John Cutts, 1st Baron Cutts

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John Cutts, Baron Cutts

John Cutts, 1st Baron Cutts (* 1661 in Arkesden, Essex , † January 25, 1707 in Dublin ) was an English lieutenant general and politician.

Life

origin

He was born around 1661 as the second son of the country nobleman Richard Cutte (also Cuttes) and his wife Joan Everard, a daughter of Sir Richard Everard, 1st Baronet (of Much Waltham in the County of Essex). His father was a squire of Woodhall and Arkesden in Essex and inherited his lands in Cambridgeshire on the death of his distant relative, Sir John Cutts, 1st Baronet (of Childerley in the County of Cambridge) in 1670.

In February 1676 he began his studies at Catharine Hall College of the University of Cambridge .

Early career

He went to London around 1680, where he met some of the leaders of the Whigs . He became a follower of the Duke of Monmouth and, in 1682, was part of the retinue that supported Monmouth's advances north. In 1684 he followed the Duke into exile in Holland, but did not take part in Monmouth's later rebellion. During this time he tried his hand at writing and published his first work La Muse de Cavalier in 1685 under a pseudonym . At the end of 1685, at the request of William of Orange, he volunteered for the imperial army under Duke Charles of Lorraine in Hungary . He proved himself in the storm of Buda in July 1686 and was appointed adjutant general to the Duke of Lorraine. In early 1687 he published a second poem, the Poetical Exercises , which he dedicated to Princess Maria von Orange. In autumn 1687 he left the imperial army and returned to England from a campaign in Transylvania , where he was denied a command. He followed the call of Orange in 1688 and received as a lieutenant colonel a regiment that was formed in Holland by Colonel Sidney, and then had the Earl of Romney as its owner. In January 1690 he was ordered to increase the regiment to one hundred men per company and to embark for Ireland in March.

When his older brother Richard died unmarried, he inherited the family estates in Essex and Cambridgeshire, but showed more preference for life at court and with the army. Cutts had spent £ 8,000 of his own money supporting the Prince's cause. With the revolution he hoped to improve his future position in England. Cutts had amassed £ 15,000 in debt by then and was in financial trouble for the rest of his life through these transactions, forcing him to sell a large portion of his property. He became colonel of a foot regiment, fought under Orange in the Battle of the Boyne and took part in the siege of Limerick , where he was wounded. After Limerick's surrender, he was appointed city commander.

Landlord in Ireland

His services were from King Wilhelm III. rewarded on December 6, 1690, who enfeoffed him with Gowran in County Kilkenny , Ireland and bestowed on him the Irish hereditary title of Baron Cutts , of Gowran. On December 18, 1690, Cutts married the young widow of the merchant Trevor, a daughter of George Clark, who had already been married twice. Cutts served in Flanders from July 1691 under the command of General Hugh Mackay , he led the brigade of the Prince of Hesse-Darmstadt , who was sidelined at Aughrim because of his wounds . General Mackay describes Cutts at this time as quite tall and well-formed, as a pleasant companion with a sense of humor, but also predisposed to being too vanity and arrogant. His brigade was among those who were crushed by the French in the Battle of Steenkerke (August 3, 1692). Mackay had fallen, Cutts himself was wounded.

His financial situation worsened with the death of his first wife because her family stopped their money flows. On March 22, 1693 he was promoted to brigadier general and appointed governor of the Isle of Wight , but did not receive the local vice admiralty, which was previously associated with the latter appointment. Whose proceeds went to Charles Poulet, Marquess of Winchester , son and heir to the Duke of Bolton . Since the acting Vice Admiral was entitled to a share of the fishing on the coast there, the Cutts, who had been cheated of the income, was understandably disappointed. The dispute explains why Poulet opposed the influence of the nobility in the dispute with Cutts when running for the parliamentary elections in three island districts. Cutts tried to convert these constituencies back into safe government seats in parliament. In late 1693 Cutts won a narrow victory in a by-election of the Knight of the Shire in his county of Cambridgeshire and thereby became a member of the English House of Commons . After he was ranked first on the list, on February 25, 1694, Cutts favored a stricter trial by the court under the new law on high treason trials. He accused several representatives of the opposition to act as agents of France, and also to prepare the return of King James II . In the summer campaign of 1894 he took part in the expedition against Brest , which was a military failure , he was wounded again in the daring battle of Camaret . General Thomas Tollemache , the commander of the failed expedition, who soon succumbed to the wounds he received, previously complained that Cutts had grossly disregarded his orders. Even his death did not prevent Cutts from taking Tollemache's position as Colonel of the Coldstream Guards on October 3, 1694 . Cutts was given leave of absence as a Member of Parliament on December 21, 1694 and had to develop other financial sources of income. In May 1695 he obtained an estate for himself from the king in Barbados , the owner of which had recently died without a will and without an heir. That same month, Cutts began another argument with Lord Winchester over the appointment of a governor for Hurst Castle on the Isle of Wight, which was ultimately decided in favor of Cutts' candidate.

