Sir Denzil Holles MP, 1st Baron Holles of Ifield

Family and Education b. 31 Oct. 1598, 2nd s. of Sir John Holles* and Anne, da. of Sir Thomas Stanhope† of Shelford, Notts., bro. of John*.2 educ. Christ’s, Camb. 1613, BA 1615, MA 1616; G. Inn 1615; travelled abroad 1618-19.3 m. (1) 4 June 1626, Dorothy (d. 21 June 1640), da. and h. of Sir Francis Ashley* of Dorchester Friary, 4s. (3 d.v.p.); (2) 12 Mar. 1642, Jane (bur. 25 Apr. 1666), da. and coh. of Sir John Shurley* of Isfield, Suss., wid. of Sir Walter Covert* of Slaugham and John Freke* of Westbrooke House, Upwey, Dorset, s.p.; (3) 14 Sept. 1666, Esther (d.1684), da. and coh. of Gideon le Lou of Colombiers, Normandy, wid. of Jacques Richer of Combernon, s.p. cr. Bar. Holles of Ifield 20 Apr. 1661. d. 17 Feb. 1680.4

Offices Held

Freeman, Dorchester 1628,5 Poole, Dorset 1671;6 capt. militia ft. W. Dorset 1636;7 commr. sewers, Dorset 1638, Westminster 1660, 1672-3, Bedford Great Level 1662, Mdx. 1667, 1671;8 j.p. Dorset by 1640-2, 1660-at least 1664, Hants 1641-2, Wilts. 1641-2, 1660-at least 1664, custos rot. Dorset 1641-2, 1660-at least 1664;9 commr. oyer and terminer, Western circ. 1641-2, 1660-at least 1673,10 subsidy, Dorset 1641-2, Bristol 1642;11 ld. lt. Bristol 1642; commr. sequestration, Dorset and Wilts. 1643, execution of ordinances, 1644, defence, Wilts. 1644, Surr. 1645, assessment Dorset and Wilts. 1644, 1647, 1660-1, Surr. 1645, 1647, Notts. 1637, Northern Assoc., Notts. 1645; gov. of Covent Garden precinct, Westminster 1646; commr. appeals, Oxf. Univ. 1647, militia, Bristol and Notts. 1648, Dorset and Wilts. 1648, 1660.12

Commr. relief of the king’s army and northern counties 1641, raising and levying money for the defence of Eng. and Ire.,13 affairs of Ire. 1642;14 member, cttee. of safety 1642-3,15 sequestration 1643-4,16 navy and customs 1644-?,17 commr. treaty of Uxbridge 1645, Admlty. 1645-8, propositions for relief of Ireland 1645, abuses in heraldry 1646, exclusion from sacrament 1646, sale of bps’ lands 1646, indemnity 1647, compounding 1647-8, scandalous offences 1648; cllr. of state 25 Feb.-31 May 1660,18 PC 1 June 1660-7 Jan. 1676, 24 June 1679-d.;19 commr. trade 1660-72, plantations 1660-70;20 high steward to Queen Catharine of Braganza 1662-d.;21 amb. France 1663-6; plenip. Breda 1667;22 commr. subsidy, peerage 1671.23

Col. of ft. (parl.) 1642.24

Biography Holles was one of Prince Charles’s closest boyhood companions. Despite his ‘low voice’, he was accorded a part in the Clare Hall production of Ignoramus, a play satirizing the legal profession, in March 1615. The king was so delighted that he ordered a second performance in May, much to the fury of Sir Edward Coke*, who ‘galled and glanced at scholars with much bitterness’. His intention of joining the prince in Madrid in 1623 was not carried through. Instead he went to Dorset to visit Sir Francis Ashley, presumably in an attempt to persuade him to consent to his courtship of Ashley’s daughter Dorothy, which was initially opposed by both families.25

Although the principal estates of Holles’ father lay in Nottinghamshire, the family also owned property in Cornwall, including the manor of Denzell, from which Holles derived his first name. The manor was eight miles from Mitchell, for which borough Holles was returned in 1624 after his elder brother John chose to sit for the Nottinghamshire borough of East Retford. Holles left no trace on the records of the last Jacobean Parliament, unless it was he rather than his brother who was named to attend the conference with the Lords of 22 May 1624 on the effect of the monopolies bill on the wine licences.26

