Francis Blake Delaval (1727–1771)

Last updated April 02, 2019

Sir Francis Blake Delaval KB (16 March 1727 – 7 August 1771) was a British actor, soldier and Member of Parliament. He had a privileged and aristocratic education at Westminster School, Eton College and then Christ Church at Oxford University.^[1]

The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate medieval ceremony for appointing a knight, which involved bathing as one of its elements. The knights so created were known as "Knights of the Bath". George I "erected the Knights of the Bath into a regular Military Order". He did not revive the Order of the Bath, since it had never previously existed as an Order, in the sense of a body of knights who were governed by a set of statutes and whose numbers were replenished when vacancies occurred.

Westminster School is an independent day and boarding school in London, England, located within the precincts of Westminster Abbey. With origins before the 12th century, the educational tradition of Westminster probably dates back as far as 960, in line with the Abbey's history. Boys are admitted to the Under School at age seven and to the senior school at age thirteen; girls are admitted at age sixteen into the Sixth Form. The school has around 750 pupils; around a quarter are boarders, most of whom go home at weekends, after Saturday morning school. The school motto, Dat Deus Incrementum, is taken from the New Testament, specifically 1 Corinthians 3:6.

Eton College British independent boarding school located in Eton

Eton College is an English 13–18 independent boarding school and sixth form for boys in the parish of Eton, near Windsor in Berkshire. It was founded in 1440 by King Henry VI as The King's College of Our Lady of Eton besides Wyndsor, as a sister institution to King's College, Cambridge, making it the 18th-oldest Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference school.

Life

Delaval was the eldest son of Captain Francis Blake Delaval RN of Seaton Delaval Hall, and he succeeded to his father's estate in 1752. He added to it by building the folly known as Starlight Castle, overlooking Holywell Dene which leads to Seaton Sluice. It was allegedly built in a single day to win a wager. Little survives of it now apart from a single stone arch.

Seaton Delaval Hall is a Grade I listed country house in Northumberland, England. It is near the coast just north of Newcastle upon Tyne. Located between Seaton Sluice and Seaton Delaval, it was designed by Sir John Vanbrugh in 1718 for Admiral George Delaval; it is now owned by the National Trust.

In architecture, a folly is a building constructed primarily for decoration, but suggesting through its appearance some other purpose, or of such extravagant appearance that it transcends the range of garden ornaments usually associated with the class of buildings to which it belongs.

Delaval fell in love with a singer and actor named Ann Catley in about 1760. She had been apprenticed William Bates, who was a composer and singing teacher. Bates sold Ann's apprenticeship to Delaval. Bates was given money by Delaval to make up for any financial loss to him, but Catley's father could see that Ann had been sold. Aided by his employer, her father sued Delaval and Bates but to no benefit. Eventually the relationship with Delaval ended and Catley continued her career.^[2]

Ann Catley (1745–1789), also known as Ann Lascelles, was an English singer and actress.

Francis was an actor in a group of Samuel Foote. He was a gambler but could not afford that lifestyle. He married the wealthy (and much older) Isabella, daughter of Thomas Tufton, 6th Earl of Thanet and widow of Lord Nassau Powlett, but it was not a happy marriage. His wife filed a lawsuit against him because of adultery with an actress, Miss La Roche, for which Isabella unknowingly forked out ₤1500.

Samuel Foote was a British dramatist, actor and theatre manager from Cornwall. He was known for his comedic acting and writing, and for turning the loss of a leg in a riding accident in 1766 to comedic opportunity.

Thomas Tufton, 6th Earl of Thanet, 18th Baron de Clifford PC was an English nobleman and politician.

Lord Nassau Powlett was an English army officer and politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1720 to 1734 and in 1741.

His military career was of short duration. He took part in the Raid on St Malo, and received a knighthood for his bravery when storming the Brittany beach, although there were no French troops present to offer resistance.

The Raid on St Malo took place in June 1758 when an amphibious British naval expedition landed close to the French port of St Malo in Brittany. While the town itself was not attacked, as had been initially planned, the British destroyed large amounts of shipping before re-embarking a week later. The naval forces were under the command of Richard Howe while the army was led by the Duke of Marlborough and Lord Sackville.

Brittany is a cultural region in the northwest of France, covering the western part of what was known as Armorica during the period of Roman occupation. It became an independent kingdom and then a duchy before being united with the Kingdom of France in 1532 as a province governed as if it were a separate nation under the crown.

He represented Hindon in Wiltshire in Parliament from 1751 to 1754, and Andover in Hampshire from 1754 to 1768.

Hindon was a parliamentary borough consisting of the village of Hindon in Wiltshire, which elected two Members of Parliament (MPs) to the House of Commons from 1448 until 1832, when the borough was abolished by the Great Reform Act. It was one of the most notoriously corrupt of the rotten boroughs, and bills to disfranchise Hindon were debated in Parliament on two occasions before its eventual abolition.

Andover was the name of a constituency of the House of Commons of the Parliament of England from 1295 to 1307, and again from 1586, then of the Parliament of Great Britain from 1707 to 1800 and of the Parliament of the United Kingdom from 1801 to 1918. It was a parliamentary borough in Hampshire, represented by two Members of Parliament until 1868, and by one member from 1868 to 1885. The name was then transferred to a county constituency electing one MP from 1885 until 1918.

His London townhouse was 11 Downing Street,^[3] now the official home of the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

He suffered a stroke, and was memorialized by his obituarist as "'the very soul of frolic and amusement (who) overbalanced a few foibles by a thousand amiable qualities". He left four illegitimate children but no legitimate ones and was succeeded by his younger brother John Hussey Delaval, later Baron Delaval.

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Delaval is the surname of a family of gentry/aristocracy in Northumberland, England, from the 11th century to the 19th century. Their main estate was the manor of Seaton Delaval. The 18th century Delavals are noteworthy for their colourful lifestyle, for the magnificent Seaton Delaval Hall and for the development of the little seaport of Seaton Sluice and a coal mine at Old Hartley.

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References

Footnotes

↑ Roger Burgess, Those Delavals! (1972), p.9
↑ Baldwin, Olive; Thelma Wilson (2004). "Catley, Ann (1745–1789)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 23 June 2018. Available in print, and online for subscribers
↑ Survey of London online

Sources

Parliament of Great Britain
Preceded by Valens Comyn Bisse Richards	Member of Parliament for Hindon 1751–1754 With: Bisse Richards	Succeeded by Bisse Richards James Dawkins
Preceded by John Pollen Sir John Griffin	Member of Parliament for Andover 1754–1768 With: Sir John Griffin	Succeeded by Sir John Griffin Benjamin Lethieullier

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[1] Roger Burgess, Those Delavals! (1972), p.9

[odnb-2] Baldwin, Olive; Thelma Wilson (2004). "Catley, Ann (1745–1789)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 23 June 2018. Available in print, and online for subscribers

[3] Survey of London online