[Be very careful - there are lots of St Johns, indeed lots of Oliver St Johns, and especially lots of John St Johns.]
Acc. to the SoL: Battersea: the "lease was renewed in 1541 to his son Henry Roydon junior. In the year of his death, 1568, his daughter Joan married Thomas Holcroft(e), said to have been a client of the Cecil family and perhaps a son of Sir Thomas Holcroft of Vale Royal, Cheshire. Holcroft, a Battersea churchwarden, died in 1591.Next year [1592] his [Holcroft's] mother-in-law [i.e. Joan's mother?] and his widow [i.e. Joan] secured from the Crown a renewal of the manorial lease to run from 1613. Soon afterwards [i.e. soon after 1591 or 1613?] Joan Holcroft married Oliver St John (1559-1630), from a Wiltshire branch of the prolific St John family"
No children, but his nephews and nieces eventually come to live in Battersea. Acc. to the SoL: "Joan St John, Lady Grandison, has gone down to posterity through a remark of Lucy Hutchinson, the daughter of one such niece, that 'her cruelties to my mother exceeded the stories of stepmothers'."
Born the second son of Nicolas St John of Lydiard Tregoz Wiltshire, distantly related to the Grandison family and the first earl of Bolingbroke (another Oliver St John), knew he could not expect any considerable inheritance hence would have to make his own way; BA Trinity College Oxford; "by nature the child of wrath", he kills explorer George Best in a duel; becomes a lawyer; then a soldier of fortune; becomes MP; becomes a cavalryman in Ireland during Tyrone's rebellion, in charge of increasing numbers of horse (25, then 100); knighted 1601; appointed lord deputy of Ireland 1616; active in the Plantation of Ulster etc; his "intolerable severity" towards recusants made him deeply unpopular, and is recalled to England 1622; becomes Viscount Grandison of Limerick in 1623; lord high treasurer of Ireland 1625; becomes Baron Tregoz of Highworth, Wiltshire in 1626.
Oliver St John, knighted and becomes Viscount Grandison in 1621, to accommodate the St John family. SoL: "Oliver St John was living in Battersea early in his marriage, but from 1600, when he was knighted, he was much in Ulster. There he held various official posts, took part in the plantation movement, and served as lord deputy of Ireland in 1616-22, becoming Viscount Grandison in 1621. The augmented fortune of this branch of the St Johns probably derived from his Ulster interests.
1626, buys manor of Battersea and Wandsworth and Battersea, "where he had had a house since 1600" , visits Ireland 1630 to settle his estates there, returns to Battersea, and dies soon after (30 Dec 1630).
St John married Joan, daughter and heiress of John Roydon of Battersea, and widow of Sir William Holcroft; she was buried at Battersea on 10 March 1631; by her he had no issue. The barony of Tregoz became extinct. Grandison's manors Wandsworth and Battersea, [why plural, since they were one? presumably the author didn't realise] passed to his nephew Sir John St John.
[I have made some notes elsewhere (see email) on the veery complicated relationship to Barbara Villiers, aka Lady Castlemaine.][See below - it appears it went to his young grandnephew John St John (b. 1615), though his nephew Sir John St John (1585-1648) took actual control.]
Add SoL ref
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viscount_Grandison
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oliver_St_John,_1st_Viscount_Grandison
https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Dictionary_of_National_Biography,_1885-1900/St._John,_Oliver_(1559-1630)
[His first son Oliver died 1641/2, so John St John's grandson (also called John St John (1637-1657) inherits title and land in 1648. In the meanwhile two more sons [Edward and William - i.e. three in all] have died in the Civil war. So Battersea etc then goes to his fourth [fifth?] son, Walter (1622-1708).). A man needed a lot of spare heirs in those days.] [William, his second son, was killed at the taking of Cirencester, in Gloucestershire, under Prince Rupert; Edward, the third [?] son, at the Battle of Newbury, in Berkshire; and John, the fifth [?] son, in the north]
Sir John St John (1585-1648) inherits - son of Oliver St John's older brother, also John.
"John St John was the only surviving son of Sir John St John (c.1552-1594), and succeeded to the estates of Lydiard Tregoze (with a residency at Lydiard Park) [2][3] in Wiltshire and Purley Park in Berkshire[4] upon his father's death. He matriculated at Trinity College, Oxford on 3 April 1601 and was admitted to Lincoln's Inn in 1604.[1] He was knighted at Whitehall, on 2 February 1608, and was created a Baronet at the first institution of that order, on 22 May 1611, being the seventeenth in precedency by creation. In the early 1630s he inherited from Lord Grandison, his uncle, his estates at Battersea and Wandsworth.[3] " [ SoL says it was his son that inherited from Oliver St John, though he exercised control.]
