Part 5

Even Mr. Froude, who vastly dislikes himself and his sons, is constrained to call him the "able and brilliant Hely Hutchinson," and to tell of his "meridian splendour." He quotes Lord Lieutenant Townshend's statement that he was "the most popular man in parliament to conduct a debate."

The famous Colonel Isaac Barre, who, as he got Scholarship in 1744, was a college class-fellow of Hutchinson, gives the following description of him in 1768:--"When the Army Augmentation Bill was introduced by Tom Connoly, it was opposed by Sexten Pery on constitutional grounds, and by the Attorney General (Tisdall) on grounds that left him free to support the Bill afterwards if it were his interest to do so.

"The Prime Serjeant (Hutchinson)" says Barre "was not so prudent (as Tisdall), and opposed it in a long, languid speech, full of false calculations; among the rest this curious one, that adding L40,000 per annum to the national expense was, in fact, adding a million to its debt, and that the nation, in the next session, would be L1,800,000 in debt. If all this is true, how will he have the impudence to support this measure hereafter? But, indeed, he has contradicted himself three or four times in the course of this session upon this subject. He talks now of being dismissed. His profit by his employment is trifling, not above three or four hundred a year.

"He is personally disliked, a mean gambler--not one great point in him--and exceedingly unpopular in this country. I must tell you a short anecdote which put him very much out of temper. The day after the first division he came to Council in a hackney chair, which happened, unluckily, to be No. 108 (the number of the majority). A young officer at the Castle wrote under the number of the chair, "COURT" in large characters, and at the top a coronet was drawn.

"He denied positively in the beginning of his speech, any bargain or terms proposed by him at the Castle, but was not believed.... As far as I am able to judge," continues Barre, "this country is manageable easily enough. The prevailing faction exists only by your want of system in England. They have no abilities, and their present and only friend, Hutchinson (for Tisdall is quite broken), cannot be depended on for a moment."

In the last volume (vol. viii.) of the "Historical Manuscripts Report" we find some very interesting mentions of Hutchinson in the letters that passed between "Single Speech" Hamilton and Edmund Sexten Pery. Both of these eminent men entertained a high opinion of, and a sincere personal regard for, the Provost. In 1771, Hamilton, who was Chancellor of the Irish Exchequer, and had been Chief Secretary to two Lord Lieutenants (Lords Halifax and Northumberland) wrote to Pery, the Speaker of the House:--"As long as you and Andrews and Hutchinson are in being and business, Ireland will never want attractions sufficient to make me prefer it to a situation of 'more splendour and greater influence.'"

Two years later, Hamilton wrote to Pery about the collapse of the negotiations for his resigning the Exchequer Chancellorship in Hutchinson's favour, and begged that Hutchinson would not again require him to sacrifice his own solid and substantial interests. Another letter, dated 1779, says that Flood was eagerly canvassing for the post, and that Hutchinson was discontented. The Chancellorship was not given to either of the rivals--it was given to Foster, who was afterwards Speaker; and Hutchinson accordingly failed to score a second triumph over "the generous-minded, ornamental, sonorous-voiced Henry Flood, who was eclipsing his meridian splendour."

In 1777 the Corporation of Dublin petitioned the Provost and Board for a free education for the son of the deceased patriot, Dr. Lucas. The College authorities responded in a literal spirit, and generously granted to the lad not only a remission of fees, but free rooms and free commons as well.

In 1779, were published the "Commercial Restraints," which in its original shape was, a contribution to Lord Lieutenant Buckinghamshire as to the best method of extricating the country from its discontent and troubles. Froude says (vol. ii., p. 223), that it was the most important of all the opinions gathered by the Viceroy, and that it earned Hutchinson's pardon from Irish patriotism for his subserviency to the Court and Lord Townshend. The work is an extremely able review of the whole history and condition of our native Irish trade and industries, and it is as loyal in its nationality as it is able. It is the only specimen we have to show us the Provost as a writer and as an economist, and it certainly secures him a high place in these two estimates.

