterborough was entrusted with exactly the same powers as Shovell, and each was authorised ' to wear the union