Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 44.djvu/131

Payne119Payne , which was printed at Birmingham and London in 1811, under the title ‘Trial between the Governess of a Ladies' Boarding School and the Mother of a Pupil committed to her Charge.’ He died at Blunham House, Bedfordshire, on 23 Jan. 1843.

Payne married, in August 1789, Elizabeth Sarah, only daughter of Samuel Steward, esq., of Stourton Castle, Staffordshire. She died on 12 April 1832, having had two sons and four daughters.

The eldest son, Sir Charles Gillies, called fourth baronet (1796–1870), graduated B.A. 1815 and M.A. 1818 from Merton College, Oxford, and joined the Middle Temple. He left a son, Sir Salusbury Gillies Payne (1829–1893), who, born in the West Indies, was educated at Rugby and Brasenose College, Oxford (B.A. in 1852), was called to the bar at the Middle Temple in 1857, and was chosen high sheriff of Bedfordshire in 1875, but did not serve. Sir Salusbury married Catherine, third daughter of Robert Chadwick of High Bank, Manchester. His son, Charles Robert Salusbury (b. 1859), retired lieutenant in the navy, claimed to succeed to the baronetcy in 1893. In 1863 the Rev. Coventry Payne, grandson of Sir John, the titular third baronet, raised the claims of the elder branch of the family in a pamphlet, which was replied to by Sir Charles Gillies Payne. Sir Bernard Burke, after giving particulars of the separate claims in the editions of his ‘Peerage and Baronetage’ between 1868 and 1878, thenceforth ignored the title. Foster's ‘Baronetage’ of 1882 relegates it to the Appendix ‘Chaos.’

 PAYNE, RALPH,  (1738?–1807), politician, was born at Basseterre, St. George parish in St. Christopher's, on 19 March 1737–8 or 1738–9. His father, Ralph Payne (d. 1763), chief justice and afterwards governor of St. Kitts, came of a family which had long been resident at St. Christopher's, whither it had migrated from Lavington in Wiltshire. His mother, whose ancestors came from Bridgwater in Somerset, was Alice, daughter and heiress of Francis Carlisle. After being educated in England, Payne returned to his native island, where he was at once elected a member of the House of Assembly, and at its first meeting unanimously called to the chair. In 1762 he was again in England, and he then made the tour of Europe. On 1 Sept. 1767 he married, at St. George's, Hanover Square, Françoise Lambertine, daughter of Henry, baron Kolbel of Saxony; he was then spoken of in society as ‘a rich West Indian.’ His wife had lived, before her marriage, with the Princess Joseph Poniatowski, and was one of the few charming women on terms of intimacy with Queen Charlotte. After his marriage Payne plunged into politics, and from 1768 to 1771 sat in parliament for the borough of Shaftesbury. In 1769 he made his maiden speech as the seconder of Blackstone's motion, that the complaint of Wilkes against Lord Mansfield was frivolous and trifling. He is said to have been connected with Mansfield, and to have been inspired by him with legal arguments, the speech being received ‘with much applause, although the language was wonderfully verbose.’ Later in the session he made another elaborate oration, on which occasion, according to Horace Walpole, after protesting on his honour that the speech was not premeditated, he inadvertently pulled it out of his pocket in writing. Payne had ‘a good figure, and possessed himself well, having been accustomed to act plays in a private set;’ but his language was turgid, and he became ‘the jest of his companions and the surfeit of the House of Commons,’ so that he soon became dissatisfied with his parliamentary prospects. On 18 Feb. 1771 he was created at St. James's Palace a knight of the Bath, and in the same year was appointed captain-general and governor-in-chief of the Leeward Islands, where he inherited a considerable estate from his parents. (1744–1817) [q. v.] spent some time with him there, and was employed by him in making drawings.

Payne's appointment was very popular, and his recall in 1775 was much against the wish of the inhabitants, who petitioned for his continuance in office, and, by a unanimous vote of the assembly, presented him with a sword set in diamonds. He entered once more on political life, sitting for Camelford in Cornwall from November 1776 to 1780, and for Plympton in Devonshire from 1780 to 1784.

From June 1777 until the suppression of the office in 1782 Payne was a clerk of the board of green cloth. He was one of Fox's political allies, and for many years his house in Grafton Street was known, through his love of hospitality and the personal attrac-