In this aspect the work possesses a great biographical value, inasmuch as it serves to complete the likeness of the Provost, and the complement which it supplies falls in line with the best features of the original. Although his sentences are often slovenly and sometimes ungrammatical, he could write forcibly and clearly, as well as speak persuasively and rhetorically; he could make facts and figures deliver their lesson; he could summon up the ghost of the past to illustrate and enforce the duties of the present; he could enwrap a message of peace in a mantle of warning; and when no selfish interest intervened he could fling his sword into the scale that was freighted with his country's welfare.

During Hutchinson's Provostship His Excellency the Lord Lieutenant, Lord Buckinghamshire, went in state to the University, and was received at the entrance of the Old Hall by the Provost and Fellows. At his entrance, Dr. Kearney made an eloquent oration; at the printing office, where H. E. was entertained with a view of the artists, another oration was delivered by Mr. Hutchinson, youngest (?) son of the Provost; at the Anatomy and Philosophical Rooms addresses were delivered by the Hon. Dr. Decourcy, son of Lord Kinsale, and the Hon. Mr. Jones, son of Lord Ranelagh. Thence he went to the Library, where an excellent oration was made by Dr. Leland, the Librarian, Orator, and Professor. H. E. afterwards dined in the New Hall with the Provost and Fellows, and numbers of the nobility and gentry. The elegance of the entertainment cannot be described, and is imagined to stand the College in no less than L700.

In 1791 a Visitation by Lord Chancellor Lord Clare as Vice-Chancellor, and Dr. Fowler, Archbishop of Dublin, was held in the New Theatre, at the instance of the Provost, in reference to the complaint of Mr. Allen of having been unjustly kept out of Fellowship in 1790. The Visitors ruled that the question was not open to discussion, in consequence of the length of time which had elapsed. The Provost then brought forward his claim to the negative power over the proceedings of the Board, and was replied to by Drs. Kearney and Brown. The Provost argued from the Statutes and especially from the Una cum Praeposito clauses, and spoke for three hours and a half with great ability. Mr. Miller spoke on behalf of the Junior Fellows, touching their right to retain the emoluments of their pupils when they went out on livings. Miller was rebuked by the Chancellor for accusing the Provost of wanting to turn the disposal of pupils into a matter of patronage. The Rev. Mr. Burrowes and Mr. Magee spoke on the same side. Magee was personal, and on the Provost's protest the Chancellor stopped him. The Visitors declined to decide whether the Provost has an arbitrary election negative at the election of Fellows and Scholars; they ruled that the Provost has the power of disposing of pupils; and that he is bound by the majority of the Board. The Lord Chancellor bewailed the internal dissensions, alluded to his "own education in the College, and declared that there was not another University in Europe better calculated for the great purposes of promoting virtue and learning." The Visitation lasted three days.

In 1792, Hutchinson saw the Gardiner-Hobart Catholic Relief Bill carried, and three days after, the 26th of February, he saw the House of Parliament burned. On the 1st of March following Sir John Blacquiere repaid the University for its honorary degree by moving the thanks of the house to the College students for their spirited exertions in extinguishing the fire; and by suggesting that in acknowledgment of the daring bravery of the youths their old privilege of right of admission to the gallery should be restored to them. Mr. Hutchinson, the Member for the University, acknowledged the compliment with becoming pride and dignity. The Provost's last reported appearance in parliament was on the 6th of July, 1793, when he spoke in support of the Bill for the Charitable Musical Society. In the previous month, on one of the Militia Bills, he defended his son Francis from a rebuke of Mr. Secretary Hobart, though he voted against the son.

In that his last session, he saw carried--and along with Grattan, Forbes, Yelverton, Gardiner, and the other Liberals helped to carry--the Place, Pensions, Barren Land, and India Trade Acts. He introduced the bills for the Parliament grant of L1,300 to establish the College Botanical Gardens, and he earnestly supported Knox's Bill for admitting Catholics to Parliament.

