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Sir
George Booth, Baron Delamer
George Booth, 1st Baron Delamer
Custos Rotulorum of Cheshire
In office
1660–1673
MP for Cheshire
In office
1660–1661
Personal details
Born18 December 1622
Dunham Massey Cheshire
Died8 August 1684(1684-08-08) (aged 61)
Dunham Massey
Resting placeSt Mary the Virgin, Bowdon
NationalityEnglish
Spouse(s)Lady Katherine Clinton (1639-1643)
Lady Elizabeth Grey (1644-1684)
ChildrenSeven sons, six daughters
Parent(s)Sir William Booth (died 1636); Vere Egerton (died 1629)
OccupationLandowner, soldier, politician
Military service
Allegiance England 1642–1646
Years of service1642 to 1646
RankColonel
Battles/warsFirst English Civil War
Manchester 1642; Preston 1643; Siege of Chester;
Booth's Uprising

George Booth, 1st Baron Delamer (18 December 1622 – 8 August 1684), was an English landowner and politician from Cheshire, who served as an MP from 1646 to 1661, when he was elevated to the House of Lords as Baron Delamer.

A member of the moderate Presbyterian faction that dominated the Long Parliament and many of the pre-war county elites, Booth fought for Parliament during the First English Civil War. He relinquished his commission when elected MP for Cheshire in 1646, a seat he retained throughout the Protectorate.

Suspected of involvement in the 1655 Penruddock uprising to restore Charles II of England, in 1659 he led another attempt known as Booth's Uprising. Intended as part of a larger conspiracy, it was quickly defeated, but Booth escaped punishment and was rewarded with a peerage after the 1660 Stuart Restoration. However, concerns over reforms to the Church of England and use of the Royal Prerogative led him into opposition, and during the 1679 to 1681 Exclusion Crisis, he supported barring the Catholic James from the throne. He died in August 1684 and was succeeded by his son Henry, who briefly served as Chancellor of the Exchequer after the 1688 Glorious Revolution.

Civil War

George Booth was the son of Sir William Booth of Dunham Massey and Margaret Assheton. Sir William Booth was the son and heir apparent to Sir George Booth, 1st Baronet (1566–1652), of the ancient family settled at Dunham Massey in Cheshire, by his wife Vere Egerton, daughter and co-heir of Sir Thomas Egerton. He took an active part in the Civil War alongside his grandfather, Sir George Booth, on the Parliamentarians' side. He was returned to the Long Parliament as Member of Parliament for Cheshire in 1645.[1]

Interregnum

George Booth was nominated to the Barebones Parliament for Cheshire in 1653 and was elected MP for Cheshire in the First Protectorate Parliament in 1654 and in the Second Protectorate Parliament in 1656.[1] In 1655 he was appointed military commissioner for Cheshire and treasurer at war. He was one of the excluded members who tried and failed to regain their seats in the restored Rump Parliament after the fall of Richard Cromwell in 1659.[2]

He had for some time been regarded by the Royalists as a well-wisher to their cause, and was described to the King in May 1659 as "very considerable in his county, a Presbyterian in opinion, yet so moral a man ... I think Your Majesty may safely [rely] on him and his promises which are considerable and hearty".[2] He thus became one of the chief leaders of the new Royalists who united with the Cavaliers to effect the Restoration.[2]

Uprising

A memorial to the battle photographed in 2013

An uprising[3] was arranged for 5 August 1659 in several districts, and Booth received a commission from Charles II to assume command of the revolutionary forces in Lancashire, Cheshire, and North Wales.[4]

After gaining control of Chester on the 19 August, he issued a proclamation declaring that "arms had been taken up in vindication of the freedom of Parliament, of the known laws, liberty and property",[2] and then marched towards York. The plot, however, was known to John Thurloe. Having been foiled in other parts of the country, Lambert's advancing forces defeated Booth's men at the Battle of Winnington Bridge near Northwich.[2][5][6] Booth himself escaped disguised as a woman, but was discovered at Newport Pagnell on the 23 August whilst having a shave, and was imprisoned in the Tower of London.[2]

Restoration

Estate of Sir George Booth Act 1660
Act of Parliament
Long titleAn Act for enabling of Sir George Booth Baronet to make Leases and Sales of Part of his Estate.
Citation12 Cha. 2. c. 14
Dates
Royal assent13 September 1660

However, Booth was soon liberated and returned to his seat in the Convention Parliament in 1660.[1] He was one of the twelve members deputed to carry the message of the House of Commons to Charles II at The Hague. In July 1660 he received a grant of £10,000 according to the House of Commons Journal for 30 July 1660, having refused the larger sum of £20,000 at first offered to him, and on 20 April 1661, on the occasion of the coronation, he was created Baron Delamer, with a licence to nominate six new knights. The same year he was appointed Custos Rotulorum of Cheshire.[2]

In later years he showed himself staunchly opposed to the reactionary policies of the government. He died on 8 August 1684, and was buried in the Booth Chapel at Bowdon Church.[2]

