Sir Thomas More’s house, for such it ought still to be considered, notwithstanding the great alterations made in it, was now known as Buckingham House, in consequence of its having been granted to the first Duke of Buckingham. It appears by the following extract from a periodical paper after that duke’s death, to have been in possession of his daughter Mary, who married James, Duke of Richmond and Lenox: “The Duchess of Lenox, daughter of the Duke of Buckingham, being then at Oxford, petitioned the Lords for leave to come to London, or to her house at Chelsey, to be under Dr. Mayerne’s hands for her health; a pass was ordered for her, and the concurrence of the Commons desired.”
Buckingham House, in 1649, having been seized by the Parliament, was committed to the custody of John Lisle, one of the Commissioners of the Great Seal. This gentleman’s own estates were afterwards confiscated, and he then retired to the continent. He was shot by some unknown person as he was going to church at Lausanne. A short time after the house was granted to Sir Bulstrode Whitlock, who resided with his family at Chelsea for some years.
Sir Bulstrode Whitlock was the son of a Judge of the Court of King’s Bench; he wrote a memorial of English affairs from the latter part of the reign of Charles I. to the Restoration.
George, the second Duke of Buckingham, soon after the Restoration, recovered his father’s estates, and was the possessor of this house for a few years, but was soon obliged to dispose of it for the benefit of his creditors.
Dryden, in his poem of Absalom and Achitophel, has drawn the following portrait of this nobleman in the character of Zimri:—
“A man so various, that he seemed to be Not one, but all mankind’s epitome: Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong, He’s every thing by starts, and nothing long; But in the course of one revolving moon, Was Chymist, Fidler, Statesman, and Buffoon. In squandering wealth, was his peculiar art, Nothing went unrewarded but desert. Beggar’d by fools, when still he found, too late He had his jest, and they had his estate.”
James Plummer, one of the Duke of Buckingham’s principal creditors, was the person in whose name this house was aliened in 1674, in trust, for George, Earl of Bristol, who is said to have died at Chelsea, and to have been buried in the church, but there is no memorial of him, or entry of his interment in the Parish Register.