Protestant Exiles from France/Book First - Chapter 2
Chapter II.
EMINENT DESCENDANTS OF THE EARLIEST REFUGEES.
Perhaps the Gallo-Belgic refugee surname, which stands first in order of celebrity, is Bonnell, or (as it was originally spelt) Bonel or Bonnel. In the Norwich French Church MS. Book of discipline ecclesiastique, “Thomas Bonel” signed the “articles de ceste discipline,” as an “anchien,” on 4th October 1595; and the signature of “Daniel Bonnel” followed on 12th August 1596. The name of the former is still legible at Somerset House, in the sadly dilapidated register of Norwich French Church. In that register, which begins in 1595, there are entries of three children of Thomas Bonnel and Jaquemaine Bygote, his wife. “Thomas Bonelle” is a witness to a baptism in 1603. A Samuel Bonnel appears as a father in 1606. The family removed to London.
In the lists of strangers in the metropolis, compiled in obedience to the Privy Council Order of 6th Sept. 1618, there is found, among residents in Cheap Ward, “David Bonnel, born in Norwich, the son of an alien, a merchaunt.” The authentic pedigree in the “Visitation” of Middlesex, begins with David Bonnell of the city of London, gentleman, and his wife Katherine, daughter of Best, of London, gentleman; the five sons of this couple are recorded, namely, David, Jacob, Jeremy, Nathaniel, and Simeon, all alive in 1663, and a daughter Sarah, wife of Thomas Ratcliffe. We obtain more light by consulting the register of the Dutch Church, Austin Friars, London. It appears that his wife’s maiden surname was De Beste, and that she was a native of Antwerp, and that from love to her he deserted the Walloon or French Church; they were married in the Dutch Church, and all their children were baptized there. The marriage took place on 5th February 1605, and the baptisms range from 26th December 1605 to 10th July 1625 — seven sons and seven daughters. He became a deacon in 1616, and an elder in 1626, his surname being spelt Bonneel. The list in the “Visitation” gives us only the children that survived in 1663, and were resident in London or in some locality in Middlesex. In that list (as already noted) there are five sons.
The eldest of these five sons is styled David Bonnell of Isleworth, county Middlesex, Esq., and he was living in 1667; his wife was Ann, daughter of Andrew Boevey of London, gentleman; and his son (the only son in 1663) was Andrew Bonnell of St. Dunstan’s in the East, merchant, who married in December 1670, Ann, daughter of Sir Thomas Aleyn, Bart. David Bonnell, Esq., of Isleworth, had a daughter Mary, who in 1677 was married to Thomas Crawley of St. Dunstan’s in the East, merchant. She became a widow in 1714, and died in 1718; her surviving son, Thomas Crawley, assumed in 1726 the additional surname of Boevey on succeeding to the landed estate acquired by the representatives of his great-grandfather. Mr Crawley Boevey died in 1742, and his successor was a second Thomas Crawley Boevey, Esq. (born 1709, died 1769), whose son and namesake (born 1745) having married Ann Savage, eventually the nearest relative of Sir Charles Barrow, Bart., M.P., became, in 1789, through a special remainder in that patent of baronetcy, Sir Thomas Crawley Boevey, Bart. Sir Thomas Hyde Crawley Boevey, the present and fifth baronet, is great-grandson to the first Sir Thomas.
The surname of Boevey, which has thus survived through so many generations, is also a Protestant refugee name. The will of Andrew Boevey, of St. Dunstan’s in the East, London, merchant, proved in the Prerogative Court on 13th September 1625, is dated 3d July 1623. He mentions that he was born at Cortrich in Flanders [now Courtray in Belgium], but is now in the fifty-first year of his residence in London, being of the age of fifty-seven; he leaves legacies to the Dutch congregations at London and Norwich, and “to the poor of the reformed congregation at Harlem, £5” (he mentions the children of Lewis Boevey, but does not state how he is related to them). Mr. Boevey had been twice married, and had two sons, William (by the first marriage) and James (by the second marriage). William, who died 15th July 1661 leaving £30,000 in personalty and considerable real estate, had one son John,[1] and this son’s only child Richard Boevey took the name of Garth, and is ancestor of the Garths of Morden in Surrey. James Boevey (already named) was of Cheam, Surrey, and also of London, merchant; he died in February 1696 (new style). He and his half brother William were in 1649 joint-purchasers of the estate of Flaxley Abbey in Gloucestershire, which they dealt with in various ways. Eventually it became the property of their eldest sister (their other married sister being Mrs. Bonnell) Joanna (wife of Abraham Clarke), Lady of the Manor of Flaxley Abbey, whose son Abraham Clarke inherited the estate, and dying in 1684 left it to William, only son of the above-named James Boevey, by Isabel, daughter of William de Visscher. William Boevey of Flaxley Abbey married in August 1685 Katherine, daughter of John Riches of St. Laurence Pountney, London, merchant, and left her a young and childless widow on 26th August 1692; she is supposed to be the perverse widow who is such a fascinating figure in the Sir Roger De Coverley papers, and who has a monument in Westminster Abbey. She enjoyed the life-rent of Flaxley Abbey, according to her husband’s will; and, at her death on 11th January 1726, aged 57, Thomas Crawley, Mrs. Bonnell’s representative, became Thomas Crawley Boevey, Esq. of Flaxley Abbey; the lineal descendants of the latter, namely, the Crawley-Boevey Baronets, are now also “of Flaxley Abbey.”
