Blair Worden - A Book of Friendship

JOHN MORRILL

At any rate, the seven (or eight) 26 volumes of transcription of material from the manuscript journals were almost certainly prepared for Hugh at some time after he entered Parliament (which gave him easy and privileged access to the clerks’ office) and before he became an earl, so between 1689 and 1706. Hugh Cholmondeley was principally interested in reports made to the House by committees and by executive bodies, with a special focus on financial, military and naval affairs. It is broader than that, but that is enough for our purposes. I have only analysed the volume covering 1653-60 in detail, closely comparing the King’s Inn transcripts with the Journal of the House of Commons and they are extremely accurate in all matters but spelling and punctuation, which is relevant to our concern here. If, as seems likely, the King’s Inn manuscript was produced by an as-yet unidentified parliamentary clerk or under-clerk sometime between 1689 and 1706 – from the handwriting probably in the earlier part of that period – what would have been available to guide Cholmondely’s selection? Obviously, he could see the fair copy of the journal in the form that was to be printed a century later, but he would also have had access to the rough working papers stored for each day of a session. Alas, these all went up in smoke during the great fire in the Palace of Westminster. 27 So it is perfectly possible (more likely than not?) that the version of Cromwell’s speech of 4th July 1653 contained in the King’s Inn manuscript was in the working papers of the Assembly/ Parliament which have since been destroyed. This in turn might suggest that the clerks of the time made their own shorthand notes on Cromwell’s speech and then fair-copied them. This might (oh dear, another subjunctive) also explain why someone with access to the clerks’ office and disaffected with the establishment of the Protectorate could have leaked a copy to Spittlehouse or his colleagues for their hostile printing in September/ October 1654. Or did Spittlehouse and Cholmondeley have separate sources?

26 There are seven volumes identically bound and numbered 1-6 and 8. So maybe an eighth has been lost. But there is no chronological gap between 6 and 8 so the volume numbering is probably an error. 27 Caroline Shelton, The Day Parliament Burned Down (Oxford, 2014).

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