| AdminHistory | John Digby, 1st Earl of Bristol: diplomat and statesman; born, 1580; served James I and was knighted by him, 1607; sent as ambassador to Madrid to settle the claims of English merchants in the Spanish courts and to negotiate a marriage between the English and Spanish royal families, 1611; continued in other diplomatic missions and marriage negotiations in Spain, 1613-1614; continued negotiations on financial and religious matters for the royal marriage in Madrid, 1617-1618; raised to the peerage as Lord Digby, 1618; advised James I on issues arising from the election of the King's son-in-law Frederick, Elector Palatine, to the Bohemian throne, 1620; following Frederick's expulsion from Bohemia, sent to Brussels to urge the Archduke Albert to direct a suspension of arms in the Palatinate as a preliminary to peace negotiations, 1621; attended the Emperor, Ferdinand II, in Vienna and attempted to make peace, but hostilities ensued in the Palatinate; returned to England to support James I in soliciting supplies from Parliament in order to intervene to protect Frederick's dominions; returned to Spain to pursue the marriage treaty suspended four years before, 1622; created Earl of Bristol; fell from royal favour due to friction between himself and Prince Charles and the Duke of Buckingham, and was sent to the Tower of London; rehabilited in some measure from 1628, but took no part in politics until 1639; took a position of compromise in the ensuing events, but eventually joined the king, 1642; Parliament ordered a pass for him to go overseas, 1646; spent the remainder of his life in France; died at Paris, 1653. Publication: 'An Apology of John, Earl of Bristol', a defence of his conduct in taking the King's part in the Civil War (Caen, 1647). |
| CustodialHistory | Part of the library of Charles Kay Ogden (1889-1957), linguistic psychologist, founder of the Orthological Institute and originator of the language system Basic English, whose interests in language systems are reflected in the subject matter of his collection, which comprised individual manuscripts and manuscript collections dating from the 14th to the 20th century. |