TREVOR, Thomas (1658-1730)

One of 12 Tory peers created in January 1712 by his childhood friend Robert Harley, earl of Oxford, Trevor was a highly respected lawyer, placeman and former court Whig member of the Commons. Like Harley, Trevor became increasingly distanced from William III and the Whig Junto in the late 1690s. HP Commons, 1690–1715, v. 687. He was perceived by some observers as a trimmer for moving into the Tory camp during the reign of Anne and then realigning himself with the Hanoverian regime in the 1720s, but he was also remembered as a ‘very just and good’ judge, ‘upright’ and ‘enlightened’. J. Hervey, Memoirs of the Reign of George II, i. 114; Bodl. ms Firth c 13, f. 49; J. Campbell, Lives of the Lord Chancellors, iv. 58.

Descended from prosperous Welsh and English families, Trevor’s family had strong leanings towards nonconformity but an equally firm heritage in government. His father had served as secretary of state in the 1670s; his maternal grandfather was the parliamentarian leader John Hampden^‡. Trevor was wealthy (in 1708 he purchased his Bedfordshire estate at a cost of over £21,000), his annual salary as lord chief justice was £1,000 and he had enjoyed a healthy private legal practice. By the time of his death he was able to bequeath legacies in their thousands and landed estates in Bedfordshire and Surrey. VCH Beds. iii. 45, 54–56; CTB, 1700–1, p. 323; G. Holmes, Augustan England, 124–5.

Acquainted since childhood not only with Harley but also with Simon Harcourt (later Viscount Harcourt), Trevor was a protégé of the attorney general John Somers (later Baron Somers). In 1693 Somers and the archbishop of Canterbury, John Tillotson, recommended him for the office of attorney general. However, Trevor had earned the enmity of Daniel Finch, 2nd earl of Nottingham, for his hostile speeches against the latter’s role in naval failures, and the appointment was blocked, provoking a quarrel between Somers and the king. HP Commons, 1690–1715, v. 687; Rev. Pols. 141–2; W.L. Sachse, Somers, 93; Pols. in Age of Anne, 201. Trevor was made to wait another two years for the place.

As attorney general and later as chief justice, Trevor’s expert opinion was sought by both Parliament and Convocation, on one occasion his opinion giving rise to conflict in the synod over the issue of the divine right of episcopacy. Nicolson, London Diaries, 144–5, 167, 171, 314, 445, 448, 454, 480. In spite of his close association with Somers, he was far from being a stalwart of the Junto Whigs. He opposed the attainder of Sir John Fenwick^‡ and proved similarly unwilling to agree to the punishment of Charles Duncombe^‡. After 1698 he gravitated towards the Tories, angry at what he perceived as Junto ‘pretensions’. He also chose to stand down from the Commons. B.W. Hill, Robert Harley, 48, 50; Stowe 364, f. 70; Sachse, Somers, 122; Horwitz, Parl. Pol. 186, 235, 239.

Trevor seems to have remained unwilling to emerge from the shadows over the next few years. He refused to accept the great seal after Somers’ dismissal in April 1700, despite confident rumours of his appointment and pressure from Harley to take the post. Vernon–Shrewsbury Letters, iii. 43, 52; Hill, Harley, 61; Sachse, Somers, 171; Add. 70226, T. Foley to R. Harley, 15 May 1700. He was instead appointed lord chief justice of commons pleas the following year. Trevor remained on close terms with Harley, though, as evidenced by Harley’s instruction to his sister to send Trevor ‘a very good buck’ while he was at the Herefordshire assizes. Add. 70146, R. to A. Harley, 24 July 1703.

Trevor persisted with his reluctance to give way to efforts to persuade him to take on a senior role in the administration. In March 1705 he refused an offer of the lord keepership, for which he had been proposed by John Holles, duke of Newcastle, and supported by both Somers and Harley. Sachse, Somers, 231; HMC Portland, ii. 189. Thereafter he repeatedly refused the offices of lord keeper and lord chancellor.