Family

Booth's first marriage was to Lady Catherine Clinton, daughter and co-heir of Theophilus Clinton, 4th Earl of Lincoln, with whom he had one daughter, Vera Booth. After the death of his first wife, he married Lady Elizabeth Grey, daughter of Henry Grey, 1st Earl of Stamford, by whom, besides five daughters, he had seven sons, the second of whom, Henry, succeeded him in the Booth titles and estates, which included Dunham Massey Hall and Staley Hall. Henry later became Earl of Warrington. Although this earldom became extinct on the death of the 2nd Earl in 1758, the Booth Barony of Delamer carried on another generation, only becoming extinct upon the 4th Baron's death in 1770. The Booths' even older baronetcy title then devolved upon a distant cousin, the Rev Sir George Booth, Rector of Ashton-under-Lyne, although the family's representation in the House of Lords had ceased. The Delamer title was later recreated (as Delamere) in 1821 for the Cholmondeley family, kinsmen of the Marquesses of Cholmondeley and the Cholmeley baronets.[2]

Name Birth Death Notes
By Lady Catherine Clinton[7]
Vere Booth 19 July 1643 14 November 1717 unmarried; Canonbury House, Islington 
By Lady Elizabeth Grey[7]
William Booth 17 April 1648 20 Jan 1661  
Henry Booth, 1st Earl of Warrington 13 Jan 1652 2 Jan 1693/94  
Charles Booth died at Paris  
George Booth 1726 married Lucy Robartes
Very Rev Robert Booth 1662 8 Aug 1730  
Elizabeth Booth 4 July 1681 married Edward Conway, 1st Earl of Conway; no surviving issue
Diana Booth 7 October 1713 married 1677, Admiral Sir Ralph Delaval, 2nd Bt; married 21 October 1699, Sir Edward Blackett, 2nd Bt
Cecil Booth 16 May 1711 unmarried
Ann Booth died young  
Jane Booth died young  
Sophia Booth died young  
Nevill Booth 1667 1685 merchant adventurer

Notes

  1. ^ a b c Helms, Hampson & Henning 1983.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Chisholm 1911.
  3. ^ Booth's Uprising, 1659 (BCW Project)
  4. ^ Kelsey 2006.
  5. ^ Young 1973, p. 4.
  6. ^ The Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition implies that the battle took place near Nantwich—Winnington Bridge is about a mile from Northwich.(Ormerod 1819, p. 111)
  7. ^ a b "Person Page 14348". Thepeerage.com. Retrieved 17 August 2012.

References

Attribution:

External links

4 Annotations

Third Reading

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

George Booth (1622-1684) was the second son of William Booth and his wife Vere, of Dunham Massey in Cheshire.

After the death of his father in 1636, George was brought up by his grandfather, also named Sir George Booth.

George attended the Inner Temple in 1637 but is said to have fled to France around 1639 after quarrelling with his grandfather over his marriage to Katherine Clinton, daughter of the Earl of Lincoln.

After Katherine Clinton Booth's death in 1643, George Booth married Elizabeth Grey, daughter of the Earl of Stamford, with whom he had 7 sons and 5 daughters.

George Booth returned to England on the outbreak of civil wars.
He played an active role in Cheshire and the northern Marches, accompanying Sir William Brereton on his advance into north Wales in November 1643 and taking command of the garrison at Nantwich when Brereton's forces were driven back.

As a moderate Presbyterian, George Booth opposed Sir William Brereton on both political and religious grounds. After fighting at the siege of Chester in 1645, Booth resigned his commission in order to stand for Parliament.

Despite Brereton's opposition, Booth was elected recruiter MP for Cheshire in 1646.
He was associated with the Presbyterian faction in Parliament, and was among the MPs excluded at Pride's Purge in December 1648 by soldiers under the command of his brother-in-law Lord Grey of Groby.

In 1654, George Booth MP was elected to the First Protectorate Parliament and in March 1655, he was one of the commissioners appointed to assist the Major-Generals in Cheshire.

During the elections for the Second Protectorate Parliament, Major-General Bridge intervened to substitute George Booth MP in place of the republican John Bradshaw as candidate for Cheshire.
However, Booth emerged as a critic of the Major-Generals. When he described them as "Cromwell's hangmen" during the debates over the renewal of the decimation tax, the resulting altercation with Major-General Howard almost ended in a duel.

George Booth was elected MP for Lancashire in the Third Protectorate Parliament in January 1659.

In May 1659, the Rump Parliament was recalled and the Cromwellian Protectorate came to an end with the subsequent resignation of Richard Cromwell.

