(1753 - 1819), e. s. of George Throckmorton (d. 1767); Douai 1774; m. 1782 Maria Catherine Giffard (d. 1821); suc. gd.-fa. 1791 as 5th Bt. Throckmorton of Coughton; Dilettanti 1797.
1772 Rome, Florence (Jul., Sep.)
1774 - 5 Rome (Mar. 1774, Feb. 1775)
[1790 Florence]
1792 - 3 [Geneva Sep. 1792] Naples (winter 1792 - 3), Rome (Apr.), Venice (by 4 May)
The brothers John and George Throckmorton were in Italy in 1774 - 5, and it appears that one of them had previously visited Florence and Rome in 1772. A Throckmorton was in Florence in the summer of 1772,1 and in September 'Mr Throgmorton' carried commissions to England for Horace Mann.2 A Batoni portrait of 1772 (Coughton; Clark/Bowron 351) shows either John Courtenay or his brother George (1754 - 1826, later 6th Bt.).
The brothers were certainly together in Rome by March 1774, when they were being shepherded by their uncle James Paston and the Benedictine George Augustine Walker. Father Thorpe then wrote that 'The two young Mr Trockmortons reside with the Monk Walker in a wretched situation in Trastevere. They frequent low English company, because there is the favourite card table of their tutor [Walker], unless when he chooses to exhibit with Cups & Balls, or declaim against the Jesuits in the vile hole of an English Coffee House ... The two young gentlemen appear to be very capable of improvement, & the elder of them (Mr Courtenay) to be of a most agreeable character'.3 But Thorpe was writing as a beleaguered Jesuit, and Sir Robert Throckmorton (their grandfather) seems to have been quite satisfied with Walker.4
In June 1790 Elizabeth Gibbes dined with a 'Mr Throckmorton' in Florence,5 but his identity remains uncertain.
In 1792, after he had succeeded as 5th Baronet, John Throckmorton returned to Italy with his wife Maria Catherine. They spent the winter in Naples6 and 'lived in Society' with Sir William and Lady Forbes. Later, in April 1793, the four were guided in Rome by Patrick Moir, while Lady Throckmorton introduced the Forbeses to the Arcadian Society; Sir John kept 'a sort of open table' for English Catholics at Rome.7 A Throckmorton ('Frokmorton') was in Venice in May 1793.8 A bust at Coughton, presumed to be of Sir John, is signed 'Christopherus Hewetson modellavit Christopherus Prosperi sculpsit 1800' (Hewetson had died in Rome in 1798).9 Further letters and another diary relating to Sir John and Lady
Throckmorton are in the Warwick RO (Throckmorton 0741 (ii 2/1 - 24, and 5/3).
1. Cotes jnl.MSS (n.d., after 17 Jun.). 2. Wal.Corr., 23:430n5. 3. Thorpe letters MSS (9 Mar. 1774, 25 Feb. 1775). 4. G. Scott, Gothic Rage Undone, 186 - 7. 5. Gibbes jnl.MSS (27 Jun. 1790). 6. Parker list MSS (betw. 1 Dec. 1792 and 24 Mar. 1793). 7. Forbes jnl.MSS (1, 4, 21 Apr. 1793). 8. ASV is 767 (4 - 13, 25 May). 9. Hewetson 1958, 51, and Hewetson 1986, 59, 72 .