PICKERING, Henry (d. 1668), of Whaddon, Cambs.

Henry Pickering belonged to a cadet branch of the Northamptonshire family, the Pickerings of Titchmarsh. The senior line, descended from the first Sir Gilbert Pickering (d. 1613), was represented in this period by Sir Gilbert Pykeringe* (Oliver Cromwell’s* lord chamberlain), this MP’s cousin once removed.24Winn, Dryden, ped. opp. p. 12. The church at Aldwinkle All Saints, of which Pickering’s father, Henry senior, was rector between 1592 and 1632, lay within sight of Titchmarsh and it had been his elder brother who had presented him to it. The two branches of the family remained on close terms. Henry senior married Isabella Smith in 1600 and their eldest son, John, was probably born about 1603.25P.D. Mundy, ‘The Pickerings of Aldwincle All Saints, Northants.’, N. and Q. cxcvii. 490-2; Winn, Dryden, 545n, 547n. Since their second son, Henry junior, was not apprenticed until 1626, his birth date was probably in the early 1610s. Admitted to the Fishmongers’ Company as a freeman in 1634, he then pursued a career as a London merchant.26Haskett-Smith, Lists of Apprentices and Freemen, 33.

Almost nothing is known about that career. However, it was presumably because of his standing as a merchant that the Committee for Sequestrations turned to him in November 1644 to help adjudicate on the claim of another merchant, Thomas Fisher, that he had been ruined by investing in the Irish Adventure and had therefore been promised compensation. Pickering confirmed that he was entitled to some of the money he claimed.27CSP Dom. 1645-7, pp. 76-7. Pickering himself had certainly prospered. By the mid-1640s his wealth was large enough for him to take the usual step of reinvesting it in land. In April 1646 he spent £4,000 buying the manor of Molesey Matham at East Molesey in Surrey from the trustees of the late Sir John Lytcott, one of whose daughters about this time married John Thurloe*.28VCH Surr. iii. 545. Lytcott had also owned the lease on the ferry across the Thames at Molesey and Hampton Court. This expired in May 1646 and the following month Pickering successfully petitioned the Revenue Committee for a new lease (probably for 21 years).29CSP Dom. 1645-7, p. 450; R.G.M. Baker, ‘A hist. of the Thames bridges between Hampton Court and E. Molesey’, Surr. Arch. Coll. lviii. 79-80. But in March 1647 he sold off the land at Molesley for a small profit.30VCH Surr. iii. 454. Turning his attention to areas closer to his birthplace, he began by purchasing the estates of Sir Ludovic Dyer at Little Paxton and Southoe in Huntingdonshire, only about 15 miles from Aldwinkle.31VCH Hunts. ii. 333, 349. Then in 1647 he married Elizabeth Vyner, described in her epitaph to be ‘as great an example for piety, prudence, humility, generosity, charity and all other Christian and moral virtues as this age hath produced’.32CB; MIs Cambs. 185. Her father, the goldsmith, Thomas Vyner, possessed one of the great City fortunes of his day. Perhaps making use of her no-doubt substantial dowry, Pickering acquired further lands at about this time, including an estate at Whaddon, close by in south Cambridgeshire, and this henceforth became his principal seat.33VCH Cambs. viii. 144. Claims that Pickering had in the meantime served as a colonel of foot in the New Model army appear to be based on no more than a confusion with his cousin once removed, John Pickering.34CB; Mundy, ‘Pickerings’, 491; BHO, Cromwell Assoc. database, ‘John Pickering’.

As someone who was, in a sense, a newcomer to the area, Pickering only emerged as a key figure in Cambridgeshire and the surrounding counties under the commonwealth. In the aftermath of the purge of the House of Commons in December 1648, the Rump immediately saw in Pickering a person they could trust. Weeks before, he had been named as the new sheriff of Huntingdonshire. Whether through confusion over the terms of this appointment or because someone had been named for Cambridgeshire and had refused, the Commons found it necessary to order on 14 December that Pickering’s commission should include Cambridgeshire as well.35CJ vi. 97a; LJ x. 631b; HMC 7th Rep. 67; List of Sheriffs, 14. There then followed a gradual accumulation of local offices. First, in April 1649 he was included on the assessment commission for his native Northamptonshire. This was followed by his appointment to the equivalent commission for Cambridgeshire in November 1649 and to the Cambridgeshire commission of the peace several months later.36A. and O.; C231/6, pp. 177. By March 1651 he was actively serving on both the standing committee and the militia commission for Cambridgeshire.37SP28/223. His nomination by the lord mayor, Sir Thomas Andrewes, Thomas Cullum and Edward Ashe* later that year as an alderman offered Pickering the chance to serve on the corporation of London as well. He declined this honour (paying a fine of £600 for the privilege), possibly because he now considered himself settled in Cambridgeshire. Charles Lloyd* was nominated in his place.38Beaven, Aldermen of London, i. 39, ii. 77-9.