The name of Bonnell obtained celebrity in the person of James Bonnell, Esq., whose memoir, compiled by Archdeacon William Hamilton (published in London in 1703, and frequently reprinted), is a valued piece of biography. “toThomas Bonnell (says the memoir), a gentleman of a good family near Ypres in Flanders, to avoid the Duke of Alva’s fury then cruelly persecuting the Protestants in the low countries, transported himself and his family into England, and settled at Norwich, where he was well received and much esteemed.”[2] His son Daniel Bonnell, merchant in London, left a son Samuel, who married Rebecca, daughter of Thomas Sayer, Esq., a residenter in the neighbourhood of Norwich, and who spent the prime of his life in Genoa and Leghorn. The Rev. John Strype, the famous ecclesiastical antiquary and annalist (born in 1643), was a nephew of Samuel Bonnell, Esq., and an associate of his distinguished son, James. James Bonnell was born at Genoa in 1653, and was brought by his parents to England in 1655. The father had been a prosperous merchant but met with serious losses, by which, as well as by private advances of money to the exiled royal family, he was seriously impoverished. Soon after the Restoration he was rewarded, as appears from the Irish Patent Rolls (14 Charles II. part 2), the index to which informs us that on 22d December 1662, Samuel Bonnell, Esq., and James Bonnell, gent, received the office of Accountant-General of Ireland. On the death of the former in 1664, the duties were discharged by deputy on behalf of James, whose education proceeded under the charge of his widowed mother and by the advice of Mr. Strype. Having taken his degree at Cambridge, he continued his preparation for public life by travelling as a tutor to a young Englishman. In 1684 he settled in Dublin, and “took his employment of Accomptant-General into his own hands.” His admirable mother died in England in 1690. The following sentiments he left in writing:—
“My chiefest benefactress on earth is my mother; she hath brought me to heaven. And blessed be the memory of my father which hath influenced my life. I have no children to bequeath these blessings to; let them descend upon all the faithful children of Abraham, and diffuse themselves the more for not being confined to a single line, till after many descents they shall come at last to meet themselves at the great day of jubilee. O all ye that love God, this is my legacy. The blessing, descended on me from my father and mother, I leave among you.”
During the reign of James II., public servants, popishly inclined, were apt to be thrust into offices, especially in Ireland; however, Mr. Bonnell, though an enthusi- astic Protestant, was not a politician, and was undisturbed. His office was coveted by an influential gentleman in the next reign, by whom he expected to be super- seded; but no change took place. When the abdicated king was in temporary possession of Dublin, Mr. Bonnell shared in the general consternation. In Sir Henry Ellis’s volumes of Letters there is one from the Rev. Theophilus Harrison to Rev. John Strype, dated Dublin, August 23, 1690, and containing this sentence:— “Mr. Bonnell tells me he acquainted you with the transactions of King James’s government here, and how severely the poor Protestants were handled; their churches, contrary to the royal word, seized and profaned by idolatrous worship.” Bonnell’s biographer says, “In the progress of the war, the Protestants in Dublin were denied the exercise of their religion, their churches turned into prisons, and their ministers confined." The victory of the Boyne was, according to the old style, on the 1st July (though now celebrated on July 12th), and two days after, Dublin felt the results. “How did we see the Protestants (writes Mr. Bonnell) on the great day of our Revolution, Thursday, the Third of July . . . congratulate and embrace one another as they met, like persons alive from the dead!” Mr. Bonnell soon formed a firm resolution to become a clergyman, and after long negotiations he agreed with a gentleman to be his successor in his office under Government. In the end of 1693 he married Jane, daughter of Sir Albert Conyngham, by whom he had two sons, Albert and Samuel (who predeceased him), and one daughter. His feeble health did not permit him to receive holy orders, and a malignant epidemic fever was the cause of his early death (i.e., in the 46th year of his age), on the 28th April 1699. Now (said he) must I stand or fall before my great Judge. It was answered that no doubt he would stand firm before Him, through the merits of our crucified Saviour. His reply was, It’s in that I trust. He knows it’s in that I trust. He was buried in St. John’s Church, Dublin, and his epitaph was contributed by Bishop King (afterwards Archbishop of Dublin).[3]
P. M. S.
JACOBI BONNELII, ARMIGERI,
Regibus Carolo IIdo. Jacobo IIdo. et Gulielmodo.
Erat a rationibus generalibus, in Hiberniâ, temporibus licet incertis, fidus —
ab omni factione immunis, nemini suspectus, omnibus charus.
Natus est Novembris 14o. 1653.
Patre Samuele, qui, propter suppetias Regiae Familiae exulanti largiter exhibitas,
Officio Computatoris-Generalis Fisci Hibernici, Ano. Dom. 1661
unà cum filio remuneratus est —
Avo Daniele —
Proavo Thomâ qui sub Duce Albano, Religionis ergo, Flandriâ patria sua exul,
Norvicum in Angliâ profugit, ubi mox civis, et demùm praetor.
Pietate avitâ et penè congenitâ, imò primaevâ et Apostolicâ,
Eruditione, prudentiâ, probitate, comitate, et morum simplicitate conspicuus —
Mansuetudine, patientiâ, et (super omnia) charitate insignis —
Urbem hanc, exemplo et praeceptis meliorem, morte maestam, reliquit.
Obiit Aprilis 28, 1699.
Monimentum hoc ingentis doloris publici,
praesertim sui, exiguum pro meritis, posuit conjux moestissima
Jana e Coninghamorum gente.
