After finding out that John Horne Tooke was buried in the churchyard of St Mary's Church, Ealing, we arranged a visit with their church administrator. We were kindly given a tour of the church and there is a description of its history on the St Mary's Church website. The church now is a fine example of 19th century English Gothic Revival architecture by Samuel Sanders Teulon.
"There has been a church building on this site for nearly a thousand years.....the medieval church was pulled down in the late 1720s and a plain and simple Georgian building erected, which forms the core of what still stands here today....the architect Samuel Sanders Teulon transformed the simple village church into a huge 'Byzantine shrine'...On May 30th 1866 the new building was consecrated."
"In the Gallery on the North side, there are two rose windows that were designed by Morris & Co and Edward Burne-Jones." Morris & Co was a famous design company, which used the services of the Pre-Raphaelite artists, including here, Edward Burne-Jones who was closely involved in the rejuvenation of the tradition of stain glass art in England."
The funeral was on the morning of Monday, March 30th, 1812 described on 449 of the book 'Memoirs of John Horne Tooke: interspersed with original documents, Volume 2' by Alexander Stephens (1813).
"John Horne Tooke wanted to be buried in a tomb he had erected in his garden without ceremony and without ostentation. He had had imported from Ireland a black, glossy, marble top for his tomb, with dimensions: 7 feet 1 inch by 3 feet 6 inches by 9 inches. It was placed on a tumulus, consisting of a brick vault covered with turf. Inscribed on it was:
John Horne Tooke,
late proprietor,
and now occupier of this spot,
was born in June 1736,
and died in [ ],
in the [ ] year of his age,
content and grateful.
At length, however, it was determined that the body should be interred in the tomb of his sister at Ealing, and orders were given for that purpose. Accordingly, on the morning of Monday, March 30, 1812, the company invited assembled at Wimbledon, and at eleven o'clock the corpse was brought out. It was contained in a leaden coffin, which was enclosed within a very large and deep oak chest, unornamented with cloth, paint, or any decoration whatever; and as it had been originally destined for the vault in the garden, there were not even handles to it; every thing in this particular being in exact compliance with desires of the deceased. Several mourning coaches, containing the friends and acquaintance of the deceased, accompanied the body, while the carriages of sir Francis Burdett, sir William Rash, Mr- Bosville, Mr. Knight, and Mr. Cuthbert, with four horses to each, followed empty.
The funeral service was read in a very amiable and impressive tone of voice, by the rev. Coulston Carr, after which the body of Mr. Tooke was interred along with that of his mother, in the usual manner, and with the customary ceremonies, every thing being in exact conformity to the practice of the church of England."
What we saw was a stone tomb in the churchyard on the south side of the church.
It had parts broken and on the top was a faded inscription,
which read,
John Horne TOOKE late of Wimbledon author of the Diversions of Purley was born June 1736 and died March 18th 1812 contented and grateful also of Mrs. Anne DICKER who died October 12th 1831 in the 90th year of her age.
Mrs Anne Dickers, whose name appears on top of the tomb is Tooke's youngest sister, she married a paint dealer and became a rich widow, 1740-1831, and was buried later in the same tomb.
On the side of the tomb was another inscription, which had names which included
Benjamin Horne, his eldest brother who was a successful market gardener in Brentford. John Horne Tooke once remarked about his brother Benjamin: "You, my dear brother, have inverted the laws of Nature; for you have risen by your gravity, while I have fallen by my levity."
Tooke's other brother was Thomas Horne, who succeeded his father in the Poultery business.
He also had three other sisters, besides Anne Dickers, all younger than himself. The eldest sister was Mary Horne who married Thomas Wildman, a wine merchant. He left all his estate to Mary. The next sister was Sarah Horne who married Dr Stephen Charles Triboudet Demainbray, an astronomer, who was tutor to the future king George III. The next sister was Elizabeth Horne who married Mr. Clarke, a haberdasher.
Tooke never married, but had one son by a woman whose surname was Montague, and two daughters by another woman called Hart. The eldest was his son Sidney Montague (1768- ). His two daughters Mary Hart ( -1855) and Charlotte Hart, lived with him in Wimbledon.
John Horne Tooke's father was John Horne, a poulterer and his mother was Elizabeth.
We were shown the very impressive bronze plaque dedicated to him and hung inside the church.
This was indeed a strong message supporting the struggle for American independence and self-government by The New England Society in the City of Brooklyn mentioned on their website on page 19 of their history section. The American Consul General Robert P. Skinner unveiled the memorial tablet given by the New England Society in the City of Brooklyn in John Horne Tooke's honour and paid for a refurbishment of his grave.
The reason for their gratitude was that although John Horne Tooke was an Englishman, following a clash between the colonists and British troops at the battles of Lexington and Concord in April 1775, the Constitutional Society, at John Horne Tooke's suggestion, raised a subscription for the Americans concerned. He was to convey the money to Benjamin Franklin, and the society's resolutions were drawn up by John Horne Tooke and published in the newspapers to announce that the subscription was for 'our beloved American fellow-subjects, who … preferring death to slavery, were … inhumanly murdered by the King's troops' (Bewley and Bewley, 60).
Far from being honoured at the time, John Horne Tooke found himself charged with libel for the advertisement he prepared, and on 4 July 1777 was tried before Lord Mansfield. He defended himself with characteristic forcefulness and audacity but was found guilty and sentenced to one year in prison, to pay a fine of £200, and to find sureties for three years of £400 from himself and £200 from two others. Horne was confined in the King's Bench prison.
As we walked away from the church we passed the old Ealing Film Studios and thought this story would make a fabulous film!
References
C. Bewley and D. Bewley, Gentleman radical: a life of John Horne Tooke, 1736–1812 (1998)
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