The Creevey Papers
Thomas Creevey to Elizabeth Ord, 16 August 1828
“Woolbeding, Aug. 16th.
“. . . This place is really exquisite—its
history not amiss. This venerable, grave old man‖ and offspring of Blenheim
purchased it 35 years ago with the money he won as keeper of the faro bank at
Brooks’s, and he has made it what it is by his good taste in planting,
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&c. . . . There is only one fictitious
ornament to the place, and ‘the Comical’ seems to have shown as
much address in converting it into his property as he did in winning the
estate. It is a fountain, by far the most perfect in taste, elegance and in
everything else I ever saw. I am always going to it. It came from Cowdray, 3
miles off, Lord Mountague’s. When
Cowdray was burnt down 30 years ago, this fountain, being in the middle of a
court, was greatly defaced and neglected. Lord Mountague
was drowned in the Rhine with Burdett’s brother at the precise time his house was burnt, and so never
knew it; and as there was no one on the spot to look after the ruins,
Bob thought it but a friendly office to give the
fountain a retreat in his grounds, and as he himself told me, it cost him £100
to remove it and put it up here. It has some fame, because Horace Walpole in one of his letters says he
had gone or was going to Cowdray to see Lord
Mountague’s fountain; and its history is well known as
being the production of Benvenuto
Cellini,. . . who, they tell me, was a famous man. Look in the
dictionary and tell me about him.”
Charles Sedley Burdett (d. 1793)
The second son of Francis Burdett and brother of Sir Francis Burdett who drowned
attempting to swim the falls of the Rhine in Switzerland.
Sir Francis Burdett, fifth baronet (1770-1844)
Whig MP for Westminster (1807-1837) who was imprisoned on political charges in 1810 and
again in 1820; in the 1830s he voted with the Conservatives.
Benvenuto Cellini (1500-1571)
Florentine goldsmith, sculptor, and poet whose
Vita or
autobiography was posthumously published in 1728.
Bernard Edward Howard, twelfth duke of Norfolk (1765-1842)
Educated at the English College at Douai, in 1815 he succeeded his third cousin, Charles
Howard, eleventh duke (d. 1815), and took his seat in Parliament after passage of the Roman
Catholic Relief Bill of 1829.
Charles Lennox, third duke of Richmond (1735-1806)
Son of the second duke (d. 1750); educated at Westminster School, he was a military
officer, diplomat, Rockingham Whig, and supporter of the elder Pitt who became a Tory in
his later years.
Henry William Paget, first marquess of Anglesey (1768-1854)
Originally Bayly, educated at Westminster and Christ Church, Oxford; he was MP
(1790-1810), commander of cavalry under Sir John Moore, lost a leg at Waterloo, and raised
to the peerage 1815; he was lord-lieutenant of Ireland (1828-29, 1830-33).
Lord Robert Spencer (1747-1831)
Of Woolbeding in Sussex; the youngest son of the second Duke of Marlborough, he was Whig
MP for Woodstock (1768-71, 1818-20), Oxford City (1771-90), Wareham (1790-99), and
Tavistock (1802-07). He was a friend of Charles James Fox.