During the English Civil War, St John and his family supported the Royalist cause. Three of his sons were slain in the service of King Charles I: William, his second son, was killed at the taking of Cirencester, in Gloucestershire, under Prince Rupert; Edward, the third son, at the Battle of Newbury, in Berkshire; and John, the fifth son, in the north.[3]
Only two of his eight sons survived him, and it was his sixth son, Walter, who became his heir. Sir Walter went on to found the Sir Walter St John School at Battersea.[5]
https://gw.geneanet.org/lard?lang=en&n=st+john&oc=13&p=john
Battersea and Wandsworth manor is passed formally to his great-nephew John St John (b. 1615), but for all practical purposes to the latter's father and Grandison's nephew and executor, Sir John St John (1585-1648), who was created a baronet in 1611.
[This older Sir John St John (b.1585) dies 1648 - so his son (b.1615) must be Lord of the Manor until his death in ????????]
He [Sir John St John (1585-1648)] promptly commissioned the east window in the parish church, commemorating the St Johns' ancestry and asserting their newly bought rights over the parish.
[Lots of sons, but...] Most of Sir John St John's many sons predeceased him (three, including John, the legal owner of the manor, fighting for the Royalists in the Civil War).
His heir was Sir John St John (1636-56/7) his grandchild by his oldest son, Oliver. This short-lived 2nd baronet [he died "in the north" during the Civil War]seems to have had little to do with the Battersea property, which next descended to the 1st baronet's oldest surviving son [his sixth!],
Wikipedia: "He was the sixth son of Sir John St John, 1st Baronet of Lydiate Tregoze and inherited the baronetcy on the death of his nephew Sir John St John, 2nd Baronet (c. 1637-1657), the son and heir of Oliver, the son and heir apparent of Sir John, 1st Baronet. [1]" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sir_Walter_St_John,_3rd_Baronet
Around the time of their father's death Walter and his brother Henry (1628 - 79) married their cousins Johanna and Katherine St John, daughters of yet another and more famous Oliver St John, the leading Parliamentarian and Chief Justice during the Interregnum. Both couples appear to have been at first domiciled in Battersea, but Henry and his wife left for Ireland around 1664. [38]
[Notice how divided the seventeenth-century St Johns were in matters of politics.]
Walter is credited with
- the school, named after him "Sir Walter St John's School, endowed in 1700 towards the end of its patron's life but perhaps also inaugurated in the 1670s.
- draining land by attention to the Falcon Brook
- building almshouses
establishment of almshouses 'near the pound' by Sir Walter around 1675, and by the enduring memorial of Sir Walter St John's School, endowed in 1700 towards the end of its patron's life but perhaps also inaugurated in the 1670s. [40] [SoL]
there is testimony that Sir Walter looked after Battersea's difficult drainage, or at least the Falcon brook, at his own expense and 'kept it in brave order'. [41] The character and habits of Sir Walter and Lady Johanna come to life from her surviving letters, which show the couple shifting between Battersea and their Wiltshire estate at Lydiard Tregoze, with Sir Walter generally staying near London during parliamentary sessions so long as he sat as a Whig MP. [SoL]
With Sir Walter St John's death in 1708 ends all sense of a lord of the manor present and active in Battersea.
His eldest son, Sir Henry St John, 4th baronet (1652 - 1742), [from 1716 1st Viscount St John ], though even longer-lived than his father, possessed (in Taylor's words) 'an idle and purposeless temperament' and made no impact on the parish. [46]
[Sir Henry St John, 4th baronet (1652 - 1742)'s oldest surviving son and successor was of a different stamp.
[Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke (1678 - 1751)]
This was the celebrated Tory politician Henry St John, from 1712 first Viscount Bolingbroke .
Bolingbroke's mother died after he was born, so his early childhood was spent with his Battersea grandparents. He seldom visited there during his ascendancy under Queen Anne, probably because he did not get on with his father ('Old Frumps'), though he paid a visit when his grandfather died. [47]
[NB he was a Jacobite, and went to France to plot against Anne!]
Unofficially exiled to France following the Jacobite rising of 1715, he passed briefly through Battersea on his return in 1723, but when not in town lived at Dawley Farm, Uxbridge (1725 - 35).
After another spell in France, Bolingbroke came back at the age of 64 to claim his inheritance following his father's death. He found the manor house 'an old and decayed habitation', [48] but had it in good enough order to invite the 3rd Earl of Marchmont and his close friend Alexander Pope for extended stays from November 1743 till just before the poet's death some months later.
