Sunderland

Sunderland, ROBERT SPENCER, EARL OF, was born in 1640, and in September 1643 succeeded his father, who fell at the first battle of Newbury, having three months before been created first earl. After serving as ambassador to several courts, in 1679 he became Secretary of State, and at first united with Essex and Halifax in opposing Shaftesbury, who wished to set Monmouth on the throne, and favoured the exclusion of the Duke of York. He encouraged Charles II. to persevere in the degrading French alliance, and, with the Duchess of Portsmouth, to whom he attached himself, negotiated a treaty by which, in consideration of an annual French pension, Charles was to assemble no parliament for three years. Before the year was out a new triumvirate, consisting of himself, Hyde, and Godolphin, succeeded to the confidence of Charles. The treaty with France was broken off, and Sunderland, who was now afraid of the Whigs, engaged the king in a more popular alliance with Spain. After the dissolution of the last of the exclusion parliaments he lost his office; but the duchess remained faithful to him in disgrace, and in 1682 he was, 'upon great submission made to the Duke [of York], again restored to be Secretary.' He remained in office until the accession of James II., when his influence in the ministry became greater than ever. Although there is reason to believe he gave some encouragement to Monmouth in his rebellion, he managed, with consummate art, to win James's entire confidence, and in 1685 became prime-minister. He alone was entrusted with a knowledge of the king's intention to establish Catholicism as the national church; and in 1687 he privately conformed thereto, and afterwards openly professed his conversion. His influence was so great that James would grant no favour until he had asked the question: 'Have they spoken to Sunderland?' and when told that this nobleman got all the money of the court, he would reply: 'He deserves it.' Yet we find him about this time in correspondence with William of Orange. With profligate but masterly dexterity he contrived to deceive both James and Barillon, and to keep them in ignorance of the events that were passing in Holland. When William arrived in England Sunderland went to Amsterdam, whence he wrote to the new monarch, claiming his favour and protection on the ground that he had all along been in his interest. In 1691 he was allowed to return to England, and to kiss the king's hand; in 1695 William spent a week at his house at Althorp. He had changed, it was said, his religion, in the late reign, in order the more effectually to ruin King James; and it was generally believed that he had rendered King William, when Prince of Orange, some signal services, which no one else could have done. This belief gained credit from the favour now shown him. He was made Lord Chamberlain, and as such took his seat at the head of the council table. After directing affairs as the acknowledged head of the government, he resigned office in 1697, and retired to Althorp, where he died, 28th September 1702. By his wife, Anne, daughter of the second Earl of Bristol, he left CHARLES SPENCER, third earl, who was born in 1675, and whom Evelyn describes as a youth of extraordinary hopes, very learned for his age, and ingenious. From 1706 to 1710 he was Secretary of State in the reign of Queen Anne, and under George I. he rose to be all-powerful; but in 1721, being accused of receiving £50,000 worth of the fictitious stock distributed by the directors of the South Sea Scheme (q.v.), in order to bribe the government, he was acquitted only by an inconsiderable majority and that from party considerations, and the indignation of the public made him resign his office. He died on 19th April 1722, not without suspicion of having intrigued, after his fall, for the restoration of the Tories, if not for the return of the Pretender. Sunderland was a type of the political morality, or rather immorality, of a disgraceful age, when the greatest statesmen made no scruple of sacrificing either their own party or the interests and dignity of the nation to personal ambition. His title descended to Charles, his second son, who succeeding in 1733 to the honours of his maternal grandfather, John Churchill, the earldom of Sunderland became absorbed in the dukedom of Marlborough. The third son, John, was father of the first Earl Spencer (q.v.).