VERNEY, Richard (1622-1711)

‘A gentleman … of a noble and courteous disposition’, Verney was already in his sixties when he succeeded his great-nephew as heir to the dormant barony of Brooke (or Willoughby de Broke). Compton Verney, ed. Bearman, 36; HP Commons, 1660–90, iii. 636. There is some doubt as to his precise age: most authorities give his birth year as 1622 but a pedigree compiled by Verney himself recorded the year as 1624. SCLA, DR 98/1731/23. Already a substantial landowner, he had purchased the estates of Allexton in Leicestershire in 1652 and Belton in Rutland in the 1670s. VCH Rutland, ii. 29. Marriage to Mary Pretyman, daughter of the unfortunate Sir John Pretyman, allied him to the Heath family of Brasted in Kent and Cottesmore in Rutland, and on the death of his nephew, Sir Greville Verney, in 1668 Verney was said to have benefited by ‘a great windfall’, inheriting lands valued at £4,000 a year and £20,000 in money. SCLA, DR 98/1652/138. With the death of his great-nephew, William Verney, the remainder of the Verney estate reverted to his control. Verney ms mic. M636/38, E. to Sir R. Verney, 31 Aug. 1683; J. to Sir R. Verney, 3 Sept. 1683.

Verney’s new lands extended his midlands interests into Warwickshire but it is perhaps indicative of his attitude towards his claims on the peerage that he made no attempt to petition for a writ of summons and was content to demonstrate his increased influence in the area by presenting himself for election to the Commons as knight of the shire for Warwickshire in 1685. Solidly Tory in outlook, Verney does not appear to have been an active member of the lower House, nor does he appear to have played a prominent role during the Revolution. He continued to represent Warwickshire in the Convention and voted against the resolution that the throne was vacant. HP Commons, 1660–90, iii. 636. Such opposition to the new regime perhaps led to the loss of his seat at the 1690 general election.

In the autumn of 1694, formal proceedings were begun to revive the barony of Brooke, though the initiator of this move appears to have been Verney’s son John^‡, rather than himself. Warws. RO, CR 1886/9160; VCH Leics. ii. 119–20; Nichols, Leicestershire, iii. 10. Verney’s cause brought him into direct conflict with his cousin Fulke Greville, 5th Baron Brooke. The dispute was, in essence, over style and precedence. In 1611 James I had conferred the barony of Brooke of Beauchamps Court on Sir Fulke Greville^† but Sir Fulke (Lord Brooke) and Richard Verney’s father, Sir Greville Verney, had also been co-heirs to the Willoughby barony of Broke (or Brooke). BL, General Reference Collection, L.R.305.a.8(16), Pedigree of Richard Lord Willoughby de Broke. Brooke’s death without direct heirs vested the latter in the Verney family, while the barony of Brooke of Beauchamps Court passed by special remainder to Brooke’s cousin Robert Greville^†, who succeeded as 2nd Baron Brooke.

It was thus Verney’s insistence on being styled Brooke rather than Willoughby de Broke or Verney of Broke, both which forms were suggested as suitable alternatives, that was initially at the heart of the disagreement. Warws. RO, CR 1886/9160. Brooke did not contest Verney’s right to be summoned as the Willoughby heir (although some lawyers of the time did question whether Sir Fulke’s acceptance of the barony of Brooke of Beauchamps Court had de facto extinguished the older Brooke barony); he merely wanted to ensure that Verney would not be permitted to take a title too close to his own or to challenge his precedence within the House. SCLA, DR 98/1731/9; Lexington Pprs. 27. Brooke’s lawyers made painstaking investigations into the Willoughby peerage. They found that the records were ambiguous on point of style, though one at least concluded that the Willoughbys had indeed styled themselves as Lords Brooke. Before the winter sessions, Verney approached Brooke to press for the cause to be settled by arbitration. Brooke, however, was unwilling to settle and Verney’s continuing intransigence on the point of style made an early resolution impossible. Warws. RO, CR 1886/9159, 9160, 9162, 9165.