On the accession of Charles I Holles reputedly refused to be made a knight of the Bath or to participate in the coronation masque.27 There is no evidence that he sought election to the first two Caroline Parliaments. In June 1626 he finally married Dorothy Ashley, and the couple took up residence in Dorchester, where his father-in-law was the recorder and where Holles, like Ashley, became a friend of the renowned puritan minister John White, the so-called ‘Patriarch of Dorchester’. Sir Francis Ashley settled lands worth £600 a year on the couple, while Holles’ father made over his Cornish property to them. Although then worth only £40 a year, it was thought these lands were capable of being improved to yield £250. In addition Holles received a legacy of £600 from his maternal grandmother.28

On 9 Aug. 1627 Holles wrote to his sister’s husband, Sir Thomas Wentworth*, reporting on the impact of the war on the economy of the West Country: ‘all trading is dead, our wools lie upon our hands, our men are not set on work, our ships lie in our ports unoccupied to be sold as cheap as firewood; land, sheep, cattle - nothing will yield money’. He complained of the disorders of the soldiers, and that at sea few prizes had been taken. Those that had been captured were not worth much, for ‘by that time my lord admiral and his vice-admirals be satisfied, and all other rights and wrongs be discharged, a slender gleaning is left to the taker’. He joked that ‘the most prizes most common nowadays are ... rebellious gentlemen’, like Wentworth, ‘who will not open their purse-strings and supply His Majesty’s wants for the maintenance of the wars, and my lord duke’s expenses ..., in war and peace’. Writing again after the disaster at Ré he opined: ‘this only every man knows, that since England was England it received not so dishonourable a blow’.29

Holles presumably owed his return for Dorchester in 1628 to his father-in-law, who had previously sat for the borough. He was made free of the corporation on the same day as the election. In the 1628 session he received three committee appointments and made as many recorded speeches. He was among those ordered on 24 Apr. to report on the lists of recusants brought in by the knights of the shire. In his first recorded speech on 30 May he argued that the House should resolve by a single question whether a patent concerning the drawing up legal documents was a grievance rather than vote on the various points at issue individually. On 10 June he spoke against the estate bill promoted by the 2nd earl of Devonshire (Sir William Cavendish I*), a major East Midlands landowner, arguing that Devonshire’s cousin, the 1st Viscount Newark (Robert Pierrepont†) had an interest in the estate but had not consented to the bill. Together with Wentworth he was appointed a teller against the bill, but as the noes agreed to yield there was no division. On the pardon proffered by the king, he declared on 13 June that ‘many good subjects should take little benefit by it as it now is’. His other committees were to examine the registration of pawnbrokers and to consider a petition against Sir Edward Mosley* (17, 18 June).30

In the 1629 session Holles was named to committees for bills to explain the Recusancy Act of 1606 (28 Jan.) and to reverse a decree in the Court of Wards (19 February). On 23 Feb. he urged the House to punish the customs farmers who had seized goods from those merchants who were refusing to pay Tunnage and Poundage.31 He came to national prominence by his share in the tumult that brought the Parliament to an end, being one of the Members, led by Sir John Eliot, who met after Parliament had been adjourned on 25 Feb. at the Three Cranes tavern to work out their tactics.32 How Holles was recruited to this group is unknown, but it may have had something to do with his connection with Cornwall, the native county of Eliot and the latter’s ally William Coryton. Another member of this group, Benjamin Valentine, had previously been a servant of Holles’ father’s patron, Robert Carr, 1st earl of Somerset.33 Fearing that a dissolution was imminent, Holles and his associates determined to put on record a formal declaration against the unparliamentary collection of Tunnage and Poundage, and to protest against the growth of anti-Calvinism in the church. However, they suspected that the Speaker, John Finch II, would attempt to adjourn the sitting again immediately. Consequently, when the Commons reassembled on 2 Mar., Holles and Valentine arrived early and sat next to the Speaker. These seats were usually occupied by the privy councillors, but Holles subsequently alleged that ‘he had at other times as well as then seated himself in that place’, and claimed precedence, presumably as an earl’s son, over the privy councillors at any time other than at a meeting of the Council. As anticipated, Finch delivered a message from the king ordering another adjournment, but as he tried to rise Holles and Valentine held him down. Resisting the attempts of the privy councillors to free the Speaker, Holles swore ‘by God’s wounds you shall sit till we please to rise’. ‘Are we a Parliament, or no Parliament?’ he demanded. ‘Are we assembled by the by the king, trusted for the good and safety of the king? The laws and liberties? Or are we not?’ In reply to Finch’s expression of anxiety about disobeying the king, Holles retorted that the Speaker was obliged to obey the Commons and ‘that will secure you’. Eliot thereupon read out the declaration, but in the ensuing uproar he panicked and burned the document. Consequently, when John Selden called for a vote, Eliot was unable to produce the paper again. Having gone thus far, Holles was understandably angry with Eliot and rebuked him, but fortunately he had his own copy available, which he proceeded to read to the House while Black Rod fumed outside the locked door. According to some versions of events the paper was then carried by acclamation, whereupon the Commons dispersed.34