Reluctance to accept high office did not mean that Trevor was uninvolved in the business of the House. Following his appointment as lord chief justice, petitions and bills were frequently referred to him for expert opinion and oversight, though he appears to have been cautious about offering his opinion on matters relating to privilege. On 11 Jan. 1703 the Lords queried whether a bill should be brought in to protect those peers born out of England prior to the passage of the Act for the further limitation of the crown from the disabilities contained in the legislation. The House had proposed to hear the judges on the ‘force of a law already passed, for limitation of the crown’; after debate, Trevor (on behalf of all the judges) asked the House to excuse them from giving an opinion on the grounds that ‘it is on the right of peerage, and of Lords sitting in Parliament; but that, if it was their Lordships’ pleasure to command them to give their opinions, they desired to have further time allowed them’.

Numerous other instances of his involvement in the Lords followed throughout the reign of Anne. On 15 Dec. 1703 it was ordered in the House that Trevor, the lord chief baron (Sir Edward Ward) and Mr Justice Powys (with any other judges deemed necessary) should prepare and introduce a bill to prevent the buying and selling of offices. On 15 Jan. 1705 Trevor sent to the Commons a reminder of the bill to appoint commissioners for the treaty of Union between England and Scotland. On 17 Dec. 1706 the House ordered that Trevor, with the lord chief justice of queen’s bench (Sir Littleton Powys) and Ward, prepare and introduce a bill to settle the estate of Woodstock and house of Blenheim. In February and March 1707 (along with Sir Littleton Powys) he presented reports on the petitions of William Hyde, John Farmer and Matthew Humberstone. On 4 Mar. 1707 he was appointed to consider the private bill for Robert Hitch and to furnish the House with legal opinion on the legislation, and on 11 Mar. he (and Robert Price^‡, one of the puisne barons of the exchequer) conveyed a message to the Commons seeking their concurrence in a bill settling the estates of Henry Somerset, 2nd duke of Beaufort.

On 21 Jan. 1708 Trevor and Justice Powys delivered their report on the bill to settle the estate of John Cecil, 6th earl of Exeter. The following month, on 11 Feb., they were ordered to prepare a bill to settle the method of returning the 16 representative peers of Scotland; Trever delivered the bill to the House on 23 February. Between 1709 and 1711 he regularly reported on petitions and private bills that had been referred to the judges. During the trial of Henry Sacheverell in the spring of 1710, he was involved in the heated exchanges surrounding Judge John Powell’s decision to bail one of those involved in the riots, ‘for which their lordships were going to send him to the Tower’. Trevor told the House that if Powell were imprisoned ‘they would all go with him’. HMC Portland, iv. 534–5.

The formation of the new ministry renewed pressure on Trevor to accept office. On 22 Sept. 1710 he wrote at length to Harley to explain his continuing reluctance to give way. He hoped that there was ‘not the least doubt but that I shall upon all occasions be ready to serve the queen to the utmost of my power’ but begged that he might ‘have the liberty of doing it in my present station’. He continued:

’Tis not the want of honour or profit which hath hitherto induced me to decline the other you mention … but the knowledge of my own weakness and want of strength to discharge the duty of that place. For though I enjoy a tolerable share of health … the fatigue of that place would utterly destroy it … ’tis a great uneasiness to me to be obliged to return an answer that may be unacceptable to so gracious and honourable a proposal, and I earnestly entreat you that this may put a full stop to any further consideration of this matter. Add. 70026, ff. 170–1; HMC Portland, iv. 598.

Trevor finally agreed to act as first commissioner of the great seal on a temporary basis only, but by 5 Oct. was asking Harley to press the queen to name a new lord chancellor before the start of the new term. He insisted that he had accepted the commission only so that writs for a new Parliament could be issued, but was ‘unwilling to enter upon the business of the court in hearing causes’. Add. 70261, T. Trevor to R. Harley, 5 Oct. 1710. Three days later, still fearful of the queen’s reaction to his continuing refusal, he implored Harley, ‘as you are my friend you will represent this matter so to her majesty that I may not be so unhappy as to incur her displeasure’. He recommended a number of persons for the post, including Heneage Finch, Baron Guernsey (later earl of Aylesford), though he wanted Harley to keep his suggestions as ‘the greatest secret’. HMC Portland, iv. 610. By the 12th, Trevor could report that he was on his way to deliver up the great seal and on the 19th he dined at Hampton Court after the swearing in of his old friend Harcourt. Add. 70261, T. Trevor to R. Harley, [12 Oct. 1710]; WSHC, Ailesbury mss 1300/1077.