The restored Parliament was generally regarded as more radical than the Protectorate had been, and George Booth MP was active in demanding the re-admittance to Parliament of the Presbyterian MPs who had been expelled at Pride's Purge in 1648.
When these demands were rejected, he became involved in a conspiracy for a Royalist insurrection and was commissioned by the Great Trust to lead the insurgency in Cheshire, Lancashire and north Wales.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

PART 2

Out of a series of insurrections around the country planned for the summer of 1659, Booth's Uprising was the only one that occurred. Although the insurgents succeeded in seizing Chester, they were easily defeated by Major-Gen. John Lambert at Winnington Bridge near Northwich on 19 August, 1659.
Booth tried to escape disguised as a woman, but was arrested and imprisoned in the Tower of London.
He was released on bail in February 1660 after the excluded MPs were reinstated by Gen. Monck.

In April 1660, William Booth was elected to the Convention Parliament as MP for Cheshire.
He was one of the 12 MPs appointed to convey Parliament's invitation to Charles II to return as King.

Booth appealed for clemency on behalf of a number of those threatened with prosecution, including Oliver St.John, Sir Arthur Hesilrige and even Major-Gen. Lambert.
Parliament awarded him £10,000 for his role in securing the Restoration and, at the King's coronation in April 1661, Booth was elevated to the peerage as Lord Delamere.

Sir George Booth, Lord Delamere MP was active in Restoration politics in support of Presbyterianism and against Catholicism until his death in August 1684.

Info from http://bcw-project.org/biography/…

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

George Booth was descended from a younger branch of a Lancashire family, settled at Dunham Massey since 1433. His great-grandfather represented Cheshire in 1572. His father died before the Civil Wars, but his grandfather was a parliamentary supporter, and George was in arms for the same cause, and sat for the county as a recruiter until Pride’s Purge.

Chancellor Clarendon described George Booth MP as ‘a person of the best fortune and interest in Cheshire, and, for the memory of his grandfather, of absolute power with the Presbyterians’.

During the national uprising against the Rump in 1659M George Booth MP, who had been commissioned by Charles II as commander-in-chief for Cheshire, Lancashire and North Wales, was the only conspirator to get together anything like an army.
He carefully avoided a public commitment on the monarchy, but was easily defeated by Gen. John Lambert, and captured in female attire when his disguise was betrayed by an unwary call for a razor.

Despite the ludicrous circumstances of his defeat and capture, George Booth’s reputation stood high in 1660, and he was returned for Cheshire at the general election, probably unopposed.
Marked as a friend on Lord Wharton’s list, he was a moderately active Member of the Convention, in which he was named to 36 committees, including 4 conferences, acted as teller in 5 divisions, and made 17 recorded speeches.
He was appointed to the committee of elections and privileges and sent to the Lords on 1 May 1660 to announce that the Commons were ready for a conference to settle ‘the great affairs of the kingdom’.

George Booth MP was among those instructed to prepare bills in accordance with Charles II’s letter. He absent-mindedly greeted Edmund Ludlow with great civility, but soon recollected himself enough to glare at him.
He was the first Member chosen to carry the answer of the Commons to Breda.

On his return to the House Booth acted as teller for the successful motion that no more than 20 offenders should be excepted from the indemnity bill.
He defended Bulstrode Whitelocke†, acting as teller on 14 June against putting the question on excepting him, and offered a petition from Oliver St.John, the Cromwellian chief justice, which was refused.
He twice acted as teller for imposing an import duty of £2 10s. a head on Irish cattle.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

PART 2

On 30 July a bill was introduced to enable him to lease and sell lands for payment of his debts and raising portions for his younger children. It was read twice and committed, and immediately followed by a resolution to confer £10,000 on him out of the excise ‘as a mark of respect for his eminent services and great sufferings for the public’. He declared himself willing to forego the gift if his estate bill were passed, but he was overborne. The concurrence of the Lords was speedily obtained, and the excise commissioners ordered to make payment accordingly.
With his credit thus re-established he was among those ordered on 13 Aug. to raise a government loan of £100,000 in the City.
Four days later he was appointed to the committee to state the facts about the attendance of Charles I’s judges at his trial, and he helped to manage 2 conferences on the regicides.

He brought in two papers drawn up by his late brother-in-law Thomas, Lord Grey of Groby, who had died in 1657, ‘to testify his penitence for his former being against the King’, and persuaded the House to strike his name out of the bill.
He also spoke on behalf of his old opponent Gen. Lambert, and Sir Arthur Hesilrige.

He helped to manage the conference on settling ministers in their livings before Parliament adjourned for the autumn recess.

In the second session he was named to the committee for the attainder bill, and acted as teller on the unsuccessful motion for a second reading of the bill for modified episcopacy.

George Booth was raised to the peerage as Lord Delamer in the coronation honours, but he cannot have welcomed the Anglican religious settlement and the lack of restraint on the prerogative. He retained his Presbyterian chaplains, and naturally came under suspicion.

Attempts were made to implicate him in the northern plot of 1663.

After the Diary he was in opposition under Thomas Osborne, Earl of Danby, entering 3 formal protests against the non-resisting test, and he voted for the second exclusion bill.

Sir George Booth, Lord Delamer died on 8 Aug. 1684 and was buried at Bowdon.

From https://www.historyofparliamenton…

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References

Chart showing the number of references in each month of the diary’s entries.

1660