Together with eight other Members of the Commons suspected of plotting the 2 Mar. disturbance, Holles was summoned before the Privy Council on 4 March. Under questioning he claimed that ‘he came into the House that morning with as great zeal to do His Majesty service as anyone whatsoever’ but ‘finding His Majesty was displeased with him, he humbly desired that he might rather be the subject of his mercy than his power’. He was imprisoned in the Tower until November, when, at the importunity of his wife and her parents, he submitted to be bound over, with his father-in-law and William Noye* as his sureties. Indicted before King’s Bench with Eliot and Valentine, they disputed the jurisdiction of that court over anything said or done in Parliament, and it was not until 12 Feb. 1630 that judgment was reached. He was fined 1,000 marks, but avoided making payment for as long as he could.35 Meanwhile the Dorchester corporation gave him a standing-cup worth 20 marks to mark their appreciation of his services in this Parliament.36

Holles’ actions on 2 Mar. 1629 established him as a national political figure. He refused to pay Ship Money in the 1630s and was re-elected for Dorchester to both the Short and Long Parliaments, in which he emerged as one of the most prominent Members of the Commons. One of the Five Members accused of treason by Charles I in January 1642, he took up arms for Parliament, but subsequently became a leading supporter of a compromise peace. He was again accused of treason by the New Model Army in 1647 and was subsequently secluded from Parliament. After living privately for most the 1650s he was raised to the peerage after the Restoration, becoming a prominent diplomat and privy councillor in the 1660s. In the following decade he was a leading critics of the policies of lord treasurer Danby (Sir Thomas Osborne†), although he opposed the exclusion of the future James II. He drafted his will on 26 July 1670, added a codicil on 9 Mar. 1679, and was buried in St. Peter’s, Dorchester on 10 Apr. 1680. His son and heir, Sir Francis, after sitting for the Cornish borough of Lostwithiel as a recruiter and for Wiltshire under the Protectorate, was returned for Dorchester at both elections of 1679.37