Another eminent refugee from Ypres was Francis La Motte, son of Baldwin La Motte. Francis La Motte and Mary his wife fled from “the great persecution in the Low Countries under the bloody and cruel Duke of Alva.” They had hesitated whether their place of refuge should be Frankendale in the Palatinate or England, and providentially choosing the latter country they, in the fourth year of our Queen Elizabeth, settled at Colchester, having made “piety their chiefest and greatest interest, and the free exercise of religion their best purchase.” This phraseology I copy from the life of their son, John, included in Clarke’s Lives of sundry eminent persons in this later age (London, 1683), a life abridged from a separate memoir. To old Samuel Clarke I am indebted also for all the facts, except several dates and the contents of the will, which an obliging correspondent has furnished. John Lamot, or Lamott, or Lamotte, or La Motte, was born at Colchester on 1st May 1577, but when a young man he removed with his father to London. His father, who had been “very forward and industrious in setting up and promoting the great and useful manufacture of making Sayes and Bayes,” died in London. John Lamotte had, before his father’s death, begun business on his own account as a merchant. He is entered in the List of 1618, as an inhabitant of Broad Street, “John Lamot, born in Colchester, useing merchandizeing, free of the company of Weavers in London.” His parish was the parish of St. Bartholomew the Little, near the Royal Exchange. He served the public in various offices, and rose to be an alderman. His first wife was Ann Tivelin, widow of David King, and a daughter of refugee parents settled at Canterbury; he had two sons and eight daughters, but Hester and Elizabeth were the only children who grew up. His wife died in January 1626 (new style); she was buried in St. Bartholomew by the Exchange on the 30th. John Lamotte, Esq., married again in 1627, Elizabeth, widow of Levinus Munck, Esq.,[4] “one of the six clerks;” by her he had no children, and he was again a widower in 1644, Mrs Lamotte being buried on 22d October. He was for nearly thirty years an elder in the Dutch Church in London. “Every year, upon the 17th of November, which was the day when Queen Elizabeth came to the crown, that put an end to the Maryan Persecution, he made a feast;” and would stand up before his guests and make a good speech on the light of the Gospel and the national enjoyment of liberty “for so many years, the number whereof he would alwayes tell them what it was.” He devoted much of his income to benevolent donations, giving a share (as he himself put on record) to “the commonwealth, the service of God, the ministers, and the poor members of Christ.” “In that cruel and barbarous massacre in Piemont, not long before his death, when a general collection was made for those poor creatures who survived that storm, the minister and some other of the parish wherein he lived (St. Bartholomew’s Exchange) going to his house to see what he would contribute, and sending up word to him what was the occasion of their coming, he came to them and told them that they had had a collection in the Dutch Church for them where he had contributed twenty pound; and (saith he) the Devil hath tempted me to put you off with this answer, but he shall not prevail, and therefore here is ten pound for you more on this occasion.”
His daughter Hester was married, first, on January 28th, 1623 (new style), to John Mannyng, Esq., merchant, and second, to Sir Thomas Honeywood, knight, “of Marks-hal” in Essex. Her three children by her first husband died young, and of the seven children by her second husband there survived Elizabeth, Thomas, and John-Lamotte Honeywood. The other daughter Elizabeth was married on 19th July 1632 to Maurice Abbott, daughter of Sir Maurice, and niece of Archbishop Abbott; her married life was brief; she left a son, Maurice. John Lamotte, Esq., died on 13th July 1655, aged 78, and his will, dated May 23d, was proved on 8th August by Mr James Houblon of London, merchant, and by the testator’s grandson, Maurice Abbott. It is unnecessary to mention the domestic portion of the will, except that it contains a legacy to his stepson, Rev. Hezekias King. His charitable bequests were £5 to the poor of the parish of St. Bartholomew, and £20 for a weekly lecture on Sunday afternoon; £100 to the Dutch Church in London, and another £100 for maintaining their minister, also to the French Church in London, to churches in Colchester and other places, to the poor in hospitals, prisons, &c, many bequests. He also left a letter to his daughter, and to his four grandchildren, containing benedictions and exhortations, and concluding, “I would have every one of you to be zealous for the service of God — heartily affectionate to the poor members of Christ — and to give with the relief a comfortable word when occasion permits.” There is a very fine and rare engraved portrait of Mr Lamotte by Faithorne.
In 1619 Elie Darande, or D’Arande, appears as minister of the Walloon Church (or God’s house), Southampton. The name being often spelt D’Aranda, it is supposed that he was of Spanish ancestry, and that his parents had fled from Flanders from the Duke of Alva’s persecution. His tongue was French, and he died at Southampton, 13th May 1633. He had married Elizabeth Bonhomme, and had two sons, Elie Paul D’Arande, or (as Calamy styles him), Rev. Elias Paul D’Aranda, who was educated at Oxford, and took the degree of M.A., and Pierre (born 1626, died 1628). The elder son (born 6th January 1625, died 1669) was, in 1648, Fellow of Pembroke College, Oxford, and he served successively as a curate in Petworth, Patcham, and Mayfield. But his sympathy with the Nonconformists drove him from such employments in the year 1662, and in 1664 he became minister of the French Church at Canterbury. Calamy says of him, “He was a man of considerable accomplishments, a valuable preacher, and of an agreeable conversation.” His first wife, Esther, had a son, Paul, and a daughter, Elizabeth (born 1664). He married, secondly, in 1666, Frances, daughter of Benjamin Pickering, of West Hoodley, Sussex, and had by her a son, Benjamin (born 1667). The above-named Paul (born 1652, died 1712) was the father of another Paul D’Aranda (born 1686, died 1732); both father and son were Turkey merchants in London. The name has died out, the family being represented collaterally only.