In 1654 Pickering was returned to Parliament for Cambridgeshire. The election result has the appearance of a clean sweep by supporters of the protectorate in the Cromwellian heartland. Two of the four men returned (John Disbrowe* and Francis Russell*) were close relatives of the protector himself, while Pickering, like Robert Castell*, should probably be counted as a loyal servant of the government in the localities. Once elected, Pickering was entirely inconspicuous in the proceedings of this Parliament. The decision to name him as one of the commissioners for scandalous ministers in the Cambridge area was largely a foregone conclusion.39A. and O. The following year, after the dissolution of this Parliament, he was included on the commission to levy the decimation tax on the Cambridgeshire royalists.40Bodl. Rawl. C.948, p. 24.

Pickering was re-elected for Cambridgeshire in 1656 in a result which was essentially a re-run of that two years earlier. Castell, Pickering and Russell were all again returned for the county seats. Pickering’s 16 committee appointments between September 1656 and June 1657 at least indicate regular attendance on his part throughout the first session. Several of these appointments, such as those to the committees on the excise arrears (11 Nov. 1656) or the Levant Company petition (27 Jan. 1657) no doubt reflected his City connections.41CJ vii. 453a, 483a. The committee on trade, to which he was named on 20 October 1656, had an obvious interest for him and, in that case, he is known to have attended at least one of its meetings; he turned up on 23 December to support the Merchant Adventurers in their dispute with the cloth workers.42CJ vii. 442a; Burton’s Diary, i. 221. One issue on which he had strong views was the persecution of recusants. On 3 December 1656 he spoke in favour of the bill for discovering them, telling the House, ‘the end is not to punish any for their opinions, but to reduce them to the obedience of the government’, and that ‘great sums go out of this nation from the papists, and great sums come from beyond seas for relief of poor papists’. Thomas Burton*, in taking notes on this speech, was unimpressed by Pickering’s efforts, commenting that Pickering then ‘made a long story to little purpose’.43Burton’s Diary, i. 8. Pickering had already been named to one committee on a recusant bill (22 Oct. 1656) and would be added to another later in the session (1 June 1657).44CJ vii. 444a, 543b. Pickering’s one other known intervention came during the debate on the highways bill (2 Jan. 1657). On that occasion, he spoke against the bill (perhaps sharing the concerns of others about the proposed appointment of a surveyor-general of the highways), although he was nevertheless named to the committee appointed to consider it.45Burton’s Diary, i. 294; CJ vii. 478a. His membership of the committee to receive reports from the governors of Bridewell (28 Feb. 1657) is insufficient evidence on which to judge what his opinions may have been regarding the Naylor affair. Nor is there any way of discerning his view on the kingship question from his membership of two committees relating to the Humble Petition and Advice.46CJ vii. 497b, 521b, 540b.

Pickering also sat on three committees during this Parliament’s second session in early 1658. These included those on the bills for the maintenance of ministers, to which he was added after the Commons had decided to extend its scope (21 Jan.), and to combine the parishes within Huntingdon (26 Jan.). In both cases, these were probably matters of particular interest to his close friend, the MP for Huntingdonshire, Nicholas Pedley*.47CJ vii. 580b, 588a. On 1 February 1658, four days before this Parliament was dissolved, Pickering was knighted by the lord protector.48Shaw, Knights of Eng. ii. 224.

The 1659 Parliament seems to have proved less eventful for Pickering. His re-election – this time together with Sir Thomas Willys* – showed that he could still succeed, even when the old, narrower, franchise was in operation. Rather surprisingly, given the experience he had gained in the previous Parliament, he left no traces in the records of this session.

Pickering had few reasons to be enthusiastic about the Restoration. The grant of a baronetcy in January 1661 more than made up for the loss of his knighthood, but it was not enough to disguise the fact that his local standing was not what it had been only a few years before.49CB. He made no further attempts to stand for Parliament and seems to have spent his remaining years living quietly at Whaddon. For a time, his sister Mary, widow of Erasmus Dryden and mother of John Dryden (the poet), joined him there.50P.D. Mundy, ‘The brothers and sisters of John Dryden, the poet’, N. and Q. cxciii. 121, 123. Meanwhile, Lady Pickering inherited £1,200 on the death of her father in 1665.51PROB11/316/583.

Pickering died at Whaddon on 4 March 1668. He was buried in the local church on 27 March.52PROB11/326/556; CUL, EDR. H3. Whaddon, no. 48. No monument was erected over his grave as he had left instructions that his interment should cost no more than £10. His will decreed that some of his lands should be sold off and the rest administered by three trustees (one of whom was Pedley) until his eldest son came of age. The legacies for the other children were generous, amounting to £2,800 for the eldest daughter and £2,000 each for the others. The younger sons were to be apprenticed as Turkey merchants. By an oversight, Pickering failed to name any executors in the will, but within weeks the persons whom he had clearly intended to name – his wife, Pedley and two others – successfully applied for powers to execute its provisions.53PROB11/326/556. The eldest son, Henry†, later married one of the five daughters of Sir George Downing*. He went on to sit for Morpeth as a tory in 1685 and for Cambridge as court whig in the four Parliaments between 1698 and 1702. The baronetcy became extinct on his death in 1705.54HP Commons 1690-1715.