Monday, March 10, 2014

Creeping towards Completion of the Continuing Collation of Caroline's Courtiers

In some ways I got a bit ahead of myself with my post two weeks ago. I had hoped to post several updates over the last two weeks, but unfortunately I underestimated the drain midterms would make on my research time, and so didn't get nearly as much as I might have liked done over that week. Fortunately, however, I did get a good amount of research done over Spring Break, and look forward to biting off some more big chunks of the project in the coming weeks now that I'm not weighed down with three different papers every night.
Today's post is going to be a brief update on what I got done over break, and a preview of what I plan on taking care of this week. I've just about finished going through the lists for the court of Princess/Queen Caroline and collating the information in the Establishment Books with the information in Sir John's lists. I've found the Establishment Books to be rather more comprehensive in terms of sheer numbers of names, which Prof. Bucholz told me was likely to be the case, while Sir John tends to have more information on the terms of the officeholders. I suppose it's fairly unsurprising that the Establishment Books are more complete, though, since they are essentially financial records...when in doubt, follow the money!
This week I'll be moving on to Prince/King George II and his court, doing the same thing I've been doing for Caroline, but in this case relying exclusively on the Establishment books. Hopefully, my next step will be to procure .pdf scans of Magna Britannia Notitiae, a series of contemporary lists of court officials compiled by John Chamberlayne.
I look forward to adding a few additional posts this later this week as my research continues to progress!
Interesting Historical Tidbit/Courtier of the Week!
I think this week I'll forgo an interesting tidbit, and instead provide some information about a selected courtier (or, in this case, pair of courtiers) I came across in my research this week: Thomas Fermor, the Earl of Pomfret, and his wife Henrietta. Henrietta Louisa Fermor (1698-1761) served Princess Caroline as a Lady of the Bed Chamber and continued in the same post after Caroline's Coronation, while Thomas (1698-1753) served as Master of the Horse after Caroline's coronation. Although Thomas was born a Lord, he was elevated to Earl of Pomfret, a town in Yorkshire today known as Pontefract, in 1721. Here's a picture of the First Earl of Pomfret:
"My Title is Earl"

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