In the year 1589 the signature, “Adrien de Le me,” as a diacre of the French Church was appended to the Norwich Book of Discipline. From this good deacon’s will, written in the French language, it appears that he was born in 1549 at Nomayn (probably Nomeny, fourteen miles north of Nancy), and that the Christian name of his deceased father was Michiel. Adrien de Le mé spent his refugee life in Norwich, where he died in 1603. His will (dated 28th September, proved 9th December), which is printed at the end of my Historical Introduction, implies that his capital amounted to about £250. His wife’s Christian name was Marguerite. His daughter, Marie, wife of Jaques Le Greyn, seems to have been his eldest child; he had another daughter, Annis, and four sons — Pierre, Jaques, Philippe, and Nathanael, the last two being his youngest children. All these children were born before 1595, or before June of that year, when the only extant register of the Norwich French Church begins. (Elisabeth, daughter of Adrien “de le Met,” was baptized in 1596;[5] and, if a child of our Adrien, she must have died in childhood.)
The son Philippe became an eminent man. He must have been born about 1590. He had made up his mind to be a pasteur in 1603, for his father, while bequeathing clothes and furniture to his brothers, left to him his great Bible, Bullinger’s Decades, and Calvin’s Institutes. He passed through his theological course successfully; and at an unknown date, probably 1615, he signed the Book of Discipline as minister of the French Church of Norwich. His good education seems to have rendered his peculiar name, De le mé, displeasing to him. We can fancy the young divine soliloquising thus: du mé would be grammatical, or (if you change the gender) de la mé but de le mé is monstrous. Accordingly, he signed the Discipline, in “a clear, bold hand,” Philippe Delme, ministre. In 1625 (or later) his brother signed as a deacon, “Pierre de me,” and; is also in the baptismal register of Norwich as “Pierre du me.”
As to the pasteur, we at last obtain an authentic date, namely, the day of his marriage in the French Church of Canterbury, 29th December 1616. He is entered in the register as Philippe Delme, native of Norwich, and minister at Norwich, son of the late Adrien. His wife was Elizabeth, daughter of Elias Maurois, of Canterbury. This marriage brought him into affinity with many good French families in that metropolitan centre — the Maurois, the Desbouveries, the Du Quesnes, &c. His eldest son was Elie, or Elias, but he is not registered at Norwich. Mr Delme’s marriage led also to his translation to the French pastorate of Canterbury. His other children were baptized in that church — Elizabeth (1619), Anne (1621), Philippe (1627), Pierre (1630), and Jean (1633). (A daughter Jeanne was not registered at Canterbury.)
His own worth and abilities, however, were greater than any family influence. Again we have occasion to refer to the serviceable biographies by the venerable Samuel Clarke. In one of these, the life of Herbert Palmer, B.D., he found occasion to mention “Master Delme,” “a godly, faithful, prudent, and laborious minister of the French Church in Canterbury.” The occasion was an invitation addressed to Palmer to become the Lord’s Day afternoon lecturer in Alphage Church, Canterbury; this was “about the year 1626.” “Master Delme (says Clarke), with divers others of the most considerable gentlemen and citizens, having earnestly sought direction from God in a matter of such concernment, did seriously advise about it, and, being first assured of the concurrent desires of many others, did, by letters and messages to Cambridge, signify to him the desires of the godly in that city that he would undertake to preach a lecture among them.”
The highest compliment paid to Delmé was his being enrolled as a member of the Westminster Assembly of Divines, although not as an original member. His name was entered thus: “Philip Delmé, or Delmy, of French Church, Canterbury, v. Rathbone, deceased.” Dr Grosart, in his memoir of Palmer, published in 1864, says that the fragrance of Delmé’s memory has not yet exhaled in Canterbury. Philippe Delmé died there on 22d April 1653. The registrar of his death and burial returned to the original spelling of his surname, and entered him as “nostre pasteur Monsieur De le me.” His family and descendants, however, have always spelt their name Delmé.
This eminent and lamented pasteur seems to have printed nothing. But his youngest son, John, in the beginning of the next century, brought some fragments of his manuscripts to light —
(1.) “The Method of Good Preaching: being the Advice of a French Reform’d Minister to his Son. Translated out of French into English. London, printed by J. B., & are to be sold by Andrew Bell at the Cross Keys & Bible in Cornhill, near Stocks Market. 1701.” 4to. 52 pp.
A rough translation had been made, and it was put into the hands of Rev. James Owen, who prepared it for the press, as he explains in his dedicatory epistle “to his honoured and dear friend, Mr John Delmé, merchant,” dated Salop, December 3, 1700. He also says: “’Tis a pity these remains of your excellent father should lye buried in the dark for so long a time. . . . ’Tis you that gives ’em a happy resurrection.”
(2.) “A Spiritual Warning for Times of War, containing a description and prognostick of War, with Christian Advice what is to be done when God either threatens or inflicts that dreadful judgment, in a Sermon preached upon Jer. x. v. 22, 23, 24, 25. By the author of the ‘Method of Good Preaching.’ Done out of French. London, printed by F. Brudenell for John Lawrence at the Angel in the Poultry, and sold by A. Baldwin near the Oxford-Arms in Warwick Lane. 1701.”
The filial editor states that his father preached this sermon at Canterbury on 2d August 1626, upon a day of solemn humiliation appointed by King Charles I.
