Orde, Thomas
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- Orde, Thomas
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(1746 - 1807) of Bolton Castle, Yorks, 2nd s. of John Orde of Morpeth, Northumb.; educ. Eton and King's Camb. 1765, fell. 1768 - 78; L.Inn 1769, called 1775; FSA 1775; MP 1784 - 90 [I], 1780 - 96; m. 1778 Jean Powlett, illeg. dau. and h. of 5th D. of Bolton, taking additional name of Powlett 1795; cr. B. Bolton 1797.
1772 - 3 Bologna ( - 5 Nov. 1772), Florence (6 - 15 Nov.), Siena (15 Nov.), Naples (betw. 20 Dec. 1772 and 11 Feb. 1773), Rome (by 15 Feb.), Capua (1 Mar.), Naples, Rome (by Apr.)
Orde had travelled in France and Switzerland in 1772, and part of his Italian journal survives for November 1772 (Orde jnl.MSS). Largely devoted to discussing works of art, it also contains general descriptions of some interest. He noticed the bad Italian spoken in Bologna and admired the 'romantic and pleasing' country between Bologna and Florence, a journey he made overnight, stopping only to inspect the volcano of Pietra Mala. Orde was somewhat disappointed with Florence 'and particularly in the buildings'. He stayed at Carlo's [Hadfield's] with some twenty other Englishmen; 'every day fifteen or sixteen dine together', and the English set the tone for dress, besides sponsoring the opera. Horace Mann was 'wonderfully civil', but Lord Cowper 'who has been so long establish'd here, is, I as I understand, not so civil to his Countrymen'. Orde was presented at Court (with John Corbet, William Hervey, Richard Neville, Sir John Rous and John Chetwynd Talbot) and was struck by the incongruity of the splendid palace and the Grand Duke's 'doing all in his power to lessen luxury by discrediting it'. The Grand Duke [Leopold I] was 'a thin lively looking young man, rather wanting dignity in his person' who 'talked French to us very affably'. He was very anxious to embellish his city, and talked of 'so many works, that it is probable, he will perfect none'; the Uffizi was still being repaired after the fire [of 12 August 1762], roads were under construction and the Chapel of S.Lorenzo [Sagrestia Nuova] was being completed. Orde also reflected upon the 'violent excess of a certain unnatural vice' in Florence, which the police were trying to regulate, without effect. In the galleries he was critical of the restoration of The Family of Niobe, recently arrived from Rome; most of the figures 'have been much broke, and I do not like the manner in which they have restored the Niobe herself'. But he was pleased with the recent washing of the Venus de Medici, 'which operation has succeeded well - as it has only taken off the dirt, and still left the softening coat of antiquity'. Orde also described the apartments under the Uffizi for the workmen 'who copy pictures, engrave, take casts of statues &c., inlay marbles and paint in mosaic'.
He was probably the Mr Ord seen by William Hervey in Naples during the winter of 1772 - 3.1 His surviving journal makes clear that Orde had intended to return to Bologna and Florence the following spring, but he was then in Rome. Orde was in Capua on 1 March 1773, going to or from Naples, with William Macdowall and a Mr Barre2 and his name occurs in Townley's accounts in Rome on 13 March and 10 April.3 Lord Hyde also saw him in Rome before the end of April 1773.4 He sat to Batoni for a half-length portrait dated 1773 (Clark/ Bowron 366; priv. coll.) and he also appears in a conversation piece attributed to Wickstead painted at Rome c.1773 with James Byres, Richard Neville, John Staples and William Young (Springhill, Ulster, and Audley End).5 In 1774 he was travelling in Flanders, Holland and Switzerland.6
1. Hervey (Wm.) Jnl., 236. 2. ASN cra 1259. 3. Townley MSS. 4. MSS priv. coll. (Ld. Hyde to John Orde, 2 May 1773). 5. R.B. Ford, Apollo, 99[1974]:453 - 4, 461n43. 6. See F. Russell, Burl.Mag., 112[1970]:817.