On 11 Dec. 1694 Verney presented the first of several petitions to the House for recognition as Baron Brooke. PA, HL/PO/JO/1/468/859. The confusion and ambiguities surrounding the peerage were exemplified by the continually evolving appeals made by Verney to further his cause. Concerned that his pedigree had not been represented from the bar ‘so clear as your petitioner is ready to make the same appear’, he requested to be heard in person and in another petition he acknowledged the controversy surrounding the style of his title and admitted that as he had ‘been informed that the direction of the … writ being Roberto Willoughby de Broke Chevalier, the title created thereby might not be the same which your petitioner claimed’. SCLA, DR 98/1731/6–7. Nine days after entering the first petition, counsel was heard on both sides. The House resolved that the attorney general should also be heard and, after further deliberation, on 10 Jan. 1695 the House rejected Verney’s claim. The following day a committee was established to draw up a report to be presented to the king explaining the House’s decision; it met on 12 Jan. chaired by John Sheffield, marquess of Normanby (later duke of Buckingham and Normanby). PA, HL/PO/CO/1/ 5, p. 238.

The dismissal of Verney’s petition failed to conclude the issue, which became increasingly enveloped by the broader question concerning the rights of all peers holding baronies by writ to a writ of summons. The committee sat again on 16 Feb. 1695 but failed to come to a resolution. Ibid. p. 271; Add. 29565, f. 518. Opposition to the rights of those claiming their baronies by writ was led by Laurence Hyde, earl of Rochester, while several peers, led by James Bertie, earl of Abingdon, and Thomas Tufton, 6th earl of Thanet, vigorously supported their claims, dismayed by the possible implications for their own baronies as a result of the rejection of Verney’s petition. On 20 Feb. Thanet moved that the House should declare its reasons for rejecting Verney’s claim, after which a series of debates ensued over the following weeks. On 8 Mar. a long debate was held in the House on the matter. The continuing contretemps brought Brooke back to London but he remained adamant that he would not agree to Verney being granted precedence over him. Following further hearings, on 19 Mar. the House finally passed a resolution that heirs to baronies by writ did have the right to demand a writ of summons. Among the eight protestors were Rochester, Brooke and Thomas Grey, 2nd earl of Stamford, patron of John Verney’s rivals in Leicestershire. The House’s resolution clearly rendered rejection of Verney’s claim untenable, leading Sidney Godolphin, Baron (later earl of) Godolphin, to move that the vote in Verney’s case should be withdrawn, but consideration of his motion was postponed and no further progress was made prior to the prorogation. Add. 29565, ff. 417, 518, 528, 545.

Verney renewed his petition for a writ of summons in January 1696 and on 3 Feb. the Lords’ original decision was finally overturned. PA, HL/PO/JO/10/1/468/859a; CSP Dom. 1696, p. 8; Add. 29566, f. 146; Add. 72486, ff. 23–24. By a compromise, it was at last resolved that Verney should be summoned as Baron Willoughby de Broke but he was granted precedence over his cousin Brooke. PA, HL/PO/CO/1/5, p. 366. He took his seat without introduction as a peer by descent on 27 February. He then sat for a mere 11 days before retiring to the country, registering his proxy in Normanby’s favour on 16 March. Having at last received his writ, Willoughby was troubled with a demand for the payment of fees amounting to £26 6s. 8d. Once again, it seems to have been John Verney who took the initiative, employing the controversial Lancaster Herald, Gregory King, to take up the matter with the clerks, arguing that as a peer by descent Willoughby was exempt from such charges. SCLA, DR 98/1731/18.

Willoughby took his seat during the following session on 19 Nov. 1696 and sat on 36 occasions until 27 Jan. 1697 (approximately 32 per cent of all sitting days in the session). On 15 Dec. he registered his dissent at the resolution to read Goodman’s information against Sir John Fenwick^‡, and three days later he dissented again at the resolution to read the bill of attainder a second time. He then voted against passing the bill on 23 Dec. and subscribed the protest when the measure was carried. On 10 Feb. he again registered his proxy in favour of Normanby, which was vacated by the close of the session.

Willoughby returned to the House for the opening of the next session on 3 Dec. 1697. Present on just 14 per cent of all sitting days, on 4 Mar. 1698 he protested against the second reading of the bill to punish Charles Duncombe^‡. He voted against the committal of the bill on 15 March. He returned to the House for the first session of the new Parliament on 16 Dec. 1698 (attending for 22 per cent of all sitting days) and on 8 Feb. 1699 he voted against agreeing with the committee resolution offering to assist the king to retain his Dutch Guards. He then registered a further dissent at the resolution to agree with the committee’s findings.