(3.) “The Parable of the Sower; or, the Hearers’ Duty. By the author of the‘ Method of Good Preaching.’ Done out of French. London, printed by F. Brudenell in Little-Britain. 1707.”
This also was brought out by Mr John Delmé, who says: “If I had the whole of these excellent sermons preach’d by my father on this subject to the Walloon Church in Canterbury, the composure wou’d have been longer and better.”
The above are in the British Museum library.
Philippe Delmé had made his will on 28th March 1653, and it was proved by his widow, at Westminster, on January 4, 1654 (n.s.). As Mr Edward Arnold, notary public, certified as to himself, “I have truly translated it (verè transtuli),” I infer that the will was written in French, and therefore in the following copy I adopt modern spelling.
In the Name of God. Amen. This eight and twentieth day of the month of March, in the year one thousand six hundred fifty and three, I Philip Delmé, Minister of the Holy Gospel of my Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, according to the order which he hath established in the Reformed Churches, for which I praise God, as I also most humbly do for his holy vocation to grace and glory by the power of His Holy Spirit and of His word — finding myself indisposed in body, but, God be thanked, in good disposition of mind and understanding, with good memory, have found good to make my will, and to ordain and dispose of myself, and of that which God in His liberality hath given me, in the form which followeth:— First, I recommend my soul to the only Almighty God and wise mercy of my God and Father, by and through the only sufficient and most perfect merits of my Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ His only Son, who is come into the world to save and redeem me by His perfect obedience even to the death of the cross; and, therefore, also in the same faith I recommend unto Him my body to be gloriously raised to immortality, from the sepulchre in which I ordain that it be decently deposited. Moreover, I give to my son, Elias, all my books, saving such French books which it shall please my well-beloved wife, his mother, to choose and take for herself. Item, I give to my said son, Elias, sterling. Item, I give to my daughter, Elizabeth, widow of the late Samuel Dubois, £150 sterling. Item, I give to my daughter, Jane, wife of Mr John Crowe, Minister of the Word of God, £100 sterling. Item, I give to my son, Peter, £100 sterling. Item, I give to my son, John, £300 sterling, to be paid unto him at the age of one and twenty years, but if he come to die before the said age, I ordain in such case that his brothers, Elias and Peter, and his sisters, Elizabeth and Jane surviving — or in case of their decease, their children or child, if they leave any — shall inherit the portion of £300 sterling, of their said brother or uncle John, deceased, by equal parts, the children or child left after the decease of their father and mother representing their father and mother deceased. And I ordain and constitute my very dear and well-beloved wife, Elizabeth, executrix of this my testament, ordering that she give to the stock of my regular Walloon Church of Canterbury, £7 sterling. And further, I ordain that my said executrix distribute £3 sterling to some poor of my said church, who are regular and not schismatics, such as she shall think fitting, and by such portions as she shall find convenient. And I ordain that she distribute 40s. in the same sort to the poor of our parish, therein comprising the poor of the hospital upon the bridge. And as touching the rest of my goods, moveable and immoveable, actions, and estate personal, I give to my most beloved wife, Elizabeth, to enjoy and dispose thereof according as God shall direct her, continuing her ordinary care of our children, recommending her and them, and all the Churches of God to the saving grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, true God, with the Father in the unity of the Holy Spirit, particularly against all sorts of heresies and schisms which Satan hath raised and raiseth, against which I most instantly recommend unto them to watch, and always to guard themselves therefrom.
The witnesses to his signature, &c, were Stephen Du Thoit and John Oudart.
With regard to his eldest son, Elie (named after his grandfather, Elie Maurois), he was born in the end of 1617 or beginning of 1618. He was admitted to the ministry of the French Church in London, and was during the Commonwealth a pasteur along with Messieurs Christofle Cisner and Jean Baptiste Stouppe. His father left him his theological books, and also the MS. of the Method of Good Preaching. The heading of the first page of the imprint (already mentioned) is, “The method or skill of good preaching, being the advice of a French minister to his son when he was entering on the ministry, translated out of the French by a near relation — the father and son were preachers of the Word in the French and Walloon Reformed Churches, and both are long since dead” (1701).
The father’s widow, Mrs Delmé, made her will in 1665, and the young pasteur had died before that date. She had joined her son, Peter, in London. The pious preamble of her will was an exact copy of her husband’s, except as to her funeral, where she speaks of the grave “in which I ordaine it [my body] to be deposed with decencie and all Christian modestie.” Her bequests were as follow:—
“I will and bequeath unto my sonne, Peter Delmé, my largest silver boule with its cover, being both guilte, and to his wife, a holland cupboard-cloth, laced with a nett lace. Item, unto my said sonne, Peter, and my sonne John Delmé, I will and bequeath all my bookes. Item, unto my said sonne John, I will and bequeath myne owne portrature or picture of my selfe, and to his wife a lawne cupboard-cloth, laced before with a needle-lace. Item, I will and bequeath unto my daughter Elizabeth, widow late of Mr Samuel Dubois, my sable muffe. Item, unto my daughter Jane, the wife of Mr John Crowe, I will and bequeath a peece of tapestrie-covering. Item, unto my grandchildren, which shall be liveing att the tyme of my decease, I will and bequeath fourtie shillings a peece. Item, I will and bequeath unto the Deacons of the Walloone congregation of the Cittie of Canterbury, of which my late husband was Minister, for the use of the poore of the said congregation, the sume of ten pounds sterling. Item, I will and bequeath unto the poore of the Parish of All-hallowes in Canterbury (being the parish of my birth), including the poore of the hospitall in that Parish, on the Bridge, two pounds sterling. Item, I will and bequeath unto such of the poore of the French Church of London as my executors shall thinke fitt, five pounds sterling. Item, I will and bequeath unto my neece, Anne Ferbu, wife of John Ferbu, fower pounds sterling, to buy her cloathes, or other things of which she shall stand in need. Item, I will and bequeath unto the children of my deceased nephew, David Desquire of Norwitch, to witt, David, Susan, Anne, and Elizabeth, to each twentie shillings. Item, I give and bequeath all the rest of my goods and chattells and all my Estate, personall and reall, whatsoever and wheresoever, to my most deare children, to witt, Peter Delmé, John Delmé, Elizabeth, late widowe of Samuel Dubois, and Jane, the wife of John Crow, minister, to be equallie devided amongst them fower. And I do appointe and ordaine my two sonnes, Peter Delmé and John Delmé, to be the Executors of this my last Will and Testament — recommending them, the rest of my children, with all the churches of God, to His Almightie Grace, by and for the love of Jesus Christ, my only Saviour and Redeemer, true God, with His Father in the Unity of the Holy Spiritt.