Ref Volumes: 1604-1629 Author: John. P. Ferris Notes 1. Disabled 27 Jan. 1648, readmitted 8 June, did not sit after Pride’s Purge 6 Dec. and readmitted 21 Feb. 1660. 2. CP, vi. 545. 3. Al. Cant.; GI Admiss.; APC, 1618-19, p. 100; Letters of John Holles ed. P.R. Seddon (Thoroton Soc. Rec. ser. xxxv), 230. 4. CP, vi. 546; Eg. 784, f. 88v. 5. C.H. Mayo, Municipal Recs. of Bor. of Dorchester, 425. 6. Dorset RO, DC/PL/B/1/1. 7. Dorset RO, D84 (official). 8. C181/5, f. 113; 181/7, ff. 38, 148, 412, 586, 627, 632. 9. C66/2858; C231/5, pp. 475, 478, 481, 495, 528-30; Perfect List of all such Persons as by Commission under Great Seal of Eng. are now Confirmed to be Custos Rotulorum, Justices of Oyer and Terminer, Justices of the Peace and Quorum (1660), pp. 13, 59; C193/12/3, ff. 23, 109v. 10. C181/5, ff. 189, 221; 181/7, ff. 94, 636. 11. SR, v. 83, 150-1. 12. A. and O. i. 2, 111, 116, 459, 460, 475, 542, 544, 624, 707, 731, 815, 927, 464, 964, 971, 976-7, 1234, 1236, 1240, 1244; ii. 1430, 1445; SR, v. 211, 221. 13. SR, v. 78, 167. 14. Jnls. Mar.-June 1642, 403. 15. CJ, ii. 651; LJ, vi. 348. 16. SP20/1/1, f. 62v; 20/1/2, f. 163. 17. CJ, iii. 670. 18. A. and O. i. 609, 669, 723, 839, 853, 905, 914, 937, 1208; ii. 1418. 19. CP, vi. 546. 20. Officials of Boards of Trade comp. J.C. Sainty, 101. 21. CTB, iv. 154; PC2/55, f. 30; SP29/47/116. 22. Handlist of British Diplomatic Representatives comp. G.M. Bell, 24, 115. 23. C66/3125/14. 24. P. Crawford, Denzil Holles, 80-2. 25. Crawford, 12-13; Letters of John Holles ed. P.R. Seddon (Thoroton Soc. Rec. ser. xxxi), 63; Chamberlain Letters ed. N.E. McClure, i. 598. 26. Letters of John Holles ed. P.R. Seddon (Thoroton Soc. Rec. ser. xxxvi), 512; CJ, i. 709a. 27. G. Holles, Mems. of Holles Fam. ed. A.C Wood (Cam. Soc. ser. 3, lv), 102. 28. Letters of John Holles, 152; Crawford, 15, 26-7. 29. Strafforde Letters (1739) ed. W. Knowler, i. 40, 42. 30. CD 1628, iii. 61; iv. 31, 220, 230, 300, 345, 362. 31. CD 1629, p. 236. 32. Crawford, 20. 33. While visiting his Cornish relations Holles’ gt.-uncle, Gervase Holles, had met, fought a duel with, and struck up a ‘hearty friendship’, with William Coryton’s fa. Holles, 127. 34. CD 1629, pp. 104-5, 171-2, 226-7, 240, 243-4; Lansd. 93, f. 138; I.H.C. Fraser, ‘Agitation in the Commons, 2 Mar. 1629’, BIHR, xxx. 91. 35. Crawford, 23-5; Lansd. 93, f. 138. 36. Eg. 784, f. 77v. 37. Crawford, 30; Oxford DNB; R. Ashton, Civil War, 193-4; PROB 11/362, f. 163v-5v; CP, vi. 546; HP Commons, 1660-88, ii. 563.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denzil_Holles,_1st_Baron_Holles

Denzil Holles, 1st Baron Holles PC (31 October 1599 – 17 February 1680) was an English statesman and writer, best known as one of the five members of parliament whom King Charles I of England attempted to arrest in 1642.

Early life

Holles was the third son of John Holles, 1st Earl of Clare (c. 1564–1637), by Anne, daughter of Sir Thomas Stanhope. The favourite son of his father and endowed with great natural abilities, Denzil Holles grew up under advantageous circumstances. Destined to become one of the most formidable antagonists of King Charles's arbitrary government, he had been Charles's childhood friend. The Earl of Clare was, however, no friend to the Stuart administration, being especially hostile to the Duke of Buckingham; and on the accession of Charles to the throne the king's offers of favour were rejected. In 1624 Holles was returned to parliament for Mitchell in Cornwall, and in 1628 for Dorchester. He had from the first a keen sense of the humiliations which attended the foreign policy of the Stuart kings. Writing to Strafford, his brother-in-law, on November 29, 1629, he severely censures Buckingham's conduct of the expedition to the Isle of Ré; "since England was England," he declared, "it received not so dishonourable a blow"; and he joined in the demand for Buckingham's impeachment in 1628.

Parliamentary activity and imprisonment

To these discontents were now added the abuses arising from the king's arbitrary administration. On March 2, 1629, when Sir John Finch, the speaker, refused to put Sir John Eliot's Protestations and was about to adjourn the House by the king's command, Holles together with another member, Sir Walter Long, thrust him back into the chair and swore "he should sit still till it pleased them to rise." Meanwhile Eliot, on the refusal of the speaker to read the Protestations, had himself thrown them into the fire; the usher of the black rod was knocking at the door for admittance, and the king had sent for the guard. But Holles, declaring that he could not render the king or his country better service, put the Protestations to the House from memory, all the members rising to their feet and applauding. In consequence a warrant was issued for his arrest with others on the following day.

