Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 19.djvu/271

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Fleetwood
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Fleetwood

demnity which was immediately passed (2 Jan.), but was summoned (24 Jan.) to appear before parliament on 31 Jan. 1660 to answer for his conduct. Pepys was told on 31 Jan. that Fleetwood had written a letter ‘and desired a little more time, he being a great way out of town. And how that he is quite ashamed of himself, and confesses how he had deserved this for his baseness to his brother. And that he is like to pay part of the money paid out of the exchequer during the committee of safety out of his own purse again’ (Diary, 31 Jan. 1660). The day fixed for his appearance was several times adjourned, and he does not appear to have been actually punished.

Fleetwood's escape at the Restoration was due to the fact that he had taken no part in the king's trial, and was not regarded as politically dangerous. The commons excepted twenty persons not regicides from the act of indemnity for penalties not extending to life, and among these was Fleetwood (18 June 1660) (Old Parliamentary History, xxii. 351). When the act came before the lords the Earl of Lichfield exerted himself on behalf of Fleetwood, and, thanks to his influence and that of other friends, Fleetwood was ultimately included in the list of eighteen persons whose sole punishment was perpetual incapacitation from all offices of trust (Ludlow, Memoirs, p. 354; Act of Indemnity, 29 Aug. 1660). The rest of his life was therefore passed in obscurity. Shortly after the Restoration occurred the death of Bridget Fleetwood, who was buried at St. Anne's, Blackfriars, 1 July 1662 (Notes and Queries, 4th ser. iii. 156). Eighteen months later, 14 Jan. 1663–4, Fleetwood married Dame Mary Hartopp, daughter of Sir John Coke of Melbourne, Derbyshire, and widow of Sir Edward Hartopp, bart. (ib. 4th ser. ii. 600). From the date of his third marriage he resided at Stoke Newington, in a house belonging to his wife, which was afterwards known as Fleetwood House. This house was demolished in 1872 (ib. 4th ser. ix. 296, 364, 435, 496). During this period he was a member of the congregation of Dr. John Owen, two of whose letters to him are printed by Orme (Life of Owen, pp. 368, 516). Fleetwood's third wife died on 17 Dec. 1684, Fleetwood himself on 4 Oct. 1692; both were buried in Bunhill Fields cemetery. His will, dated 10 Jan. 1689–90, is printed in ‘Notes and Queries’ (4th ser. ix. 362), and also by Waylen (House of Cromwell, p. 69). In 1869, when the cemetery was reopened as a public garden, Fleetwood's monument, which had been discovered seven feet below the surface of the ground, was restored at the expense of the corporation of London. An engraving of it was given in the ‘Illustrated London News’ of 23 Oct. 1869.

Fleetwood left issue by two of his wives, but his descendants in the male line became extinct about the middle of the eighteenth century. By his first wife, Frances Smith, he had (1) Smith Fleetwood (1644–1709), who married Mary, daughter of Sir Edward Hartopp, their descendants became extinct in 1764 (Noble, ii. 367); (2) Elizabeth, married Sir John Hartopp, third baronet, from whom the existing Cradock-Hartopp family is descended (ib. ii. 367; Foster, Baronetage, ed. 1883). By Bridget Cromwell, Fleetwood was the father of (1) Cromwell Fleetwood, born about 1653, married in 1679 Elizabeth Nevill of Little Berkhampstead, Hertfordshire (Chester, Marriage Licenses, ed. Foster, p. 491); administration of his goods was granted in September 1688; he seems to have died without issue. (2) Anne Fleetwood, buried in Westminster Abbey, and exhumed at the Restoration (Chester, Westminster Abbey Registers, p. 522); (3) Mary, who married Nathaniel Carter (21 Feb. 1678), and other children, most of whom died young, and none of whom left issue (Waylen, p. 88; Notes and Queries, 5th ser. vi. 390).

[Pedigree of the Fleetwood family, drawn up by J. P. Earwaker, esq., and communicated by W. S. Churchill, esq.; articles by Colonel Chester in Notes and Queries; Noble's House of Cromwell, 1787; Waylen's House of Cromwell, 1880; Cal. State Papers, Dom.; Thurloe Papers; Carlyle's Cromwell's Letters and Speeches.]

C. H. F.

FLEETWOOD, GEORGE (fl. 1650?), regicide, was the son of Charles Fleetwood, knt., of the Vache, near Chalfont St. Giles, Buckinghamshire, and Catherine, daughter of Henry Denny of Waltham, Essex. In the will of Sir George Fleetwood, who died 21 Dec. 1620, George Fleetwood is described as his third son, but Edward and Charles, his elder brothers, appear to have died without issue. In ‘Mercurius Aulicus,’ 7 Dec. 1643, it is stated that ‘Young Fleetwood of the Vache’ had raised a troop of dragoons for the parliament, to defend the Chiltern parts of Buckinghamshire; and in an ordinance of 27 June 1644 the name of Fleetwood appears in the list of the Buckinghamshire committee (Husband, Ordinances, 1646, p. 54). He entered the Long parliament in July 1647 as member for Buckinghamshire (Names of Members returned to serve in Parliament, i. 485). In 1648 he was appointed one of the commissioners for the trial of the king, attended two sittings of the court, and was present