“This done and ordained in London upon the thirteen day of July, in the yeare of our Lord, one thousand six hundred sixty and five. In witnesse whereof, I have hereunto sett my hand and seall. Elizabeth Delmé. Signed, sealed, published, and declared and delivered by the said Elizabeth Delmé, the testator, as and for her last Will and Testament in the presence of Peter Ducane. John Crow.”
At the above date (13th July 1665) she described herself as “being in indifferent good bodily health, in perfect understanding and good memorie.” She seems to have survived for seven years longer, as her will was proved at London, before Kenelm Digby, LL.D., surrogate of Sir Leoline Jenkins, Knight, LL.D., by her sons Peter and John Delmé, 11th November 1672.
Her sons Elie and Philippe had predeceased her; the latter had died at Canterbury in 1632, aged 5. Pierre was the founder of the English family of Delmé, and he and his descendants shall be treated of in another chapter. It remains to speak of Jean, or John, in whom the spirit of his ancestry eminently survived.
John Delmé was baptized in Canterbury on 27th January 1733 (n.s.). He became a merchant in London, and married in the French Church, Threadneedle Street, on 30th October 1664, Deborah Leadbetter. Their only child Elizabeth was baptized in the same church on 3d January 1673. She was married about 1692 to Gerard Van Heythuyssen, junior, a member of the Dutch Church of London, and four of her children are registered in that church. To that church Mr and Mrs Delmé seem to have been drawn, both their names on a gravestone being still legible there:—
Here lyeth the body of Mrs |
And of |
He died 23d January 1712 (new style), and his will was proved by Peter Delmé and John Gunston on the 13th February following. It was dated 4th December 1707. He styles himself, “John Delmé, of London, merchant,” and says,
“First and principally I bestow my soul into the hands of the one eternall and ever blessed Lord God, one in essence, three in persons, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, my Creator, my Redeemer and Sanctifyer, trusting alone in free grace and the precious meritts of Jesus Christ for everlasting salvation. I will and desire that my body may be decently buried without pomp and ostentation, according to the discretion of my executors, with the approbation of my dear daughter hereinafter named, in that burying place by me lately purchased, in the church called the Dutch Church, in the parish of St. Peter Poor, in the City of London. . . . I will that my executors, hereinafter named, shall within six months next after my decease pay the summe of £150, to be distributed by my said daughter unto such godly poor persons as I shall in my lifetime give my said daughter directions.”
I have already mentioned his publication of a few of his father’s sermons. The “Spiritual Warning for Times of War,” printed in 1701, had this characteristic letter prefixed to it:—
“To my dear and well-beloved daughter, Mrs Elizabeth Van Heythuysen. — My dearest daughter, — Ever since the Lord was pleas’d to bestow you upon me my paternal affection hath constantly watch’d for, and most cheerfully embraced, all opportunities of doing you good. A most tender love towards you began, grew up with, and, when you were disposed of in marriage 'twas doubled with yourself. Ever since it hath been encreasing and multiplying with that lovely offspring which our good and bountiful God hath given you. But, as there is nothing which I long for so much as your souls, so above all things it fills my heart with the sweetest transports of joy to find an holy work of God conspicuous and thriving in you, and behold such buddings of his grace (as through the tenderness of their age can be expected) in those endearing plants my grandchildren. When it pleased the Lord to take one of them from us, the wound to nature was deep and sharp, but, I can truly say, the hopes I had of its translation to a far better place was heavenly and healing balm. This world may well be called a vale of tears, where exercises and afflictions are connected as if the removal of one were to make room for another, and private troubles are swallow’d up in publick dangers. You know how severely God hath corrected our Protestant Brethren in France and elsewhere, He hath given them water of gall to drink. The nations also by warlike concussions have been put into a bloody sweat and the clouds are returning after the rain; a blacker tempest of desolating war gathers and thickens over this part of the world. Can we — whose sins and provocations have been, and still continue to be, so great — flatter ourselves with dreams of perpetual tranquility? The wise man foreseeth the evil and hideth himself, but the fool goeth on and is punished. My great concern for you and myself is, that we may understand what course to take for allaying our present fears, or preventing, if possible, or (if that cannot be done) preparing ourselves to bear (when they come) impendent judgments.
