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270 CLARENDON a Lord of the Admiralty 1 748-56. He was cr.^ 3 June 1 756, BARON HYDE OF HINDON, Wilts, with rem. of the said dignity to the heirs male of his body by Charlotte, his then wife, with rem. to the said Charlotte and the heirs male of her body.(^) P.C. 9 Sep. 1763; Joint Postmaster Gen. 1763-65; Chan- cellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, 1771-82, and again Dec. 1783-86; Joint Postmaster Gen. again Sep. 1786 till his death. On 14 June 1776, he was cr. EARL OF CLARENDON, with the ordinary limitation to heirs male of his (own) body; on 16 July 1782, he obtained the Royal lie. that he and his issue should bear their arms on the Royal Eagle of Prussia, in the manner granted to him by Frederick III, King of Prussia, by whom also he is said to have been made a Count of that Kingdom. He %., 30 Mar. 1752, Charlotte (coh. of her mother), 3rd, but ist surv. da. of William (Capel), 3rd Earl of Essex, by his ist wife, Jane, da. of Henry (Hyde), 4th and last Earl of Clarendon abovenamed. He d. at Watford, Herts, 11, and was bur. there 20 Dec. I786,aged77.() Will dat. 5 July 1775, pr. 5 Jan. 1787. His widow, who was b. 2 Oct. 1721, and who had taken the name of Hyde, d. at Stony Stratford, 3, and was bur. 11 Sep. 1790, at Watford afsd. Will dat. 25 Dec. 1786, pr. 18 July 1791. VL 1786. 2. Thomas (Villiers), Earl of Clarendon, tfc, s. and h., b. 25 Dec. 1753, ed. at St. John's Coll. Cam- bridge; M.P. (Tory) for Christchurch, Hants, 1774-80, and for Helston, 1780 to Feb. I 78 1, and June 1781-86. He d. unm., after a long illness, at The Grove," Watford, 7, and was bur. at Watford 17 Mar. 1824, in his 71st year. Will pr. May 1824 and Feb. 1857. Vn. 1824. 3. John Charles (Villiers), Earl OF Clarendon, fc?c., br. and h., b. 14 Nov. 1757; ed. at Eton from I77i,and at St. John's Coll. Cambridge, M.A., 1776; Barrister (Line. Inn) 1779; King's Counsel in the Duchy of Lancaster, 1782-86, and Surveyor of Woods Newcastle and his earldom from North, the latter having been procured, according to Horace Walpole, through the influence of the Earl of Suffolk, who led the Grenville Whigs after that statesman's death. In the Royal Register, vol. v (1781), his promo- tion is treated as a reward for " ratting." " He was a convert, which I am sorry to say has been for some years past a very powerful recommendation." A statement as true in 1 91 2 as in I 78 1. V.G. (^) He thus had a peerage dignity not so ample as the usual one {i.e. that with rem. to the heirs male of the grantee's body), but no objection appears to have been raised by the House of Lords to his taking his seat thereunder. See for a similar grant of the Earldom of Vane (and a sitting thereunder in 1823) sub Charles, Marquess of Londonderry [1822]. See also vol. ii, p. 515, note "b." (*■) "Lord Hyde was so dull a man, that Lord John Cavendish said with a sneer, 'The Ministers have made a rebellion [in America] and now they have made a Lord Clarendon to write the history of it.'" (H. Walpole, Journal, 3 June 1776). The same writer had described him as "a very silly fellow " 26 Dec. 1748. V.G. <(