The crisis that enveloped the Oxford ministry in the winter of 1711–12 put paid to Trevor’s efforts to maintain a low profile. On 29 Dec. it was reported that he was to be one of a number of new peers called to the Lords and on 1 Jan. 1712 he was accordingly raised to the peerage as one of Oxford’s ‘dozen’. He took his seat in the House the following day, introduced between Charles Butler, Baron Butler of Weston, and Charles Boyle, Baron Boyle. The reason for Trevor’s selection was no doubt his closeness to Oxford but also his appropriate standing in society. He was the first ever lord chief justice of common pleas to be raised to the peerage – George Jeffreys, Baron Jeffreys, had been chief justice of king’s bench – but he was believed to be a man acceptable to all sides. Partisan Politics, Principle and Reform in Parliament and the Constituencies, ed. C. Jones et al., 36–37. He attended the session for 73 per cent of sittings.

At some point in January 1712, while in the House, Trevor spoke with William Wake, bishop of Lincoln, about a case involving John Smith, who was shortly afterwards instituted as rector of Hemingford Abbots in Huntingdonshire; Trevor’s wife was one of the patrons of the parish. CCED; LPL, ms 1770, f. 117. On 29 Feb. he received the proxy of John Sheffield, duke of Buckingham (vacated the following day). On 13 Mar. he reported from the committee for the bill involving the Buckinghamshire rectory of Gothurst (possibly co-ordinating with Wake) and on 28 Mar. from the committee on the Bromsall Estate bill. Christ Church Lib. Oxf. ms Wake 3, ff. 282–6. On 29 Apr. he reported from the committee on the petition of the minor Thomas Wise that related to an appeal heard five years previously, Calthorpe v. May, ruling that the original judgment of the House was not intended to deprive the petitioner’s father of his lands and ordering the Irish court of chancery to make a similar ruling in favour of the petitioner. On 28 May he voted with the ministry in the division on the ‘restraining orders’. PH, xxvi. 177–81. On 6 June he received the proxy of Montagu Venables Bertie, 2nd earl of Abingdon (vacated on 12 June). On 8 July he joined with Oxford to introduce the recently elevated Henry St John as Viscount Bolingbroke.

Trevor presided over the trial concerning the claim of Mary Hill Morton to be married to Peregrine Osborne, 2nd duke of Leeds, in July 1712. London Gazette, 20–23 Feb. 1714. Later that year his reputation for impartiality may have been behind Dr William Stratford’s desire for him to act as the college’s representative during the dispute at Christ Church, which had been provoked by the appointment of Francis Atterbury, later bishop of Rochester, as dean. Trevor was thought a suitable candidate being a former member of the college, but perhaps more importantly he was believed to be ‘not more acquainted with one party than the other’. HMC Portland, vii. 118, 120, 129.

Trevor attended three prorogation days following the close of the previous session. On 10 Mar. 1713 he officiated as Speaker during Harcourt’s illness. Stowe 304, f. 215. He returned to his place for the start of the new session on 9 Apr. and thereafter attended for 70 per cent of sittings. Three days later he was present in the congregation at Camberwell church when Henry Sacheverell was the preacher. Holmes, Trial of Dr Sacheverell, 261. On 1 June he spoke in the debate on the state of the nation on the unsuccessful motion to dissolve the Union. He ‘made a vehement speech against it, as a thing hardly to be done’, in which he was supported by Oxford. Timberland, ii. 394–8. Trevor and Oxford agreed that Scottish grievances ‘might be just’ and they conceded the desire for redress but queried why this necessitated a dissolution of the Union. On 8 June, when the House went into a committee of the whole on the malt bill, Trevor was in attendance but, like lord chancellor Harcourt, remained silent. Scot. Hist. Soc. Misc. xii. 155, 161. By the 13th he was forecast by Oxford as being in favour of the bill confirming the eighth and ninth articles of the French commercial treaty. He attended for the prorogation on 16 July 1713, when he was one of those who examined the Journal.