Willoughby was absent from the House from March 1699 until February 1700, when he sat on just one occasion (7 February). In December of that year he was active, with his neighbour Thomas Leigh, 2nd Baron Leigh, in the Warwickshire elections on behalf of his son-in-law, Sir Charles Shuckburgh^‡, and Sir John Mordaunt^‡ but Mordaunt complained that Willoughby and Sir Henry Parker had been ‘making an interest with the freeholders in their neighbourhood for Sir Charles and my self which was without my knowledge and consent’. Warws. RO, CR 1368/iii/34, Sir J. Mordaunt to ‘Lord’, 24 Dec. 1700. Mordaunt fell sick shortly after but Leigh and Willoughby were successful in persuading the sheriff to put off the county meeting until Mordaunt had recovered. Warws. RO, CR 1368/iii/34, Sir C. Shuckburgh to Sir J. Mordaunt, 28 Dec. 1700; CR 1368/iii/40.

Willoughby took his seat once more shortly after the opening of the new Parliament on 10 Feb. 1701, after which he was present on 16 per cent of all sitting days. The following month, on 20 Mar. he protested at the resolution not to send the address relating to the Treaty of Partition to the Commons for their concurrence. He was absent from the House again from April until the end of the year. Notwithstanding his lacklustre attendance in the House, Willoughby’s interest in Warwickshire remained strong. He was one of those who met at the Swan in Warwick on 25 Nov. 1701 to decide on the county’s representatives, and an undated letter from him to Sir John Mordaunt requesting that he stand with Andrew Archer^‡ for the county may date from the same election, as it was considered unlikely that Sir Charles Shuckburgh would agree to contest the seat again. Warws. RO, CR 1368/iii/32. In the event Shuckburgh underwent a change of heart and the usual pairing of Mordaunt and Shuckburgh was returned with little difficulty. HP Commons, 1690–1715, ii. 620.

Willoughby returned to the House on 19 Jan. 1702. He sat for just eight days before retiring for two months but ensured that his proxy was again registered in favour of Normanby on 14 February. The proxy was vacated by his return to the House on 15 Apr., after which he sat for just three more days (in all he was present on just 12 per cent of days in the whole session). Queen Anne’s coronation of 23 Apr. presented him with a new dilemma. Having failed to secure a set of second-hand robes for the ceremony, he was eventually compelled to have a new set tailored for the occasion. He entrusted the commission to his neighbour Sir John Mordaunt, pressing him to discover whether a coronet was ‘absolutely necessary’. E. Hamilton, The Mordaunts: An Eighteenth-Century Family, 49–50. Willoughby’s reluctance to invest in the robes may not just have been a matter of parsimony but could also underline the comparative novelty of barons being granted the right to wear ‘robes of estate’.

Willoughby took his seat at the opening of Queen Anne’s first Parliament on 20 Oct. 1702 but he sat on just one other day in the session, after which he was away from the House for three years. Despite his prolonged absence, he was listed by Daniel Finch, 2nd earl of Nottingham, as being in favour of the bill for preventing occasional conformity. A further estimate by Charles Spencer, 3rd earl of Sunderland, on the same issue echoed Nottingham’s forecast. A division list of December 1703 appears to suggest that Willoughby voted as expected by proxy but the proxy book is defective and no record of the proxy has survived. Willoughby was excused at a call of the House on 23 Nov. 1704 and on 2 Dec. he again registered his proxy in favour of the duke of Buckingham (as Normanby had since become), which was vacated by the close of the session. Despite his absence, Willoughby was included by Nottingham in a list of members of both Houses he drew up in 1704 which may indicate expected support over the ‘Scotch Plot’.