Pope reported the newly installed Bolingbroke as 'busy about inclosing a Common, & improving his Estate here, about Battersea & Norwood'. [49] These improvements were not sustained, probably because in time he and his French wife both became ill.
Frederick, 2nd Viscount Bolingbroke and 3rd Viscount St John (1734 - 87)
On the childless Bolingbroke's death [1751] the manor passed to his absentee nephew, Frederick, 2nd Viscount Bolingbroke and 3rd Viscount St John (1734 - 87).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_St_John,_2nd_Viscount_Bolingbroke
"That profligate and indebted rake married Lady Diana Spencer in 1757. [50] "
Who she?
It was during the decade of their marriage (which ended in a notorious divorce) that he sold the manor of Battersea and Wandsworth in 1763 to her cousin, Viscount Spencer.
[Which Spencer is this?]
http://www.thepeerage.com/p10614.htm
Frederick St. John, 2nd Viscount Bolingbroke 2
Frederick St. John, 2nd Viscount Bolingbroke was born on 21 December 1732.3,4
He was the son of John St. John, 2nd Viscount St. John and Anne Furnese.5 He was baptised on 17 January 1732/33 at St. George's Church, St. George Street, Hanover Square, London, EnglandG.3
He married Lady Diana Spencer, daughter of Lt.-Gen. Charles Spencer, 3rd Duke of Marlborough and Hon. Elizabeth Trevor, on 8 September 1757 at Harbledown, Kent, EnglandG.1
[Charles Spencer, 3rd Duke of Marlborough - http://www.thepeerage.com/p10509.htm#i105089]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Diana_Beauclerk
He and Lady Diana Spencer were divorced on 10 March 1768 by Act of Parliament, with the cause being her criminal conversation with Topham Beauclerk (whom she then married.)1
He died on 5 May 1787 at age 54.1 His will was proven (by probate) in June 1787.1
He was educated at Eton College, Windsor, Berkshire, EnglandG.1
He succeeded as the 3rd Baron St. John of Battersea, co. Surrey [G.B., 1716] on 19 June 1748.6
He succeeded as the 3rd Viscount St. John, of Battersea, co. Surrey [G.B., 1716] on 26 November 1748.6
He succeeded as the 2nd Viscount Bolingbroke, co. Lincoln [G.B., 1712] on 12 December 1751.1
He succeeded as the 6th Baronet St. John, of Lidiard Tregoze, co. Wilts [E., 1611] on 12 December 1751.7
He succeeded as the 2nd Baron St. John of Lydiard Tregoze, co. Wilts [G.B., 1712] on 12 December 1751.1
He held the office of Lord of the Bedchamber between 1762 and 1765.8 He and Nelly O'Brien were associated circa 1763.2
In 1763 he sold the estate of Battersea, Surrey to Viscount Spencer.8
He held the office of Lord of the Bedchamber between 1768 and 1780.8
Lord Chesterfield records that he was "by his talents no way unworthy to bear his uncle's name," and as having "true and solid good sense, real taste and knowing a great deal."8
According to Cokayne and Gibbs, "for the last six years of his life he was out of his mind."8
_____________
There is scant sense of direction about Battersea during most of this period. The manor house was let; Sir Walter St John's School stagnated; York House, the archbishops of York's seat further west was also given up for industry.
It cannot be accidental that the Vestry began to stir in this period, setting up a workhouse in 1733 under the new Poor Law Act, and meeting monthly from 1742.
But most of Battersea's land was as yet under manorial control. Estate business carried on desultorily. Under the first Viscount St John leases of no more than 31 years were assigned, usually by himself but
[15]
sometimes by his son, Lord Bolingbroke, suggesting that relations between them were not quite broken. [51]
After Bolingbroke inherited there was some effort at renewal, as hinted in Pope's letter quoted above. The idea of replacing Battersea ferry with a bridge was resurrected, and two roads had been laid out by 1746 with that purpose seemingly in view. [52] From about 1755 longer terms of up to 61 years were offered by the 2nd Lord Bolingbroke, perhaps because the City merchants now trickling into the upland areas insisted on more security for the houses they were just starting to build. Meanwhile industry began to accumulate along the Thames foreshore, with mills, malthouses and, notably, the short-lived Battersea enamel works at York House (1753 - 6). But the shaky finances of the St Johns seem to have prevented them from taking advantage of these fresh opportunities, so they decided to sell.
[To his wife Diana's cousin ? Spencer