RADCLYFFE, Francis (1625-96)

Sir Francis Radclyffe came from a long-established Catholic gentry family in Northumberland with extensive property there and in surrounding counties. His estate included Dilston, Amble, Meldon, Temple Thornton in Northumberland, other lands in Westmorland and Yorkshire and, most lucratively, lead mining interests in Alston Moor in Cumberland. By 1673 it brought in an annual income of £6,263. L. Gooch, Desperate Faction, 16. He was accounted one of the greatest landowners in the north of England and one of its leading Catholics. With his first two sons he was accused of complicity in the Popish Plot – it was said that he had a commission as major general of a Catholic army which was to secure the north. He was in the custody of the serjeant-at-arms in June 1679 but was discharged to return to Dilston upon providing a security of £5,000 for good behaviour. Morrice, Ent’ring Bk. ii. 80-81; Add. 47840, ff. 13-56; W. Gibson, Dilston Hall, 26.

From at least 1672 he was keen on matching one of his children with a member of the royal family and claiming for himself a title, preferably the earldom of Sussex, which had previously been in the possession of another branch of the Radclyffes. Hampson, 235; Arch. Aeliana, n.s. i. 98-99. These ambitions were thwarted during the reign of Charles II, but when the Catholic James Stuart, duke of York, ascended to the throne in 1685, Sir Francis looked to the new and religiously sympathetic regime to secure him place and prestige. In late March 1687 it was reported that one of his daughters was to be married to James Fitzjames, the recently created duke of Berwick, for which connection Sir Francis was to receive an earldom. Longleat, Bath mss Thynne pprs. 42, ff. 137-8, 147.

That plan fell through, but in August Sir Francis’s eldest son Edward Radclyffe, later 2nd earl of Derwentwater married Mary Tudor, the illegitimate daughter of Charles II by the singer and actress Mary Davies. Her portion was reported to be of £15,000, and Sir Francis settled £3,000 on the couple and £2,500 a year for their maintenance. HMC Downshire, i. 247, 258; Hampson, 235; Gibson, 26. Along with this lucrative match, James II in March 1688 rewarded this faithful and rich Catholic follower with the earldom of Derwentwater. Only a few months later the earl was able to prove his loyalty to his royal benefactor. The ailing Henry Cavendish, 2nd duke of Newcastle, judging that Derwentwater was, like himself, steadfastly loyal to the king, requested that he replace him as lord lieutenant of Northumberland. Although the earl did not take up this role, all his younger sons served as officers in Newcastle’s regiment in the north at the time of William of Orange’s invasion, and his eldest son was commissioned to raise his own troop in Yorkshire and Durham. Morrice, iv. 247; Dalton, Army Lists, ii. 175, 185; Eg. 3335, ff. 80-83; HMC Hodgkin, 74.

Derwentwater refused to take the oaths to the new monarchs, and as a Catholic he was excluded from taking his seat in the House in William III’s Parliaments. After the Revolution he was seen as the leading Jacobite in the north. His residence at Dilston Hall was constantly watched, and at one point he was under threat of imprisonment. CSP Dom. 1689-90, pp. 71, 132, 518; Hampson, 235. He died in April 1696 when his lands and title passed to his eldest son, Edward, who had forsaken his family’s natural position in the north for a life in the capital.