They were prosecuted first in the Star Chamber and subsequently in the King's Bench. When brought upon his habeas corpus before the latter court Holles offered with the rest to give bail, but refused sureties for good behaviour, and argued that the court had no jurisdiction over offences supposed to have been committed in parliament. On his refusal to plead he was sentenced to a fine of 1000 marks and to imprisonment during the king's pleasure. Holles had at first been committed and remained for some time a close prisoner in the Tower of London. The "close" confinement, however, was soon changed to a "safe" one, the prisoner then having leave to take the air and exercise, but being obliged to maintain himself at his own expense. On October 29 Holles, with Eliot and Valentine, was transferred to the Marshalsea. His resistance to the king's tyranny did not prove so stout as that of some of his comrades in misfortune. Among the papers of the secretary Sir John Coke is a petition of Holles, couched in humble and submissive terms, to be restored to the king's favour; having given the security demanded for his good behaviour, he was liberated early in 1630, and on October 30 was allowed bail.

The drift to Civil War

Being still banished from London he retired to the country, paying his fine in 1637 or 1638. The fine was repaid by the parliament in July 1644, and the judgment was revised on a writ of error in 1668. In 1638 we find him, notwithstanding his recent experiences, one of the chief leaders in his county of the resistance to ship money, though it would appear that he subsequently made submission. Following the end of the Eleven Years Tyranny Holles was a member of the Short and Long Parliaments assembled in 1640. According to Laid he was now "one of the great leading men in the House of Commons," and in Clarendon's opinion he was "a man of more accomplished parts than any of his party" and of most authority.

He was not, however, in the confidence of the republican party. Though he was at first named one of the managers for the impeachment of Strafford, Holles had little share in his prosecution. According to Laud he held out to Strafford hopes of saving his life if he would use his influence with the king to abolish episcopacy, but the earl refused, and Holles advised Charles that Strafford should demand a short respite, of which he would take advantage to procure a commutation of the death sentence. In the debate on the attainder he spoke on behalf of Strafford's family, and later obtained some favours from the parliament for his eldest son. In all other matters in parliament Holles took a principal part. He was one of the chief movers of the Protestation of May 3, 1641, which he carried up to the Lords, urging them to give it their approval. Although, according to Clarendon, he did not wish to change the government of the church, he showed himself at this time decidedly hostile to the bishops.

He took up the impeachment of Laud to the House of Peers, supported the Londoners' petition for the abolition of episcopacy and the Root and Branch Bill, and afterwards urged that the bishops impeached for their conduct in the affair of the late canons should be accused of treason. He showed equal energy in the affairs of Ireland at the outbreak of the rebellion, supported strongly the independence and purity of the judicial bench and opposed toleration of the Roman Catholics. On July 9, 1641 he addressed the Lords on behalf of the queen of Bohemia, expressing great loyalty to the king and royal family and urging the necessity of supporting the Protestant religion everywhere. Together with Pym, Holles drew up the Grand Remonstrance, and made a vigorous speech in its support or November 22, 1641, in which he argued for the right of one House to make a declaration, and asserted: "If kings are misled by their counsellors we may, we must tell them of it."

On December 15 he was a teller in the division in favour of printing it. On the great subject of the militia he also showed activity. He supported Arthur Haselrig's Militia Bill of December 7, 1641, and on December 31, 1641 he took up to the king the Commons' demand for a guard under the command of Essex. "Holles's force and reputation," said Sir Ralph Verney, "are the two things that give the success to all actions." After the failure of the attempt by the court to gain over Holles and others by offering them posts in the administration, he was one of the "five members" impeached by the king. Holles at once grasped the full significance of the king's action, and after the triumphant return to the House of the five members, on January 11, 1642, threw himself into still more pronounced opposition to the arbitrary policy of the crown. He demanded that before anything further was done the members should be cleared of their impeachment; was himself leader in the impeachment of the Duke of Richmond; and on January 31, 1642, when taking up the militia petition to the House of Lords, he adopted a very menacing tone, at the same time presenting a petition of some thousands of supposed starving artificers of London, congregated round the House. On June 15, 1642 he carried up the impeachment of the nine Lords who had deserted the parliament; and he was one of the committee of safety appointed on July 4, 1642.

