Curious Characters: Marquess of Granby

Jul2

Lieutenant-General John Manners, Marquess of Granby PC (2 January 1721 – 18 October 1770) was a British soldier and the eldest son of the 3rd Duke of Rutland. As he did not outlive his father and inherit the dukedom, he was known by his father’s subsidiary title, Marquess of Granby. Granby served in the Seven Years’ War as overall commander of the British troops on the battlefield and was subsequently rewarded with the post of Commander-in-Chief of the Forces. He was popular with his troops and many public houses are still named after him today.

Granby was one of the first who understood the importance of welfare and morale for the troops. The character of British soldiering improved, and properly led the army was unbeatable in war. Nearly all the portraits show him mounting a horse, or helping the wounded. On 7 June 1760 he wrote to Viscount Barrington, Secretary at War, receiving a reply ten days later making enquiries as to the Hospital Board accommodation for his wounded men.

Granby’s tactical skill commanding the allied cavalry required courage, control and communication, also bringing Horse artillery to bear. The victory at the Battle of Warburg in July 1760 of an army three times the size distinguished his generalship, and marked the man as a genuine British military hero. His opponent, the duc de Broglie, was so impressed that he commissioned a portrait of Granby by Sir Joshua Reynolds.

He is probably best known today for being popularly supposed to have more pubs named after him than any other person – due, it is said, to his practice of setting up old soldiers of his regiment as publicans when they were too old to serve any longer.

The Marquis of Granby, Waddingham

An incident between an aging Granby and Frances Hayman, the famous theatre set-designer and painter at Vauxhall Gardens, appeared in The Vauxhall Papers in 1841.

Sadly, after his military and political career ended, Granby suffered from financial problems. A close family friend wrote this after learning of his death:

“You are no stranger to the spirit of procrastination. The noblest mind that ever existed, the amiable man whom we lament was not free from it. This temper plunged him into difficulties, debts and distresses; and I have lived to see the first heir of a subject in the Kingdom have a miserable shifting life, attended by a levee of duns, and at last die broken-hearted.”

Belvoir Castle, the seat of the Rutland dukedom

Curious Characters: Sir Samuel Morland

Jun14

Sir Samuel Morland by Sir Peter Lely, 1845

Sir Samuel Morland, 1st Baronet (1625-1695), or Moreland, was an English academic, diplomat, spy, inventor and mathematician of the 17th century, a polymath credited with early developments in relation to computing, hydraulics and steam power.

The son of Thomas Morland, the rector of Sulhamstead Bannister parish church in Berkshire, he was educated at Winchester College and Magdalene College, Cambridge, where he became a Fellow in 1649. Devoting much time to the study of mathematics, Morland also became an accomplished Latinist and was proficient in Greek, Hebrew and French—then the language of culture and diplomacy. While a tutor at Cambridge, he first encountered Samuel Pepys who became a lifelong acquaintance.

While serving as secretary to John Thurloe, a Commonwealth official in charge of espionage, however, Morland became disillusioned with the Government of the Commonwealth, allegedly after learning of a plot by Sir Richard Willis, Thurloe and Richard Cromwell to assassinate the future King Charles II. As a double agent, Morland began to work towards the Restoration, engaging in espionage and cryptography—activities that later helped him enter the King’s service.

Morland’s multiplying machine

On 18 July 1660 he was created a baronet and given a minor role at court, but his principal source of income came from applying his knowledge of mathematics and hydraulics to construct and maintain various machines. These included:

“water-engines”, an early kind of water pump. He was, for example, engaged on projects to improve the water supply to Windsor Castle, during which time he patented a ‘plunger pump’ capable of “raising great quantities of water with far less proportion of strength than can be performed by a Chain or other Pump.”
a vacuum that would suck in water (in effect the first internal combustion engine)
ideas for the future development of a working steam engine. Morland’s pumps were developed for numerous domestic, marine and industrial applications, such as wells, draining ponds or mines, and fire fighting. His calculation of the volume of steam (approximately two thousand times that of water) was not improved upon until the later part of the next century.
a non-decimal adding machine (working with English pounds, shillings and pence)
a machine that made trigonometric calculations
a “Multiplying Instrument”
an ‘arithmetical machine’ by which the four fundamental rules of arithmetic were readily worked (regarded by some as the world’s first multiplying machine, an example is in the Science Museum in South Kensington).
a design for making metal fire-hearths
the speaking trumpet, an early form of megaphone.

He also corresponded with Pepys about naval gun-carriages, designed a machine to weigh ship’s anchors, developed new forms of barometers, and designed a cryptographic machine.

From The Vauxhall Papers:

Sir Samuel being a great mechanic, every part of his house shewed the invention of the owner: the side-table in the dining-room was supplied with a large fountain, and the glasses stood under little streams of water. His coach had a moveable kitchen, with clock-work machinery, with which he could make soup, broil steaks, or roast a joint of meat. From the this description of Sir Samuel’s character, an impression prevailed… that his house was the identical spot of the present Vauxhall Gardens; and a history of Lambeth, published in 1827, thus summarily disposes of the affair:—“The matter is put beyond the question of doubt from the information of one of the late proprietors, that the present dwelling belonging to the garden was built by Sir Samuel Moreland. The house is large, and from the back kitchen a lead pump was removed about 1794, bearing Sir Samuel Moreland’s mark, viz:—

HOWEVER, the editor of The Vauxhall Papers, Mr. A. Bunn, proves that the two were not the same property, using public documents from the Duchy of Cornwall.

VAUXHALL HOUSE, of which Sir Samuel was… the tenant, was leased to Mr. Kent, a distiller, for 28 years, in the year 1725, and the site thereof subsequently leased to Mr. Snaith: while the Spring Garden, Vauxhall, was leased by Mr. Jonathan Tyers in the year 1730, which fact may also be proved by a reference to the office of the Duchy of Cornwall. Here is proof positive, and utterly undeniable: but we can bring down the present property in direct descent, without any reference whatever to Sir Samuel Moreland, whose estate (VAUXHALL HOUSE), was a total distinct property.