“I think more plain, more rational and scriptural advice cannot be desired than is contained in the following discourse which I present unto you. It contains the substance of a sermon preached by your reverend and pious grandfather, August 2, 1626, upon a day of solemn humiliation appointed by King Charles I. I shew’d the original, written in French by my dear father’s own hand, to several French ministers who judged it as proper for this time as ever it was for that wherein delivered, and advised me by all means to let it see the light. I have done it into English for more publick service, and have dedicate it to yourself, with your dear and honoured consort, as such a word in season which Solomon compares to apples of gold in pictures of silver. My wishes and prayers are for your happiness in all respects, and I hope the Lord will be with you in your present circumstance and shortly make you the joyful mother of another child — thereby (which is the glory of Christian parents by their offspring) to increase the kingdom of Christ. As my chief concern is for the souls of yourself and all yours, so my most sincere advice and earnest entreaty that you would lay out yourselves to the utmost, and use your authority over children and servants for God. Remember, and often ponder, that noble character which God gives Abraham (Gen. xviii. 19). I know him that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment; that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him. As ’tis our honour to be called (though not the natural, but which is far better) the spiritual children of Abraham, let us not flatter ourselves in saying we have Abraham to our Father, unless we walk in the footsteps of our father Abraham’s faith (Rom. iv. 12). Then, as ’tis said of him (Heb. vi. 13, 14), when God made a promise to Abraham, because he could swear by no greater he sware by himself, saying, surely Blessing I will Bless thee, &c. — so also we, as it follows, v. 17, 18, with the rest of the heirs of promise, by two immutable things in which it is impossible for God to lye, may have strong consolation when we flie for refuge to lay hold on the hope set before us, &c.
“Great is the rage, deep the designs, deadly the conspiracies of Antichristian enemies against the Church of Christ at this day. Let us not fear them as much as their sins — any sordid compliance with them in doctrine, worship, and manners. So long as we keep close to our God in a way of faith and holiness, amidst all the terrors of war the Lord will be the shield of our help and the sword of our excellency. Then we may be sure that God will let out no more of our enemies’fiery indignation against us than he himself sees fit, and will sanctifie to exercise and refine our graces, and thereby also they will sooner become ripe and kindle the consuming flames of Divine wrath against themselves. — I am, dear son and daughter, your entirely loving and most affectionate Father,{{float right|John Delmé.”
Monsieur Delmé’s colleague in Canterbury was the pasteur Jean Bulteel.[6] It would appear that he was some years older than Delmé, and came to Canterbury a little before him, and thus was his senior colleague. He is the “John Bulteel of Canterbury,” named in the pedigree of 1633-4 (“Visitation of London,” c. 24, p. 300). His grandfather was James Bulteel, of Tournay, whose wife’s maiden surname was Willocquean. This Walloon couple had two sons, John and Giles, refugees in England. In 1633, John was represented by a son, Charles, of whom we hear no more. Giles returned three sons, James, John, and Peter. James was resident in Canterbury in 1621, as appears from a Government return, and was alive in 1632. John, the pasteur,[7] is reported in 1633 as “of Canterbury.” Peter, the third brother, was returned in the lists of 1618 as a merchant, then aged 37; and he in 1633 names his five sons and two daughters. (His third son was the ancestor of the influential Devonshire family of Bulteel.)
Peter, as already indicated, having been born in 1581, we may say that John was born in or before 1580. From the French Church Register of Canterbury, we know that Monsieur Jean Bulteel, “Ministre de la parole de Dieu,” and “Ministre du st. evangile," married Marie Gabri, and had five children, Jean (1627), Gilles (born 1629, died 1634), Jeanne (1632), Pierre (1634), and Susanne (1637). As Peter’s male representatives soon became a Devonshire family, we take the pasteur’s eldest child to be the “John Bulteel, gentleman,” whom we shall notice in a future chapter. [As to the surname Gabri or Gabry, Ciprian Gabry, merchant, came to England from Antwerp in 1582, and Gaspar Gabry in 1618 from Tournay.] The earliest date associated with the pasteur’s name is 1619, in connection with a publication of which we are to speak in another paragraph. From the valuable book which he contributed to refugee history, we learn that a synod of all the foreign churches in England was held at Norwich in 1619, and he was chosen its scribe (synod-clerk). He was elected as ministerial deputy from Canterbury to a synod held in London in 1625. When Archbishop Laud attacked the worship and liberties of the refugee churches, “John Bulteel and Philip Delmé, ministers of the French Church at Canterbury,” were appointed deputies to confer with the other churches. The title of the book is, “A Relation of the troubles of the three Forraign Churches in Kent caused by the Injunctions of William Laud, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1634, &c. Written by J. B., minister of the Word of God.” London, 1645; 4to. Mr. Bulteel published translations of French religious books. The pasteur, Guilbert Primrose, in the year 1610, according to Anthony a Wood, had published four volumes, entitled “Jacob’s Vow opposed to the vows of monks and friars.” The first volume, containing two books, was translated into English “by John Bulteel, a minister,” and published in 4to, London, 1617. [Primrose became a refugee minister in London in 1623.]
There was also published, “The Christian Combate, with a sermon of [on] Prayer in time of affliction, on Psalm, 1. 15,” translated by John Bulteel from the French of Du Moulin. The great Du Moulin’s book, of which the fourth French edition was published in 1632, was entitled, “Du Combat Chrestien ou des Afflictions — à Messieurs de l’Eglise Reformée de Paris.”
