Gascoigne, Sir Thomas, 8th Bt
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- Gascoigne, Sir Thomas, 8th Bt
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(1745 - 1810) of Parlington, Yorks; b. Cambrai, 3rd s. of Sir Edward Gascoigne, 6th Bt.; suc. bro. 1762 as 8th Bt.; m. 1 1772 Miss Montgomery, 2 1784 Mary Shuttleworth, wid. of Sir Charles Turner; army officer, capt. 1788, col. 1794; MP 1780 - 4, 1795 - 6.
1764 - 5 Turin (Aug. - Sep. 1764), Rome (Feb. - Mar. 1765), Florence (22 Mar.)
1776 - 9 Naples (28 Dec. 1776 - Mar. 1777), Taranto and Reggio (Apr. - May), Naples (Jun. - Sep.), Paestum (Sep. - Oct.), Sicily (Dec. 1777 - Jan. 1778), Naples (13 Feb. - Mar.), Rome (Mar. - ), Milan (Jul. - Aug.), Florence (Sep.), Rome (by 11 Nov. 1778 - ), Naples (Jan. 1779), Rome (by 8 Feb. - Mar.), the Abruzzi (6 Mar. - ), Rome ( - 17 Apr.), Florence (by 15 May) [England by 11 Jul.]
A Catholic (until 1780), Sir Thomas first went to Italy in 1764, attending the Academy in Turin in August and September.1 While there he indulged in a spectacular act of truancy with Charles Dillon; they went to hunt at Rivoli and Susa and then, hearing that Lord Abingdon intended to hunt on Mont Cenis, they went on to Geneva; they then decided to pay a brief visit to Paris, informing their tutors they would return in a few days.2
In February - March 1765 Gascoigne was in Rome with John and George Damer and was involved in a fracas in which a coachman died; William Hamilton told Horace Mann that it was 'ungenerous' of Gascoigne to blame Damer when it was said that he 'was the first mover of the whole'.3 Gascoigne alleged he was not present when the fatal blow was struck, 'but was gone home for his pistols, which he discharged among the people but perceiving they were without balls, otherwise the mischief must have been much greater'. It was lucky, as Mann commented, 'that the offended were of a rank to be quieted by money, but above all it was lucky for our countrymen that the Governor [Piccolomini] so zealously assisted them'.4 On 22 March Gascoigne had arrived in Florence.4 On his return to England he became a member of Gibbon's Roman Club.5
Gascoigne returned to Italy late in 1776, having left England the previous year. He joined his fellow Catholic and near neighbour Henry Swinburne in Bordeaux in the summer of 1775 and took him to Spain in 1776. In December they sailed with Mrs Swinburne to Naples. Gascoigne spent much of his time with Swinburne in the ensuing year exploring the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, see Swinburne. At the end of their first stay in Naples Gascoigne had amused the King by appearing at a masked ball en femme de chambre,6 but he had not always been in such good spirits, Father Thorpe alleging that during an illness in Naples he had made his will.7 They were in Rome in March 1778, and in July Gascoigne left the Swinburnes to go with the Abb? Grant to Milan, expecting to return to Rome in October.7 They were still in Milan on 19 August but had reached Florence in September.8 Gascoigne was reunited with the Swinburnes in Rome by 11 November 1778,9 but 'about' January 1779 he was on his own at Naples discussing with Thomas Jones the possibility of making copies of the Altieri Claudes. Jones described a curious conversation concerning artists' materials, in which Gascoigne upheld Philipp Hackert's practice of bleaching his canvases 'half a year' in the sun and making his own colours from minerals; the discusssion ended as Lord Tylney called Gascoigne away, but that evening Gascoigne told Jones he would hear from him, and there the matter stayed.(10)
Gascoigne was back in Rome in February, when he gave Swinburne the Petroni collection of medals bought for him in Naples.(11) That same month Swinburne gave Gascoigne Thomas Banks's Alcyone and Ceyx (Lotherton) which he had won in a raffle organised by Lady Catherine Beauclerk, see Thomas Banks. Early in March 1779 Swinburne and Gascoigne made a brief excursion in the Abruzzi, before Gascoigne left Rome on 17 April to return to England.(12) He was in Florence on 15 May, when Mann reported that he was 'setting out tomorrow for England', bringing Horace Walpole a medal (which was acknowledged on 11 July).(13) Gascoigne was presumably returning with Swinburne (who left his wife and children in Naples to pay a six-month visit to England), who also arrived in London by July.
At Rome Gascoigne had sat for his bust to Hewetson, and for a full-length portrait dated 1779 by Batoni (Clark/Bowron 416); both are now at Lotherton Hall, together with the busts of Mr and Mrs Swinburne. Most of the works of art acquired by Gascoigne while he was abroad passed to Leeds City Art Galleries in 1968 with Lotherton Hall (the family home from the nineteenth century).
1. Morgan Jnl., 172, 199. 2. Dutens, Memoirs, 1:227 - 8. 3. SP 105/316, f.76 (2 Apr. 1765). 4. Wal.Corr., 22:286 - 7. 5. Gibbon, Misc.Works, 1:200. 6. Swinburne, Courts, 1:199. 7. Thorpe letters mss (25 Jul. 1778). 8. Ibid. (25 Jul., 2 Sep. 1778). Waters letters mss (19 Aug. 1779). 9. Waters letters mss (11 Nov. 1779). 10. Jones Memoirs, 83 - 4. 11. Swinburne, Courts, 1:233. 12. Byres letters mss y (17 Apr. 1779). 13. Wal.Corr., 24:478, 500.