International Autograph Auctions Ltd.
Lot 180
GIBBON EDWARD: (1737-1794) English Historian, Writer & Politician whose most important work was The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1776-88). A fine, large D.S., Edward Gibbon, one page (vellum), large oblong folio, n.p., 17th June 1773. The attractive manuscript document is an Indenture made between Gibbon (‘only son and heir of Edward Gibbon the Elder late of Buriton….’) and Sir Stanier Porten of Saint James’s, Westminster and Joseph Newton of Aldermanbury, London, for the lease of the manor at Mapledurham in Buriton, ‘in the County of Southampton’ (Hampshire) for one year ‘in consideration of the sum of five shillings of lawful money of Great Britain’. The indenture makes references to the manor house’s surrounding meadows, pastures, glebe land, woods, gardens and orchards as well as outbuildings including barns and stables and also names several tenants including Ralph Burknall. Signed by Gibbon at the foot of the document either side of a red wax seal. Rare. A clean and attractive document, folded as standard. VG In around 1719 the Manor at Mapledurham in Buriton was purchased by Edward Gibbon, grandfather of the historian, following the death of Ralph Burknall (or Bucknel). Gibbon had acquired a fortune of £60,000 and was made a director of the South Sea Company in 1716 and was involved in the general ruin which fell upon the company in 1720. However, he soon amassed a second fortune and purchased large estates in Buckinghamshire and Hampshire. Gibbon died in 1736 and the Manor passed to his son Edward Gibbon (‘The Elder’, as referred to in the present document), the father of the historian. Gibbon’s wife died whilst their son was still at an early age and Gibbon the Elder ‘soon withdrew from the gay and busy scenes of the world, and his prudent retreat from London and Putney to his farm at Buriton in Hampshire was ennobled by the pious motive of conjugal affliction’ He lived there for the remainder of his life, dying in 1770. The Manor then passed to his son, Edward Gibbon the historian who, in had previously observed in his autobiography 'My father's residence in Hampshire, where I have passed many light and some heavy hours, was at Buriton near Petersfield…. An old mansion in a state of decay had been converted into the fashion and convenience of a modern house, of which I occupied the most agreeable apartment; and if strangers had nothing to see, the inhabitants had little to desire. The spot was not happily chosen-at the end of the village and the bottom of the hill; but the aspect of the adjacent grounds was various and cheerful: the Downs commanded the prospect of the sea, and the long hanging woods in sight of the house could not perhaps have been improved by art or expense. My father kept in his own hands the whole of his estate, and even rented some additional land, and whatsoever might be the balance of profit and loss the farm supplied him with amusement and plenty’. In April 1789 Gibbon sold the property and estate to Lord Stawell (1757-1820). Sir Stanier Porten (1709-1789) was Gibbon’s uncle. His youngest sister, Judith, had married Edward Gibbon on 3rd June 1736. Porten made a career for himself as a Government official and Diplomat, serving as a Consul in Naples and Madrid. In July 1766 he was appointed Secretary to the extraordinary embassy of Lord Rochford to the Court of France and in November 1768 as under-secretary to Lord Rochford whilst Secretary of State for the Northern department, and in December 1770 the Southern department, remaining with Rochford until 1782. Porten was knighted in June 1772, appointed Keeper of the State Papers at Whitehall in 1774, and from 1782 until November 1786 was a Commissioner of the Customs. He died at Kensington Palace in 1789.
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