From this list it appears that Mr. Bulteel was alive in 1645. There is an uncertainty whether the Pasteur Paul Gorgier, who died in 1689, officiated for forty-one years, or only for four and a half (see my “Gleanings from Registers,” in vol. ii.); if it was for the longer period, he came in 1648, and the vacancy may have been occasioned by Mr. Bulteel’s death.
I will close this chapter with a brief notice of a layman eminent both for piety and for success in life, the son of a refugee from Flanders. The refugee was Pierre Houblon, merchant-stranger, as to whom, see my Chapter IX. His eminent descendant was his son Jacques, known as James Houblon, Esq., merchant of London, and father of the Royal Exchange, who was born in 1592, and baptized in the City of London French Church, Threadncedle Street, where, on November 1620, he married Marie Du Quesne, “a woman of a meek and humble spirit,” by whom he had ten sons and two daughters, all nursed by her. He died in 1682, and was survived by seven sons. His funeral sermon was preached by Rev. Gilbert Burnet, D.D. (afterwards Bishop of Salisbury), upon the text Psalm xxxvii. 37 (authorised version). The preacher alluded to his anxious care of his children, and added, “not being satisfied with what he said to them by word of mouth while he lived, he took care that after his death he should still speak to them in a great many excellent letters and papers which he left behind him.” Some of these were printed in 1863, with the title, “Pious Memories of Mr. James Houblon, senior, merchant of London, who died June the 20th, 1682, in the ninetieth year of his age — being the substance of several letters of counsell and advice, written with his own hand, for direction and government of all his children in their short pilgrimage upon earth. London, Basil Montague Pickering, 196 Piccadilly.” Opposite the title-page is the note, “Printed by John Archer Houblon, for private distribution, in remembrance of his good ancestor.” This monumental volume includes Burnet’s Funeral Sermon.
From the sermon I extract some biographical notes:— “He was baptized in the French congregation and continued a member of it his whole life. He was one of the chief pillars of that congregation, in which he often served as Antient [an ancien, or elder], and to the support of which, and of all the poor exiles that came over, he contributed always so liberally, that if he did not still live in so many children, to whom God has given hearts as well as fortunes like his, this loss would be very sensibly felt. He did communicate once a month constantly, and was never absent from their assemblies either on the Lord’s day or on the week-day, and this was become so customary for him, that it was not without difficulty that he was kept from going thither even during his sickness.” “He looked on the Reformed churches by reason of the unreformed lives of the members of them with great regret, and did apprehend there was a severe cup to go round them, and was afraid England might drink the dregs of it, and might be again brought under the tyranny of the Church of Rome and the inundation of a foreign power.” “About forty-seven years ago an unhappy accident had almost cut him off when he was yet in the strength of his age; be being at a training [militia drill] near Morefields, some powder took fire, by which he with several others were blown up; but though some of the rest were struck dead outright, yet God had a great deal of more service for him in the world, and so, after an illness of six or seven weeks’ continuance, of which it was long doubted whether he would ever recover, he was again restored to his family, and lived to see his children’s children and some of their children, to so great an increase, that in his time a full hundred came into the world descended from him, all born in full time, and all baptized save one. Of these, sixty-seven are yet alive, to which, if eleven that are come into his family by marriages be joined, there wanted but two of fourscore that had a right to his daily blessing.”
The following is a characteristic specimen of his written address to his children:—
“If for our sins God should permit Popery to come in, labour by earnest prayers and supplications to Him that He would give you His grace that you may be able to stand in the day of visitation. Forsake not Him, least He forsake you when He shall appear in glory with His holy angells. Desert not your profession for all the insinuations of wicked men or your own relations, but say as that good man did, I will tread upon wife and children rather than forsake my God. O remember what your Redeemer hath done and suffered for your immortal souls. Whatever losses or sufferings ye may undergo, be sure you hold fast the jewell of a good conscience; constancy is the crown of religion. Forsake all your good, yea, and your very lives, rather than comply with Popery. Eschew evill and the appearance of it, and if you must suffer, choose it rather than sin. If persecution by God’s providence befall you, remember that holy martyr who said as he was going to be burnt, One stile more, and I shall come to my Father’s house.”
- ↑ Besides this John Boevey (ancestor of Garth of Morden) William Boevey had two daughters, viz., (1) Mary, wife of Francis Courtenay of Powderham, and ancestress of the Viscounts Courtenay, and (2) Judith, wife of Sir Levinus Bennet of Babraham, Bart.
- ↑ The biographer, however, was mistaken when he added that Mr. Bonnell became Mayor of Norwich.
- ↑ His funeral sermon was preached by Bishop Wetenhall. The Bonnell motto was Terris Peregrinus et Hospes.
- ↑ Mr Munck was a refugee from Brabant, and is entered in the list of 1618 as an inhabitant of Lime Street Ward, where he is styled a gentleman, and stated to have been naturalized by Act of Parliament in the first year of King James; it is added, “hee is clark of his Matys signet.”
- ↑ Le 28 Mars 1596, Adrien de le Met presente son fille pour estre baptisez, le nom de Lenfan sera Elisabeth.
- ↑ Perhaps this surname was originally Bulteau, which having been first translated by the learned into Bultellus was re-translated into Dutch and English as Bultel or Bultell, and then Bulteel. Louis XIV. had a secretary named Bulteau. And the famous library of Charles Bulteau was catalogued in Paris in 1711 as Bibliotheca Bultelliana.
- ↑ The Canterbury register mentions Ester, wife of Pierre Bulteel, the pasteur’s brother; and this proves that “John Bulteel, of Canterbury,” was the pasteur.