Military commandos in Holland

In the 1695 campaign, Cutts distinguished himself at the siege of Namur , where his determination and camouflage movements in trench warfare earned him the nickname "the salamander". In the following election campaigns on the Isle of Wight, which began in November 1695, he was less successful. He had hoped to get all six electoral officers on his side, but in this case he had only succeeded in Newport , where he had gone himself to support his candidate, Sir Robert Cotton. In 1696 Cutts was appointed head of the bodyguard, and in January 1697 he married his second wife, Elizabeth, the only daughter of Sir Henry Pickering, Baron of Whaddon, Cambridgeshire. In September 1697, Cutts was sent to Vienna on a secret mission to negotiate the terms of the Treaty of Ryswick with the emperor . A few weeks he lost his wife, who was only 18 years old, who died on November 23, 1697 after giving birth to a dead child. The peace that followed gave Cutts the opportunity to focus more on the affairs of his island, where his conflict with the local nobility was still simmering. He was working on a plan to install additional, unpaid governors in Sandham , Yarmouth and Cowes who, with the authority of a lieutenant colonel, would be able to counterbalance the landlords there. A false rumor of these intentions led the island's ruling nobility to petition Cutts, forcing them to settle another settlement in March 1698. Although peace with the local nobility on the Isle of Wight seemed secured, he was increasingly disillusioned by their unauthorized administration.

In an effort to pay off his debts, he had sold his property in Carlyl for £ 8,000 in November 1697. He was dissatisfied that his attempts to secure the governorship of Massachusetts to his governor Joseph Dudley had so far been unsuccessful with the king. Finally, in March 1698, Cutts sought a loan of £ 3,000 or a fiefdom in Ireland from the king. In August 1698 he irritated the ministers, especially the Earl of Orford, by installing his brother-in-law, Acton, in a by-election for the constituency of Newport and getting him a place in the lower chamber. In view of his own military career, he spoke out several times against the draft law to dissolve the army on the continent and on January 18, 1699 voted vehemently against these plans. It also appears that Cutts had not yet given up his argument with Lord Winchester on the Isle of Wight. On May 16, 1699 he wrote hopefully to Dudley that he had explained his problems to the king and that he would soon have the vice admiralty. Although he did not achieve the vice-admiralty, the king granted him a settlement of 1000 pounds sterling from the secret fund.

Under Queen Anna

He did not take part in the parliamentary sessions of December 1701 because he accompanied the Earl of Marlborough to Holland with the rank of major general . On February 18, 1702, a violent resistance between the Whigs and Tories broke out over a bill against corporation for the purchase of derelict goods in Ireland. Cutts only communicated his decisions regarding his county through a letter to the Speaker of the House of Commons, instead of appearing in person, according to his own report, Cutts was still working with the Tory Department. Cutts was hoping for a reward from the Ministry for his assistance, but Queen Anne's inauguration thwarted his plans. He was now only offered the governorship of Jamaica , which he declined. His pension was discontinued and the arrears due were no longer paid. When he also moved his safer seat from Newport in the Cambridgeshire general election of 1702, he was absent during the early years of government. His petition for further promotion or financial relief was not heard by the new government. Although the Lord Treasurer had instructed Sidney Godolphin to "exercise caution," Cutt's complaint only sparked a response that confirmed the new arrangement. He hoped at least to be rewarded by the government after he had taken Fort St. Michael near Venlo (September 18, 1702). In February 1703 he was raised to lieutenant general and he continued to ask for financial help. Despite further assurances from Godolphin and the Secretary of State, Sir Charles Hedges, he received nothing. After the campaign of 1703, Cutts stayed abroad for the third consecutive winter, writing his usual complaints and begging letters. In April 1704 he was awarded a royal prize of £ 1,000 for his military successes.

Last campaign and death

After a long stay in England, he returned to the army of the Duke of Marlborough in the spring of 1704 and accompanied him on the campaign on the Danube . In the battle of Höchstädt , his division bore the brunt of the desperate battle for the village of Blenheim. He returned to England in early November and spent the rest of the time in Ireland. In March 1705 he was appointed General of All Forces in Ireland, a position which earned him £ 6,000 a year. The incumbent ministers found it more convenient to help Cutts in this way than to provide him with large sums of money that would at least provide him with short-term security. Cutts died surprisingly on January 25, 1707 in Dublin, still heavily in debt. His hopes of saving his fortune through Dorothy Pickering, an elderly relative who had inherited a substantial portion of the Cutts estate several years earlier, remained unfulfilled. His two aides had to advance the premium of his embalming, which was deposited in a vault at St. Patrick's, until it was known whether his friends would transfer the body to England to be buried in Christ Church Cathedral.

literature

predecessor Office successor
New title created Baron Cutts
1690-1707
Title expired
Thomas great work Governor of the Isle of Wight
1694–1707
Charles Paulet