Civil War

On the outbreak of the Civil War Holles, who had been made lieutenant of Bristol, was sent with Bedford to the west against the marquess of Hertford, and took part in the unsuccessful siege of the latter at Sherborne Castle. He was present at Edgehill, where his regiment of Puritans recruited in London was one of the few which stood firm and saved the day for the parliament. On November 13, 1642 his men were surprised at Brentford during his absence, and routed after a stout resistance. In December he was proposed for the command of the forces in the west, an appointment which he appears to have refused. Notwithstanding his activity in the field for the cause of the parliament, the appeal to arms had been distasteful to Holles from the first. As early as September he surprised the House by the marked abatement of his former "violent and fiery spirit," and his changed attitude did not escape the taunts of his enemies, who attributed it scornfully to his disaster at Brentford or to his new wife.

He probably foresaw that, to whichever side victory fell, the struggle could only terminate in the suppression of the constitution and of the moderate party on which all his hopes were based. His feelings and political opinions, too, were essentially aristocratic, and he regarded with horror the transference of the government of the state from the king and the ruling families to the parliamentary leaders. He now advocated peace and a settlement of the disputes by concessions on both sides; a proposal full of danger because impracticable, and one therefore which could only weaken the parliamentary resistance and prolong the struggle. He warmly supported the peace negotiations on November 21, 1642 and December 22, 1642, and his attitude led to a breach with Pym and the more determined party. In June 1643 he was accused of complicity in Waller's plot, but swore to his innocency; and his arrest with others of the peace party was even proposed in August, when Holles applied for a pass to leave the country.

The king's successes, however, for the moment put a stop to all hopes of peace; and in April 1644 Holles addressed the citizens of London at the Guildhall, calling upon them "to join with their purses, their persons, and their prayers together to support the army of Essex." In November Holles and Whitelocke headed the commission appointed to treat with the king at Oxford. He endeavoured to convince the royalists of the necessity of yielding in time, before the "new party of hot men" should gain the upper hand. Holles and Whitelocke had a private meeting with the king, when at Charles's request they drew up the answer which they advised him to return to the parliament. This interview was not communicated to the other commissioners or to parliament, and though doubtless their motives were thoroughly patriotic, their action was scarcely compatible with their position as trustees of the parliamentary cause. Holles was also appointed a commissioner at the Treaty of Uxbridge in January 1645 and endeavoured to overcome the crucial difficulty of the militia by postponing its discussion altogether.

As leader of the moderate (or Presbyterian) party Holles now came into violent antagonism with Cromwell and the army faction. "They hated one another equally"; and Holles would not allow any merit in Cromwell, accusing him of cowardice and attributing his successes to chance and good fortune. With the support of Essex and the Scottish commissioners Holles endeavoured in December 1644 to procure Cromwell's impeachment as an incendiary between the two nations, and "passionately" opposed the self-denying ordinance. In return Holles was charged with having held secret communications with the king at Oxford and with a correspondence with Lord Digby; but after a long examination by the House he was pronounced innocent on July 19, 1645. Determined on Cromwell's destruction, he refused to listen to the prudent counsels of Sir Anthony Ashley-Cooper, who urged that Cromwell was too strong to be resisted or provoked, and on March 29, 1647 drew up in parliament a hasty proclamation declaring the promoters of the army petition enemies to the state; in April challenging Ireton to a duel.

The army party was now thoroughly exasperated against Holles. "They were resolved one way or other to be rid of him," says Clarendon. On June 16, 1647 eleven members including Holles were charged by the army with various offences against the state, followed on June 23 by fresh demands for their impeachment and for their suspension, which was refused. On the 26th, however, the eleven members, to avoid violence, asked leave to withdraw. Their reply to the charges against them was handed into the House on July 19, 1647, and on the 20th Holles took leave of the House in A grave and learned speech ... After the riot of the apprentices on the 26th, for which Holles disclaimed any responsibility, the eleven members were again (July 30) recalled to their seats, and Holles was one of the committee of safety appointed. On the flight of the speaker, however, and part of the parliament to the army, and the advance of the latter to London, Holles, whose party and policy were now entirely defeated, left England on August 22 for Sainte-Mère-Église in Normandy.

