Hippisley, John Coxe
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- Hippisley, John Coxe
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(1747 - 1825), o. surv. s. of William Hippisley of Yatton, Som.; educ. Bristol GS and Hertford Oxf. 1764; I.Temple 1766, called 1771; m. 1 1780 in Rome Margaret Stewart (d. 1799), 2 1801 Elizabeth Horner, wid. of Henry Hippisley Coxe; EICo 1782 and paymaster at Tanjore 1786 - 7; cr. Bt. 1796; MP 1790 - 6, 1802 - 18; Dilettanti 1804.
1779 - 80 Rome (by Easter - 10 Nov. 1779), Pisa, Leghorn (24 - 28 Nov.), Florence (Dec.), Perugia, Rome (Dec. 1779 - Jun. 1780) with visit to Naples
1793 - 5 Genoa (1 Feb. 1793), Leghorn (28 Feb.), Pisa, Siena, Rome (6 Mar. 1793 - 24 May 1795) with visits to Naples, Loreto and Ancona (Jul. 1794); Florence (May 1795), Venice
[1818 Rome]
An ambitious and busy man, not above intrigue, Hippisley first went to Italy in 1779. At Easter 1779 he was staying by the Strada Frattina in Rome, engaged 'in confidential communication with the English government', doubtless involving official relations with the Papacy, but he also spent time with British artists and occasionally acted as a cicerone.1 Thomas Jones met him in Rome on several occasions between July 1779 and February 1780.2 Tresham was painting his portrait in September 1779, 'sitting on the Capitol of a Column, a Book in one hand and a Map of antient Rome in the other. The back Ground consists of a Roman view, the Colosseo &c.'; Giuseppe Plura modelled his bust which was being cast on 24 September 1779,3 and in March 1780 Pars drew the tomb of the Horatii at Albani which he was 'to introduce in the background of a whole length Picture he is painting of Mr Hippisley'.4 The Pars portrait is in a private collection, but the other two portraits remain untraced. Hippisley was also acquainted with the antiquary James Clark and the banker Tierney in Naples, where he had been with Lord Maynard sometime before July 1780.5
When young Lord Herbert (later 11th Earl of Pembroke) returned to Rome from Naples in September 1779, he was guided by Hippisley, who had 'been in Rome some time'. Herbert wrote that 'Mr Hippisly whom I had known in England lodged in the same House I did [Margherita's], and was so good as to be my Cicerone during my whole stay, and was so excellent a one, that I flatter myself of having seen Rome more completely and to greater advantage, than most of my young Countrymen, who in fact, do not see it, although they stay often more months than I did weeks'.6 Hippisley, with another George Herbert and Robert Jarrett (who were returning home from India), rejoined Lord Herbert in Pisa and Leghorn between 24 and 28 November, and was in Florence in December 1779, before returning again alone to Rome via Perugia.7 He had advised Lord Herbert on what best to see in Florence (mentioning Guercino, Correggio and John of Bologna), Cortona and Perugia (which 'pleased me greatly'), and later acted as Herbert's agent in handling the intaglio commissioned from Marchant for his mother, Lady Pembroke.8 His attention to Lord Herbert, and the fact that in May 1780 he gave Thomas Jones a letter of introduction to Sir William Hamilton at Naples, indicate Hippisley enjoyed a certain status. Earlier that year he had married, an event which he had rather cautiously described to Lord Herbert on 7 March: 'the Lady is no other than Miss M. Stewart. She whom you don't think the best Humoured, for it is not the red-haired one'; she brought him £;3000, which would be useful in India where Hippisley was resolved to go next.9 He is last recorded in Rome on 3 June 1780.(10) Between 1782 and 1787 he made his fortune in India and he became an MP in 1790.
