Family and Education

b. 22 June 1713, 2nd s. of Lionel Cranfield, 1st Duke of Dorset; bro. of Charles, Earl of Middlesex and Lord George Sackville. educ. Westminster 1721-c.29. m. 1 Jan. 1744, Lady Frances Leveson Gower, da. of John, 1st Earl Gower, 2s. 1da.

Offices Held

Capt. 37 Ft. 1734; lt. Dover Castle 1734-46; equerry to Queen Caroline 1736; capt. and lt.-col. 2 Ft. Gds. 1740-6; ld. of the bedchamber to Frederick, Prince of Wales, 1745-9.

Biography

Before coming of age, Lord John Sackville was brought into Parliament for Tamworth on the interest of his brother-in-law, the 2nd Viscount Weymouth. Like his elder brother he ratted on Walpole by refusing to attend election petitions. In 1743 Lord Wilmington (Spencer Compton), who had been expected to leave him his Sussex estates, worth £3-£4,000 a year, died leaving him nothing.1 In 1744 he was obliged to marry the Duchess of Bedford’s sister, two days after she had given birth to a child by him at Woburn. The Prince of Wales offered to intercede for the couple with their enraged parents, undertaking to make up Sackville’s allowance to £800 a year, if his father should allow him less,2 a pledge which he carried out by making him a lord of his bedchamber in 1745, thus securing him as a recruit to his party. Next year Sackville deserted from the Guards, who had been ordered abroad, having just been released from arrest for absenting himself from duty on the day of embarkation. After being confined in a private asylum kept by the head of the Bethlehem (Bedlam) hospital for lunatics,3 he was sent into exile near Lausanne, where Shelburne met him in 1760,

living upon a very poor allowance and but very meanly looked after. He was very fond of coming among the young English at Lausanne, who suffered his company at times from motives of curiosity, and sometimes from humanity. He was always dirtily clad, but it was easy to perceive something gentlemanlike in his manner and a look of birth about him, under all his disadvantages. His conversation was a mixture of weakness and shrewdness, as is common to most madmen. When he heard of his brother Lord George’s behaviour at the battle of Minden, he immediately said, ‘I always told you that my brother George was no better than myself’.4

He died 3 Dec. 1765.

Ref Volumes: 1715-1754

Author: Romney R. Sedgwick

Notes

• 1. Ld. John Sackville to Bedford, 2 July 1743, Bedford mss.
• 2. Bedford to Ld. Gower, 1 Jan., Ld. John Sackville to Bedford, 27 Feb. 1744, ibid.
• 3. Ld. Vere Beauclerk to Bedford, 15 and 20 Sept. 1746, ibid.
• 4. Fitzmaurice, Shelburne, i. 237-8.