Following the dissolution, Trevor left London for the midland circuit. He was at Nottingham by 24 July 1713. London Gazette, 20–23 June 1713; Post Boy, 18–20 Aug. 1713. The following month he rejected a suggestion by Oxford for his son to contest one of the seats at Bedford, pointing out that he had ‘no thoughts of my son’s coming into this next Parliament’. When he did stand, Trevor insisted he would seek out a seat ‘more remote from my estate in Bedford for him to serve in’. Add. 70261, Trevor to Oxford, 15 Aug. 1713. James Butler, 2nd duke of Ormond, requested that Oxford might press Trevor to support Brigadier Richard Waring, an Irish army officer, at Bedford, but this approach appears also to have been rebuffed and in the event Waring did not stand. Add. 70200, D. Kennedy to T. Harley, 18 Aug. 1713. Trevor’s response to Oxford’s suggestion may be indicative of his gradual withdrawal from allegiance to the lord treasurer and movement towards Bolingbroke. Nevertheless, early in September Trevor made a point of congratulating Oxford on the marriage of his heir Edward Harley^†, styled Lord Harley (later 2nd earl of Oxford) which he insisted was ‘a reward of providence for the many eminent services your lordship has done for our queen and country’. He also continued to espouse Oxford, wishing him success in his ‘other great designs for the repairing and establishment of our constitution’. HP Commons, 1690–1715, ii. 11; Holmes, ‘Great Ministry’, 279; Add. 70261, Trevor to Oxford, 7 Sept. 1713.

As well as his role in the House and as a (potential) holder of influence in Bedford, Trevor remained active on the judicial bench. Bodl. ms Firth c 13, f. 49. He attended the House for the start of business on 16 Feb. 1714 and thereafter was present for just over half of all sittings. On 28 Feb. (a Sunday) he sought a private audience with Oxford ‘before the Parliament meets’, and on 21 Mar. he again sought a meeting at ‘the first opportunity’. Add. 70261, Trevor to Oxford, 28 Feb. and 21 Mar. 1714. Oxford had been dismayed by revelations of Bolingbroke and Moore’s dealings over Spanish trade and Trevor was instrumental in dissuading him from resigning as a consequence. Hill, Robert Harley, 205. In the debate on the state of the nation and Oxford’s motion for an adjournment to 31 Mar. to stop heated debate on the Catalans, Trevor was again a prominent supporter, seconding the motion. Timberland, ii. 410. By April, however, it was widely accepted that a rift was growing in the political establishment over the succession. Trevor, Bolingbroke and Harcourt were believed to be increasingly unhappy with Oxford’s direction and Trevor was convinced that the French would act independently, regardless of British actions and agreements. Add. 72488, ff. 77–78, 85–86; Add. 70331, Oxford memo. 4 July 1714. Such concerns seem increasingly to have driven Trevor into Bolingbroke’s arms.

On 8 Apr. 1714 following the motion proposed by Thomas Wharton, earl (later marquess) of Wharton, and seconded by Charles Powlett, 2nd duke of Bolton, that the queen be addressed to set a reward for the apprehension of the Pretender, dead or alive, William North, 6th Baron North, spoke against it as a barbaric encouragement to ‘murder and assassination’. He was backed by Trevor, who argued in response to the question whether it would be murder to kill the Pretender:

what that noble peer had spoke, was sufficient to show, how inconsistent such a proceeding was to Christianity, and the civil law; and therefore he would confine himself to our own laws: and if he knew, or understood any thing of these, he was confident they were as opposite to such proceedings as the civil law. That he knew, he did not speak there as a lawyer or judge, but as a peer; but he was fully satisfied of our law discountenancing all such proceedings; that if ever any such case should come before him, as a judge, he would think himself bound in justice, honour and conscience, to condemn such an action as murder, and therefore he hoped the supreme court of judicature would not make a precedent for encouraging assassination.

As a result of the interventions the motion was amended and the terms of the address altered to the Pretender’s apprehension and bringing to justice. Trevor later contributed to the debate again to help explain the queen’s meaning in urging the House to ‘put an end to jealousies’. Timberland, ii. 414; Wentworth Pprs. 372–3.

In May 1714, with ‘nothing of any great moment transacted’ in the Lords, ‘the most noise’ was said to have been caused by the House’s decision to overturn a chancery decree in the cause Ratcliffe and Constable v. Roper et al., which had been awarded by lord chancellor Harcourt, assisted by Trevor and the master of the rolls (Sir John Trevor^‡). The decree, which had determined that the personal estate of Ratcliffe (a Catholic) was not comprehended in the act disabling Catholics from disposing of their estates, had been questioned by the lord chief justice of king’s bench, Thomas Parker^†, later earl of Macclesfield, and it was Parker’s opinion that the Lords now preferred in the ruling delivered on 1 May 1714. TNA, C 107/215; Add. 72496, ff. 136–8.