He presided at the Board of Trinity College for the last time on the 25th of August this same year. His health was giving way, and his old enemy, the gout, was prevailing against him.

In the political side of his career Hutchinson saw a wondrous change in the meaning and method of Irish parliamentary life. When he began (1759) to take part in public affairs, the Irish parliament was at about its lowest level of degradation. Having been abolished by Cromwell and re-created by Charles II., it had become from the time of the Restoration little else than an office for registering and levying the English orders for pensions and salaries, and for passing the Money Bills. Poyning's Act and the 6th of George I. were in such active operation that the Government asserted the power of originating and altering the Money Bills, and that Anthony Malone was dismissed first from the Prime Serjeancy and later from the Exchequer Chancellorship for denying his right. A few years later, Lord Lieutenant Townshend, came over here for the express purpose of smashing the Irish Junto, and he smashed it by the simple process of taking the bribery into his own hands, and making it, what Sir Arthur Wellesley forty years after found it, an English state department. He was so indignant with the Commons for rejecting an altered Money Bill that he entered a protest on the Lords' Journal and prorogued the Parliament. Down to Hutchinson's time the Lord Lieutenants were absentees, and the Lords Justices were the centre of the Junto of "Undertakers" who undertook to the English Government to manage business here--i.e. "their own business"--on their own conditions. In the National Senate there was no national or intellectual life, and scarcely a name has survived in history.

There are no Reports of debates until the year 1781; for over 50 years scarcely a single important measure was passed; place holders in parliament were multiplied, and the pension and salary lists increased in proportion. To lessen the balance available for this bribery, the surplus revenue was expended in local and private jobs. The Mutiny Act was perpetual; parliaments ran for the monarch's life, judges held at pleasure, Catholics were debarred the franchise and education; Anglican State Protestantism was built up by cruelty and crime, complaints of grievances were met by commendations of the Charter Schools, and the trade and industries of the country were suffered, without remonstrance, to lie strangled under the jealous and grasping commercial restraints imposed by the English Parliament.

All these things Hely Hutchinson saw when he first looked out on the field of Irish administration; and before he died he saw most of these reproaches swept away by the operation of the courage, and intellect, and vigour which, contemporaneously with himself, found their way into the Commons House. Sexten Pery was a few years before him, and "Sexten Pery," says Grattan, "was the original fountain of all the good that befell Ireland." Flood entered parliament the same year as Hutchinson, Hussey Burgh, and Gardiner a few years later, and then came Yelverton and Grattan, and by the power of these resolute anti-Englishers the face of the country was changed. They found Ireland a child, and they watched her growth from infancy to arms, and from arms to liberty. They led the Volunteers to victory, and wrung back a portion of the people's rights from the frightened oppressor.

To this change Hutchinson directly, and still more indirectly, contributed. He quickened the parliamentary tone, and lifted its level. He was the father of the cultivated style of oratory which henceforward characterised the debates; he was the best debater in the house, and, after Grattan, the finest speaker. He could patriotise, and he could philippise; and whether he patriotised or philippised, he did it formidably and efficiently. He was venal, but he feared no man's face; he was a ready-money voter, but he could go out in all weathers. He trafficked, without satiety, in patents and sinecures for himself and his sons, but he insisted on Free Trade for Ireland.

Take him for all in all, and the first John Hely Hutchinson certainly presents a very rare combination of striking features. He was a representative man of a remarkable age, and he sprung out of the conditions of a period which he very much helped to mould. He was endowed with leading abilities, and was disfigured by hideous blemishes. From an humble start in life he made his way to the high places of the field, and, without any surroundings, he raised himself to be a living power in the State. He was mighty in speech, in courage, in council, and in achievement; and he could be craven, vindictive, corrupting, and paltry. In invective he was unequalled; and he was more sorely scorched by ridicule and rebuke than any man of his day. He lived in perpetual discords and in endless schemes, and the success which, in the main, followed him was chequered by bitter defeats and mortifications. He enjoyed a splendid fortune, maintained a lordly style, and wielded vast influence, and not a single generous action is recorded of him. Negligent of learning, he became the head of the University in one of its periods of peculiar brilliancy, and, having for twenty years drawn its revenues and exploited its resources, he is not named in its list of benefactors. He reared a numerous, affectionate, gifted, and successful family, and he founded a peerage.