Willoughby continued to command sizeable interest in Warwickshire and at the time of the elections for the new Parliament in 1705 he was courted by the maverick Captain George Lucy, who hoped that the baron’s impatience with the Tackers might be sufficient to secure his support. Add. 61496, f. 85. Willoughby was included in a list of ‘noblemen and gentry in Capt Lucy’s interest’ of April 1705 but it seems unlikely that he gave Lucy any real encouragement. Badminton mss, Coventry pprs. FMT/A3/3. An undated letter from Willoughby addressed jointly to Mordaunt and Shuckburgh probably originates from this contest, in which he explains,

my late being with Captain Lucy was nothing to this affair, neither does he desire me to interest my self in the matter having always declared I will neither meddle or make in elections, his only ambition (if I take him right) is to undeceive those that book him down for an enemy to our Church and the government … Warws. RO, CR 1368/iii/33.

Willoughby was present in the House for the opening of the new Parliament on 25 Oct. 1705 but he proceeded to attend for just two days. HMC Lords, n.s. vi. 300. On 12 Nov. he was excused at a call of the House and on the 22nd he registered his proxy in favour of the redoubtable Buckingham. He remained away from the House throughout 1706 and on 13 Jan. 1707 he registered his proxy in Buckingham’s favour once more. He took his seat again on 23 Oct. 1707 but failed to return the following day and was then absent for the remainder of the session. Willoughby’s hasty departure may have been caused by the sudden death of both his daughter-in-law and his son and heir, John Verney, who died within days of each other during that month. Verney Letters of the 18th century, i. 234; Verney ms mic. M636/53, M. Cave to Fermanagh, 5 Oct. and 3 Nov. 1707; TNA, PROB 20/2948. He also appears to have suffered increasingly poor health. He offered his interest to Mordaunt and Andrew Archer^‡ for the election of May 1708 but asked to be excused from attending the county meeting, complaining that the ‘badness of the weather … has caused me to be very lame of sciatica pains’. Warws. RO, CR 1368/iii/32; Hamilton, Mordaunts, 62.

John Verney’s death compelled Willoughby to make alternative arrangements for the distribution of his estate after his death. On 24 Feb. 1709 he petitioned the House to bring in a bill to enable him to raise a jointure for his grandson’s prospective wife. The bill was read in committee on 18 Mar. and received the royal assent on 21 April. PA, HL/PO/CO/1/7, p.352; HMC Lords, n.s. vi. 276. The same month it was rumoured that Willoughby’s younger son, George Verney, later 12th Baron Willoughby de Broke, was to succeed as bishop of Chichester, though this promotion failed to transpire. Longleat, Bath mss Thynne pprs. 45, f. 370; Thynne pprs. 46, ff. 79, 83. In May, Willoughby’s grandson, Thomas Verney, married the daughter of his Warwickshire neighbour Leigh, with a portion of £15,000. SCLA, DR 98/1435, 1438.

Following a two-year absence Willoughby returned to Parliament in February 1710, spurred into action by the Sacheverell affair. He took his seat on 18 Feb., following which he was present on approximately 24 per cent of all sitting days. A newsletter of 23 Feb. reported his arrival in town in company with John Manners, duke of Rutland, and John Cecil, 6th earl of Exeter, and claimed that, ‘’tis whispered that they’ll be of the right side, but it’s impossible that should be known till their lordships have heard the merit of their cause’. On 14 Mar. he entered his protest at the resolution that it was not necessary to include the particular words supposed to be criminal in an impeachment; the same day he protested at the resolution not to adjourn. Two days later he protested at the resolution that the Commons had made good the first article of impeachment against Sacheverell and on 17 Mar. he entered a further protest against the resolution that the Commons had made good the remaining articles. The following day he dissented from the resolution to limit peers to a single verdict of guilty or not guilty and on 20 Mar. he found Sacheverell not guilty of the charges against him. He then subscribed the protest against the guilty verdict. Willoughby was later one of those peers to fete Sacheverell in his progress through Warwickshire. Longleat, Bath mss Thynne pprs. 46, ff. 239–40, 329; HP Commons, 1690–1715, ii. 622; Add. 70421, newsletter, 8 June 1710; HEHL, HM 30659 (123).

Willoughby returned to the House on 4 Dec. 1710. He absented himself the following day and on 6 Dec. registered his proxy in favour of Buckingham for the last time. In June 1711 his name appeared on a list of Tory patriots of the previous session. He died the following month. He was succeeded by his younger son, George Verney, dean of Windsor, as 12th Baron Willoughby de Broke. Willoughby died without composing a will and it was not until December 1762 that final settlement was made of his estate. The reason for the delay is unclear.