In 1792 a bronchial complaint led him to set out again for Rome with his first wife, his small son Wyndham, and Lilias Stewart (probably Elizabeth, his wife's sister). They hired a boat at Falmouth to sail direct to Italy, but a storm drove them back and they travelled overland through France.(11) In December he attended the trial of Louis XVI in Paris. Mrs Hippisley told her other sister in Rome (the Countess Cicciaporci) that half the National Assembly then attended her morning toilet.(13) They sailed from Marseilles via Genoa to Leghorn and travelled overland through Pisa and Siena to Rome which they reached on 6 March 1793. On 17 April Sir William Forbes attended a family gathering in Rome with the Hippisleys, the Cicciaporcis and 'Miss Stuart' [presumably Lilias].14 Although the party remained centred at Rome, they visited Loreto and Ancona in July 1794 and made at least one visit to Naples. In Rome Hippisley became the admirer and confidant of Pius VI and, although a Protestant, he was an advocate of the Catholic interest both at home and abroad. With his privileged but unofficial position, he helped negotiate the provisioning of the British Mediterranean fleet in 1793 - 4, and he assisted French royalist refugees from Toulon. He was made an honorary citizen of San Marino, and he presented a number of British travellers to the Pope. At the end of his visit Hippisley received a letter from the Pope, dated 26 April 1795, thanking him for his services and saying that 'the union of the Emblems of Rome to the Arms of his Family as they are represented by the annexed model, can be but very precious to us'; the letter was annotated by Hippisley: 'no instance of a similar concession ever occurred in favour of a Protestant'. Hippisley's portrait by Guy Head (priv. coll.), shows him holding a document inscribed concordiae perpetuae, the motto given in the Papal letter.15
Evidence of Hippisley's diplomatic activity is principally preserved in two manuscript volumes of his Roman correspondence (priv. coll.), being mostly letters he received (his correspondents including Popes Pius VI and VII, Cardinal York and the Countess of Albany).16 Hippisley was not universally liked; 'the great politician, Hippisley, still remains here and is a great talker', wrote Lady Knight somewhat sarcastically from Rome in August 1793.17 His diplomacy had always been unofficial, but he had strenuously sought official recognition and a baronetcy. Hippisley had remained MP for Sudbury while he was in Rome, and claimed to his constituents that he had distributed samples of Sudbury wool in Italy.
He and his party left Rome on 24 May 1795 and returned to England through Florence, Venice and the Tyrol. In London he was described as 'an intriguer by nature educated in St James Street, polished in Italy, practised for years in the East Indies and finished in Rome'.18 In April 1796 he was finally made a Baronet for his part in negotiating the marriage between the Princess Royal and the Duke of Wurtemberg. He was subsequently instrumental in having the government pension for the aging Cardinal York increased; when the Cardinal died in 1807 he bequeathed to Hippisley a number of Stuart portraits and relics which remain in a private collection. In 1813 Hippisley negotiated the final sale of the eighteenth-century Stuart papers (bequeathed by the Duchess of Albany to the Abb? Waters, who d. 1806) to the Royal Library at Windsor.19 Hippisley paid his last visit to Rome in 1818.
1. AVR sa, S.Lorenzo in Lucina. See R.B. Ford, Apollo, 99[1974]:442 - 5. 2. Jones Memoirs, 90, 92, 93, 95. 3. Pembroke Papers, 1:269. 4. Jones Memoirs, 93. 5. Pembroke Papers, 1:223. Eg.1970, f.42 (W. Windham, 1 Jul. 1780). Morrison, 1:62 (no.93). 6. Pembroke Papers, 1:261 - 2, 269, 316. 7. Ibid., 327 - 31, 358. 8. Ibid., 304, 358, 383, 389, 486. 9. Ibid., 424. 10. Ibid., 486. 11. Itinerary from the MS History of the Trotter Family by Alex.Trotter (priv.coll., notes by F. Russell). See also Forbes jnl.MSS (27 Mar. 1793). 13. Knight Letters, 186 - 7. 14. Forbes jnl.MSS. 15. See Ford (at n1), 444. 16. See also corr. between Wm.Windham and Hippisley, 1781 - 1810; Add.37848 - 9. 17. Knight Letters. 186 - 7 (11 Aug. 1793). 18. Commons 3, 4:204. 19. Tayler 1939, 9 - 21.