Everything about George Downing totally explained
Sir George Downing, 1st Baronet (1623 – July 1684) was an Anglo-Irish soldier and diplomat, son of
Emmanuel Downing,
barrister, and of Lucy, sister of
Massachusetts Bay Governor
John Winthrop. He was born in
Dublin,
Ireland.
Downing Street, London, is named after him, while
Downing College, Cambridge derived its name from his grandson,
Sir George Downing, 3rd Baronet. The title became extinct when
Sir Jacob Downing, 4th Baronet, died in 1764.
His family joined Winthrop in America in 1638, settling in
Salem, Massachusetts, and Downing studied at
Harvard College. In 1645 he sailed for the
West Indies as a preacher and instructor of the seamen, and arrived in England some time afterwards, becoming chaplain to Colonel
John Okey's regiment (who had originally sponsored Downing's education in America).
Subsequently he seems to have abandoned his religious vocation for a military career, and in 1650 he was scout-master-general of
Cromwell's forces in
Scotland, and, and as such received in 1657 a salary of £365 and £500 as a
Teller of the Exchequer.
His marriage in 1654 with Frances, daughter of Sir William Howard of Naworth, and sister of
Charles Howard, 1st Earl of Carlisle, aided his advancement. In Cromwell's parliament of 1654 he represented
Edinburgh, and
Carlisle in those of 1656 and 1659. He was one of the first to urge Cromwell to take the royal title and restore the old constitution. In 1655 he was sent to
France to remonstrate on the massacre of the Protestant
Vaudois. Later in 1657 he was appointed resident at
The Hague, to effect a union of the Protestant European powers, to mediate between
Portugal and the
Dutch Republic and between
Sweden and
Denmark, to defend the interests of the English traders against the
Dutch, and to inform the government concerning the movements of the exiled royalists.
He showed himself in these negotiations an able diplomat. He was maintained in his post during the interregnum subsequent to the fall of
Richard Cromwell, and was thus enabled in April 1660 to make his peace with
Charles II, to whom he communicated
Thurloe's despatches, and declared his abandonment of "principles sucked in" in New England of which he now "saw the error". At the
Restoration, therefore, Downing was knighted (May 1660), was continued in his embassy in Holland, was confirmed in his tellership of the exchequer, and was further rewarded with a valuable piece of land adjoining
St. James's Park for building purposes, now known as
Downing Street.
He engineered the arrest in Holland of the
regicides John Barkstead,
Miles Corbet and
John Okey.
Samuel Pepys, who characterized his conduct as odious though useful to the king, calls him a "perfidious rogue" and remarks that "all the world took notice of him for a most ungrateful villain for his pains."
On
1 July 1663 he was created a
baronet.
Downing had from the first been hostile to the Dutch as the commercial rivals of England. He had strongly supported the
Navigation Act of 1660, and he now deliberately drew on the fatal and disastrous
Second Anglo-Dutch War, in the first year of which, 1665, he was expelled by the Dutch because of his intrigues and spying activities. During its continuance he took part at home in the management of the
treasury, introduced the appropriation of supplies, opposed strongly by
Clarendon as an encroachment on the prerogative, and in May 1667 was made secretary to the commissioners, his appointment being much welcomed by Pepys.
He had been returned for
Morpeth in the
Convention Parliament of
April 1660, a constituency that he represented in every ensuing parliament till his death, and he spoke with ability on financial and commercial questions. He was appointed a commissioner of the customs in
1671. The same year he was again sent to Holland to replace
Sir William Temple, to break up the policy of the
Triple Alliance and incite
another war between the Dutch Republic and England in furtherance of the French policy. His unpopularity there was extreme, and after three months' residence Downing fled to England, in fear of the fury of the mob. For this unauthorized step he was sent to the
Tower on
7 February 1672, but released some few weeks afterwards. He defended the
Declaration of Indulgence the same year, and made himself useful in supporting the court policy.
He died in
July 1684 in
Cambridgeshire.
Downing was undoubtedly a man of great political and diplomatic ability, but his talents were rarely employed for the advantage of his country and his character was marked by all the mean vices, treachery, avarice, servility and ingratitude. "A George Downing" became a proverbial expression in
New England to denote a false man who betrayed his trust.
He published a large number of declarations and discourses, mostly in Dutch, enumerated in Sibley's biography, and wrote also "A True Relation of the Progress of the Parliament's Forces in Scotland" (1651), Thomason Tracts, Brit. Mus., E 640 (5).
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