DEATH OF THE HONOURABLE T. M. BERKELEY.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume X, Issue 1205, 18 November 1882, Page 3

DEATH OF THE HONOURABLE T. M. BERKELEY.

The Hon. Thomas Moreton Fitzhardinge Bei-keley died on Sunday, the 27th August; at his residence, Cranford, Middlesex, in his 86th year. The deceased was the fifth son of Frederick Augustus, fifth Earl of Berkeley, who died in 1810 ; by his marriage with , Mary, .daughter of Mr William Cole, of jVattpn-under-Edge, Gloucestershire, and I yoimger brother _of_ Maurice, first Lord FitzJidrtlinge. Itc uaZ ’doth in 1T96, and. was educated at Corpus Christ! College, Oxford. ' Mr Berkeley, though the fifth son of his , father, was the first born after the marriage | of 1796, and would Have been the sixth Earl by the decision of the House of Lords ; but I he iievtr took his seat in Parliament nor : asaumed the title. He was pne of the coheir* to the Baronies of Mowbray, Seagrave, and Braose of Gower. .The heir-presumptive to the earldom is Mr Berkeley's cousin, Mr 1 George Lennox Raftdoff. Berkeley, eldest i BUrviviug son of the late Admiral Sir George : Berkeley, and grandson of the fourth Earl, I He was born in 1827, and married in 1860 i Cecile, daughter of Comte Edouard de Melfort, formerly wife of Admiral Sir Fleetwood Tellew. He has a son. The death of the last surviving son of Frederick Augustus, fifth Earl of Berkeley, play be considered to have added the final touch to one of the most curious chapters in the romance of the British peerage. Only list year his irascible and not too judicious younger brother Grantley—whose name was a very synonym for sport and life about town, as those terms were understood in the • “ palmy” days of Jerry Hawthorn and Cor- i inthian Tom—passed away at the ripe age , of eighty-two. The late Earl of Berkeley— i better known, for reasons to be given, as the , Honourable Thomas Moreton Fitzhardinge | Berkeley—who died on Saturday last at the j * old family seat of the Berkeleys, at Cranford, j Middlesex, was his senior by about four i Years; having been bom in October, 1796. i The feiids and quarrels of the Berkeley family have filled a lai ge place in gossiping i Chronicles, arid have given rise to masses of legal Reports, blue books, and pamphlets, ' fiot td speak of Mr Grantley Berkeley's too Notorious four volumes of “Recollections,” published some seven or eight years ago, in which family affairs were discussed with so edifying a degree of frankness. It is to be hoped that the old animosity and heartburnings have now finally subsided; but in ex- I cuse for them it may be pleaded that if ever , there was a combination of circumstances ‘ flUctilated to sow the seeds of dissension and mutual hatred in a family circle it is to be fotind in the facts that gave rise to the j famous suit and petition of privileges which I Constituted what was familiarly known to a , past generation as the ‘ ‘ Berkeley Peerage ' Case. The public marriage of tne Earl of Berkeley with Elizabeth Cole, daughter, as her son tells us, of “a small tradesman ini was admitted to have taken place au the parish church of St. on the 16th of of Mayj 1796, after the birth of their first four sons. It was the effort to legitimatise these sons tvhich gave rise to the cause celebre. According to Mr Grantley Berkeley's narrative there had been proceedings both in Chancery and in the House of Peers with this view in the lifetime of the Earl, the alleged motive being a passionate attachment on the part of the mother to her first-born illegitimate son, I who, if her efforts had succeeded, would of ooutac have become the lawful heir to the peerage and estates. Assuredly her husband Shared in her feelings, going even so far as to 1 * make a will, by the provisions of which the i bulk of the family property descended to Colonel William Fitzhadingc Berkeley, his | eldest son by Mary Cole, who was born in J ITB7. More than this, the testator con- ' ; eluded with a solemn declaration of the legi- i i tlmacy of the object of his bounty, while | disinheriting all and every of his other chil- [ dren who should venture to dispute his i claims. Upon the death of the Earl, which took place in 1810, William Fitzhardinge i boldly claimed the title as next in descent, But on his petition to sit in the House of Beers, the claim was referred to a Committee, who commenced their inquiry in March, 1811. i The claimant secured the services of the two ; most eminent members of the Bar, Sir ' Samuel Romily and Mr Serjeant Best, afterwards Lord Wynford ; while the interests of the sons bom of the second marriage were looked after by the Attorney-General and i ; the Solicitor-i General who appeared as coun- i sol for the Crown, The story may be found by the curious set forth in the shape of a condensed report of the proceedings in the Annual Register for that year—perhaps a better authority than Mr Grantley Berkeley’s hot-headed narrative. The foundation j of the petitioner's claim was the assertion of Lady Berkeley—and, as it would appear, of the late Earl—that there had been a pre- i vious marriage solemnised at the parish i church at Berkeley, Glonccsterahire, on the 30th March, 1780. It was unfortunate that the clergyman who was alleged to have ofti- . ciated had died just before the commence- • ment of the previous proceedings ; but a loose leaf was produced which purported to have belonged to the parish register, in which there was a fonnal entry of the marriage, attested by “ William Tudor,” who was proved to be William Cole, a brother of the lady, and one Barnes, who could not be found. Besides this document there was produced a pretended register of the banns which, as Lord Eldon had observed on the hearing of the Chancery suit, was inconsistent with the alleged desire for concealment. This paper bore the signature of the same clergyman, ami was dated in November and December, 1784. As the writer in the “ Annual Register” observes, the direct evidence for the alleged marriage lay in a small compass. Lady Berkeley swore that the I name Elizabeth Cole affixed to the former ' paper was her signature, and William Tudor 1 swore to a similar effect regarding his signature —both declaring that they were subscribed at the time when the marriage was solemnised ; but the mass of evidence pro- ! duccd went to prove that the alleged publication of banns in 1784, and marriage in 1785 could not possibly have taken place. In the end the House of Lords pronounced the unanimous judgment, ••That the claimant, William Fitzhardinge Berkeley, had not made good his claim to the titles, &c., of Earl of Berkeley." This decision formally established the right of the late Thomas Moreton Fitzhardinge Berkeley, as the eldest legitimate son, to the title of Earl of Berkeley, which, however, he never assumed. Happily there is no need to attach importance to the ungenerous suggestions on this head which his late younger brother has, in his excited fashion, embodied in his memoir's. The feeling which led the late earl to decline to take his seat in the House of Peers, or by any other act to avail himself of the judgment of that tribunal in his favor, is easily to be understood, and de- 1 senes to lie respected. His mother, Lady Berkeley, died in 1844. The title descends, : according to “ D’.«l,’ to his cousin, Mr <reo;ge Lennox Rawdon Crawley Berkeley. —“Daily News." The funeral took place on Thursday, Ist Sept., in Cranford churchyard. The obsequies were of a simple and unostentatious character