However unprincipled Hutchinson was in his bargainings with the Castle, he was often sound and straight on national and Catholic questions. He was an enthusiastic admirer of Grattan, and, on essential matters touching the interests and dignity of the country, he gave Grattan a cordial and effective support. The proudest passage in his life was the day (16th April, 1782) when, as Principal Secretary of State, he read out to the Irish Parliament the king's message, practically conceding independence. There is not in Anglo-Irish history another event of equal grandeur; and Hely Hutchinson's Provostship for ever and inseparably connects the College with the climax of a triumph over English arrogance and obstinacy which, in the main, was won by a phalanx of her own sons when the prince of all the land led them on.

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The Will of "John Hely Hutchinson, His Majesty's Principal Secretary of State," made in 1788--proved and probate granted in November, 1794, by the Right Worshipful Patrick Duigenan, Doctor of Laws, Commissary, and so forth, is in the Public Record Office.

There are seven codicils of various dates, down to the year of the Provost's death. He says that no man ever had better or more dutiful and affectionate children--God bless them all--and amongst them he left L5,000 to each of his two eldest daughters, with 5 per cent. interest, and L4,000 to each of the two younger. He left L5,000 to his son Francis, as engaged at the time of his marriage, and to his sons John, Abraham, Christopher, and Lorenzo L4,000 each; L500 to Jane, eldest daughter of his worthy friend, Dr. Wilson. If any children should die before 21, or marriage, their share was to go amongst the younger children, but so as no younger child was to have more than L5,000 on the whole. All his real and personal estate, subject to the foregoing legacies, he left to his dearly-beloved son, Lord Donoughmore, his sole executor. He was to raise the portions of the two younger daughters to L5,000, if the estate could afford it. His office in the Port of Strangford he considered part of his personal estate, having purchased it with the knowledge and at the desire of the Irish Government; and he included it in the bequest to Lord Donoughmore for the lives in being. In a codicil (1789) he bequeathed L200 each to John, and to Abraham and Christopher while they shall continue at the Temple. Later codicils mention that some of these sums had been paid in full, and the legacies were accordingly revoked. He left his books on Morality, Divinity, and Poetry to Abraham, the law books to Francis, and the rest of his books to John. In a codicil of 1794, he left to Abraham "whose health is delicate," L100 a year till he shall obtain a net income of L200 yearly by some ecclesiastical preferment, this being in addition to the former legacy. To his butler he left L20 a year, and to another servant L20. He desired his manuscript essay towards a history of the College to be published, being first perused by his son, Lord Donoughmore. He directed his body to be opened, and to be laid by his late dear wife.

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The following Will which laid the foundation of the fortunes of the family is also in the Public Record Office:--

"The last Will and Testament of Richard Hutchinson of Knocklofty, in the county of Tipperary, Esq. Whereas I have this day executed a deed, whereby it appears that there are several sums now affecting my estate, and amounting in the whole to the sum of ten thousand nine hundred and fifty-two pounds four shillings and a farthing; and whereas Ann Mauzy, widow, and Lewis Mauzy, her son, have agreed to accept the sum of four thousand pounds in lieu of all their claims and demands. Now it is my will that such personal fortune as I now, or at the time of my death shall be possessed of shall be applied, in the first place, towards paying and discharging such sums of money as John Hely Hutchinson, Esq., shall think proper to pay the said Ann Mauzy, provided the same does not exceed the said sum of four thousand pounds; and the rest and residue of my personal estate and fortune if anything shall remain, I bequeath to my beloved niece, Christian Hely Hutchinson.

"Witness my hand and seal, this fourth day of August, one thousand seven hundred and fifty-seven.