James Brydges, 1st Duke of Chandos

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James Brydges, 1st Duke of Chandos (1673 - 9 August 1744) had been member of parliament for Hereford from 1698 to 1714, and, three days after his father's death, was created Viscount Wilton and earl of Carnarvon.

During the War of the Spanish Succession, he was paymaster-general of the forces abroad, and in this capacity he amassed great wealth. In 1719 he was created marquess of Carnarvon and duke of Chandos.

The duke is chiefly remembered on account of his connection with Georg Frideric Handel for whom he acted as a major patron, and with Alexander Pope, seen as having slandered Chandos in one of his poems. He built a magnificent house "at vast expense"^[1] at Canons (or Cannons), an older house near Edgware in Middlesex. There Brydges ran through several architects prominent in the English Baroque. He began in 1713 with William Talman, whom he dismissed in favour of John James, 1714, who had partly executed his designs before James Gibbs succeeded him in 1715. Howard Colvin (ref) concludes that the south and east elevations, and the chapel were the designs of Gibbs. Brydges dismissed Gibbs in 1719, and completed the house under the supervision of John Price ^[2] and, 1723-25, Edward Shepherd. Canons was demolished in 1747. On its site, now incorporated in Greater London, is Canons Park.

Brydges is said to have contemplated the construction of a private road across his own lands between this place and his never completed house in Cavendish Square, London, probably also designed by Gibbs^[3]. For over two years, 1717-18, Handel, employed by Chandos, lived at Cannons, where he composed his oratorio Esther and his pastoral Acis and Galatea . Pope, who in his Moral Essays (Epistle to the Earl of Burlington) doubtless described Canons under the guise of Timon's Villa, referred to the duke in the line, "Thus gracious Chandos is belov'd at sight"; but Jonathan Swift, less complimentary, called him a great complier with every court. The poet was caricatured by Hogarth for his supposed servility to the duke.

Chandos, who was lord lieutenant of the counties of Hereford and Radnor, and Chancellor of the University of St Andrews (where he established the Chandos Chair in Medicine in 1721. He also became involved in the efforts to create a home for foundlings in London that would alleviate the problem of child abandonment in the capital. The charity, called the Foundling Hospital, received its royal charter in 1739, on which the Duke is listed as a governor^[4].

He was succeeded by his son Henry Brydges, 2nd Duke of Chandos, who found the estate so encumbered by debt that a demolition sale of Cannons was held in 1747, which dispersed furnishings and structural elements, with the result that elements of Cannons survive in several English country houses, notably Lord Foley's house at Great Witley, and its chapel (completed 1735: ceiling paintings by Bellucci and stained glass after designs by Francesco Sleter). The pulpit and other fittings from Chandos' chapel were reinstalled in the parish church at Fawley, Buckinghamshire, by John Freeman of Fawley Court.

[edit] Notes

1. ^ Colvin, p. 403, quoting Soane MSS)
2. ^ Price published elevations of the house with his own name as architect, "Built Anno 1720" (Colvin, sub. Price)
3. ^ Two houses built by Chandos' surveyor Edward Shepherd, eventually occupied the site (Colvin).
4. ^ Nichols and Wray, on pp. 345-353, list all governors named in the charter.

[edit] References

• This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
• Howard Colvin, 1995 (3rd ed.). A Biographical Dictionary of British Architects, 1600-1840 (Yale University Press)
• R.H. Nichols and F.A. Wray, The History of the Foundling Hospital (London: Oxford University Press, 1935)

[edit] Further reading

• Joan Johnson, 1989. Princely Chandos: James Brydges 1674-1744
• C.H. and M.I. Collins Baker, 1949. The Life and Circumstances of James Brydges,: First Duke of Chandos, Patron of the Liberal Arts (Oxford University: Clarendon Press). Still the standard work on Chandos and Cannons
• (Henry St. John, Lord Bolingbroke) 1935. Letters of Henry St. John to James Brydges (Harvard University Press)
• John Robert Robinson , The princely Chandos, a memoir of James Brydges, paymaster-general to the forces abroad during the most brilliant part of the Duke of Marlborough's military ... afterwards the first Duke of Chandos