On the day after the head of the house of Russell was raised to ducal
rank, the head of the Cavendishes received the same honor, being created
Marquis of Hartington and Duke of Devonshire. This family claims descent
from Sir John Cavendish, Lord Chief Justice of England in 1366, 1373,
and 1377. "In the fourth year of Richard II. his lordship was elected
chancellor of the university of Cambridge, and was next year
commissioned, with Robert de Hales, treasurer of England, to suppress
the insurrection raised in the city of York, in which year the mob,
having risen to the number of fifty thousand, made it a point,
particularly in the county of Suffolk, to plunder and murder the
lawyers; and being incensed in a more than ordinary degree against the
Chief Justice Cavendish, his son John having killed the notorious Wat
Tyler, they seized upon and dragged him, with Sir John of Cambridge,
prior of Bury, into the marketplace of that town, and there caused both
to be beheaded." Thus far Burke, who has small sympathy to bestow on Wat
Tyler, albeit that reformer was murdered in a cowardly way, whether it
were Walworth or Cavendish who struck the blow. "For William Walworth,
mayor of London, having arrested him (Wat Tyler), he furiously struck
the mayor with his dagger, but being armed [_i.e._ the mayor being in
armor], hurt him not; whereupon the mayor, drawing his baselard,
grievously wounded Wat in the neck; in which conflict an esquire of the
King's house, called John Cavendish, drew his sword and wounded him
twice or thrice, even unto death. For which service Cavendish was
knighted in Smithfield, and had a grant of £40 per annum from the King."
The great-great-grandson of this Sir John Cavendish was gentleman usher
to Cardinal Wolsey; after the death of his master King Henry took him
into his own employment, to reward him for the fidelity with which he
had served his former patron. His elder brother William was in 1530
appointed one of the commissioners for visiting and taking the
surrenders of divers religious houses. Needless to add that from that
day Mr. Cavendish had but to do as the King told him and make his
fortune. Before his death he had begun to build the noble seat of
Chatsworth, in Derbyshire, which his descendants still possess. His
second son, and eventual heir, was created Earl of Devonshire by King
James I. in 1618. The first earl's nephew was the renowned cavalier
general created Marquis and subsequently Duke of Newcastle. He was at
one time governor of the Prince of Wales (afterward Charles II.), and
there is a touching epistle extant in which his youthful charge entreats
the Marquis that he may not be compelled to take physic, which he feels
sure would do him no good.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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