If the House of Lords was believed to be remarkably quiet, the same was not true of the administration, which by May had fallen into two clear factions. As ever, Trevor attempted to retain a sense of balance and, while he was one of those steadily drawn into Bolingbroke’s circle, he endeavoured to remain on friendly terms with Oxford. Holmes, ‘Great Ministry’, 383. He declined an invitation to dinner with Oxford for 12 May 1714, citing business at the Guildhall and a plan to go to Peckham for a ‘short vacation’ for health reasons as his excuse. On the 25th, however, Trevor informed Oxford that he would return to town the following day and offered him his ‘poor assistance towards preventing the ill consequences of any designs that may tend to any public mischief’. Add. 70261, Trevor to Oxford, 11 and 25 May [1714].

Trevor was assessed a likely supporter of the Schism bill. He was nevertheless absent from the House on 11 June 1714 for the vote on extending the bill to Ireland. He returned on the 15th, when the bill passed the House by a slim majority. On 28 June he attended the session for the last time and on the 30th registered his proxy in favour of Harcourt. Unwell, he complained to Oxford on 2 July that he remained ‘weak and faint’ but had avoided suffering a fit with the use of ‘Jesuits’ bark’ (a form of naturally occurring quinine). Add. 70261, Trevor to Oxford, 2 July [1714]. On the 12th Trevor informed Oxford that he was still reliant on the bark to ‘prevent a return of my ague’ but that he planned to be in London the following day and would wait on Oxford that evening. Add. 70261, Trevor to Oxford, 12 July 1714. Following Oxford’s resignation, it was rumoured that Trevor would be made lord president of the council in place of Buckingham. It was subsequently put about that Trevor rather than Bolingbroke had been expected to ‘have had the chief credit’ in a new administration. NLS, Pitfirrane mss 6409, no. 70; Add. 22220, ff. 121–2.

The queen’s death put an end to such speculation and heralded a lengthy period in the wilderness. Trevor took his place in House on 2 Aug. 1714, a day into the brief session summoned in the wake of the queen’s death, after which he attended two more days before quitting the session for just over a fortnight. By the 11th he had travelled home to Bedfordshire to attend to family affairs. He returned to the chamber on 21 Aug. and then attended one more day before the session was brought to a close. The following month Trevor was said to be in a state of ‘thoughtfulness’, with members of his household contributing to rumours about his now uncertain future. Add. 61684, ff. 118–19, 122–3.

In October, on the recommendation of William Cowper, Baron (later Earl) Cowper, Trevor was removed from his position as lord chief justice. The following year he took an active role in opposing the government’s legislative programme, speaking with the opposition in the debate on the king’s speech on 23 Mar. 1715. In May it was rumoured, wrongly, that he was one of the members of the former administration to be impeached. Add. 72502, ff. 54–55. He remained loyal to Oxford during the proceedings against the former lord treasurer and in May 1717 presented Oxford’s petition to the Lords, having acted as the earl’s chief legal advisor. Add. 70346, ‘Queries to consult Lord Trevor, Lord Harcourt and the duke of Shrewsbury’, n.d.; HMC Portland, v. 526, 667, 668.

Trevor’s political and parliamentary career after 1715 will be examined in detail in the next phase of this work. he died in Peckham on 19 June 1730 from an acute stomach condition. He had retired to bed in apparently perfect health, only to be carried off in the night from what was at first thought to be an attack of colic. Daily Journal, 20 June 1730. He left two daughters and four sons, three of whom eventually took their seats in the Lords (Thomas Trevor^†, 2nd Baron Trevor, John^†, 3rd Baron Trevor, and Richard^†, successively bishop of St Davids and of Durham). In his will Trevor made provision of £5,000 and an annuity of £14 for his elder daughter, Anne; his younger sons John and Richard also received £14 annuities. Trevor’s younger daughter, Elizabeth, was bequeathed £5,000, while the three younger sons each received £2,000. He also bequeathed £10 to the poor of the parish of Camberwell. He was buried at Bromham, where a memorial including a lengthy inscription was erected (as he had requested in his will) on the north wall of the church. N and Q, 3rd ser. iii. 443.