On January 26, 1648 the eleven members, who had not appeared when summoned to answer the charges against them, were expelled. Not long afterwards, however, on June 3, these proceedings were annulled; and Holles, who had then returned and was a prisoner in the Tower with the rest of the eleven members, was discharged. He returned to his seat on August 14. Holles was one of the commissioners appointed to treat with the king at Newport on September 18, 1648. Aware of the plans of the extreme party, Holles threw himself at the king's feet and implored him not to waste time in useless negotiations, and he was one of those who stayed behind the rest in order to urge Charles to compliance. On December 1 he received the thanks of the House. On the occasion of Pride's Purge on December 6 Holles absented himself and escaped again to France.

The Commonwealth

From his retirement there he wrote to Charles II in 1651, advising him to come to terms with the Scots as the only means of effecting a restoration; but after the alliance he refused Charles's offer of the secretaryship a state. In March 1654 Cromwell, who in alarm at the plots being formed against him was attempting to reconcile some of his opponents to his government, sent Holles a pass "with notable circumstances of kindness and esteem." His subsequent movements and the date of his return to England are uncertain, but in 1656 Cromwell's resentment was again excited against him as the supposed author of a tract, really written by Clarendon. He appears to have been imprisoned, for his release was ordered by the council on September 2, 1659.

The Restoration

Holles took part in the conference with George Monck (later Duke of Albemarle) at Northumberland House, when the Restoration was directly proposed, and with the secluded members took his seat again in parliament on February 21, 1660. On February 23 he was chosen one of the council to carry on the government during the interregnum; on March 2 the votes passed against him and the sequestration of his estates were repealed, and on March 7 he was made custos rotulorum (keeper of the rolls) for Dorsetshire. He took a leading part in bringing about the Restoration, was chairman of the committee of seven appointed to prepare an answer to the king's letter, and as one of the deputed Lords and Commons he delivered at the Hague the invitation to Charles to return. He preceded Charles to England to prepare for his reception, and was sworn of the privy council on June 5. He was one of the thirty-four commissioners appointed to try the regicides in September and October.

On April 20, 1661 he was created Baron Holles of Ifield in Sussex, and became henceforth one of the leading members of the Upper House. Holles, who was a good French scholar, was sent as ambassador to France on July 7, 1663. He was ostentatiously English, and a zealous upholder of the national honour and interests; but his position was rendered difficult by the absence of home support. On January 27, 1666 war was declared, but Holles was not recalled till May. Pepys remarks on November 14: "Sir G. Cartaret tells me that just now my Lord Holles had been with him and wept to think in what a condition we are fallen." Soon afterwards he was employed on another disagreeable mission in which the national honour was again at stake, being sent to Breda to make a peace with Holland in May 1667. He accomplished his task successfully, the articles being signed on June 21. On December 12 he protested against Lord Clarendon's banishment and was nearly put out of the council in consequence.

In 1668 he was manager for the Lords in the celebrated Skinner's case, in which his knowledge of precedents was of great service, and on which occasion he published the tract The Grand Question concerning the Judicature of the House of Peeres (1669). Holles, who was honourably distinguished by Charles as a "stiff and sullen man," and as one who would not yield to solicitation; now became with Halifax and Shaftesbury a leader in the resistance to the domestic and foreign policy of the court. Together with Halifax he opposed both the arbitrary Conventicle Act of 1670 and the Test Oath of 1675, his objection to the latter being chiefly founded on the invasion of the privileges of the peers which it involved; and he defended with vigour the right of the Peers to record their protests. On January 7, 1676 Holles with Halifax was summarily dismissed from the council.

On the occasion of the Commons petitioning the king in favour of an alliance with the Dutch, Holles addressed a Letter to Van Beuninghen at Amsterdam on "Love to our Country and Hatred of a Common Enemy," enlarging upon the necessity of uniting in a common defence against French aggression and in support of the Protestant religion. "The People are strong but the Government is weak," he declares; and he attributes the cause of weakness to the transference of power from the nobility to the people, and to a succession of three weal princes." Save what (the Parliament) did, we have not taken one true step nor struck one true stroke since Queen Elizabeth. He endeavoured to embarrass the government this year in his tract on Some Considerations upon the Question whether the parliament is dissolved by its prorogation for 15 months. It was held by the Lords to be seditious and scandalous; while for publishing another pamphlet written by Holles entitled The Grand Question concerning the Prorogation of this Parliament (otherwise The Long Parliament dissolved) the corrector of the proof sheets was committed to the Tower and fined £1000. In order to bring about the downfall of Danby (afterwards Duke of Leeds) and the disbanding of the army, which he believe to be intended for the suppression of the national liberties.

Holles at this time (1677-1679) engaged, as did many others, in dangerous intrigue with Courtin and Barillon, the French envoys, and Louis XIV; he refused, however, the latter's presents on the ground that he was a member of the council, having been appointed to Sir William Temple's new modelled cabinet in 1679. Barillon described lum as at this period in his old age "the man of all England for whom the different cabals have the most consideration," and as firmly opposed to the arbitrary designs of the court. He showed moderation in the Popish Plot, and on the question of the exclusion followed Halifax rather than Shaftesbury.

Death and overview

His long and eventful career closed by his death on February 17, 1680. He was buried at Westminster Abbey on 21st February 1680[1]. The character of Holles has been drawn by Burnet, with whom he was on terms of friendship. "Holles was a man of great courage and of as great pride... He was faithful and firm to his side and never changed through the whole course of his life." He argued well but too vehemently; for he could not bear contradiction. He had the soul of an old stubborn Roman in him. He was a faithful but a rough friend, and a severe but fair enemy. He had a true sense of religion; and was a man of an unblameable course of life and of a sound judgment when it was not biased by passion. Holles was essentially an aristocrat and a Whig in feeling, making Cromwell's supposed hatred of "Lords" a special charge against him; regarding the civil wars rather as a social than as a political revolution, and attributing all the evils of his time to the transference of political power from the governing families to the "meanest of men."

Writings

He was an authority on the history and practice of parliament and the constitution, and besides the pamphlets already mentioned above was the author of The Case Stated concerning the Judicature of the House of Peers in the Point of Appeals (1675); The Case Stated of the Jurisdiction of the House of Lords in the point of Impositions (1676); Letter of a Gentleman to his Friend showing that the Bishops are not to be judges in Parliament in Cases Capital (1679); Lord Holles his Remains, being a 2nd letter to a Friend concerning the judicature of the Bishops in Parliament...

He also published A True Relation of the unjust accusation of certain French gentlemen (1671), an account of Holles's intercession on their behalf and of his dispute with Lord Chief Justice Keeling; and he left Memoirs, written in exile in 1649, and dedicated "to the unparalleled Couple, Mr Oliver St John ... and Mr Oliver Cromwell ..." published in 1699 and reprinted in Baron Maseres's Select Tracts relating to the Civil Wars, I. 189. Several speeches of Holles were printed and are extant, and his Letter to Van Beuninghen has been already quoted.

Marriages and issue

(1), in 1628, Dorothy, daughter and heiress of Sir Francis Ashley

Francis, who succeeded him as 2nd baron

(2) in 1642 Jane, daughter and co-heiress of Sir John Shirley of Ifleld in Sussex and widow of Sir Walter Covert of Slougham, Sussex

No issue

(3) in 1666 Esther, daughter and co-heiress of Gideon Le Lou of Columbiers in Normandy, widow of James Richer.

No issue

The peerage became extinct in the person of his grandson Denzil Holles, 3rd Baron Holles, in c.1692, the estates devolving on John Holles (1662–1711), 4th Earl of Clare and Duke of Newcastle.

Other matters

In 1774 the Rev. John Hutchins claimed he was told that the Cerne Abbas giant was cut by Holles, who owned the farm.[1]

Biographies

Charles Harding Firth in the Dictionary of National Biography

Horace Walpole in Royal and Noble Authors, ii. 28

François Pierre Guillaume Guizot in Monk's Contemporaries (Eng. trans. 1851

A. Collins in historical Collections of Noble Families (1752), and in the Biographia Britannica.

Patricia Crawford, Denzil Holles ISBN 0-901050-52-0

References

1.^ John Morrill, ‘Holles, Denzil, first Baron Holles (1598–1680)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Sept 2004; online edn, May 2006 accessed 18 May 2007

Samuel Rawson Gardiner, History of England (1883-1884), and History of the Great Civil War (1893)

Lord Clarendon, History of the Rebellion, edited by William Dunn Macray

Gilbert Burnet, History of His Own Time (1833)

B. Whitelock, Memorials (1732).

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (Eleventh ed.). Cambridge University Press.

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