Philip Twysden (1713–1752), was an Anglican clergyman who served in the Church of Ireland as Lord Bishop of Raphoe from 1747 to 1752. The circumstances of his death later became the subject of scandalous rumour.
Early life and family He was born in Kent,, The Province of Ulster, p. 356. south-east England, in 1713, the third son of Sir William Twysden, 5th Baronet of Roydon Hall, East Peckham, Kent, by his wife (and distant cousin) Jane Twisden.
He studied at University College, Oxford, from 1732. He was awarded a Master of Arts degree, and the honorary degree of Doctor of Civil Law in 1745.
He married twice: firstly to Mary Purcell (died 1743), and secondly to Frances Carter, daughter of The Rt Hon. Thomas Carter, Master of the Rolls in Ireland. After Bishop Twysden's death, she married her cousin, General James Johnston.
By his second wife, he had two children: Mary (died in infancy)Mary: We hear that on the 10th Instant the Lady of the Lord Bishop of Raphoe was safely delivered of a Daughter, at his Lordship's House in Pall-mall.London Evening Post, 26 September 1751 – 28 September 1751; Issue 3735. and a posthumous daughter called Frances (1753–1821).Frances: On Sunday the Lady of the late Dr. Twysden, Bishop of Raphoe, was safely delivered of a Daughter at her House in St. James's Street. London Evening Post, 24 February 1753 – 27 February 1753; Issue 3952. Frances, later Countess of Jersey, was one of the many mistresses of King George IV when he was Prince of Wales. Through Frances, they are ancestors of Diana, Princess of Wales, and of her sons, Princes William, the Prince of Wales, and Harry, Duke of Sussex.
Ecclesiastical career He was ordained a priest in the Church of England. He was instituted in 1738 as rector of Eard and in 1745, for a short time, served as the rector of Eastling in Kent.Clergy of the Church of England Database He accompanied The 4th Earl of Chesterfield to Dublin as his chaplain, upon the Earl's appointment as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland.
Twysden was nominated to the Bishopric of Raphoe in Ulster on 3 March 1746Derby Mercury 6 March 1746; p1-2 and was consecrated by the Lord Archbishop of Dublin, assisted by the bishops of Derry and Clonfert, at St Michan's Church, Dublin, on 29 March 1747.The Gentleman's and London Magazine: Or Monthly Chronologer, 1741–1794;, Handbook of British Chronology, p. 405., A New History of Ireland, volume IX, p. 410.
Death Bishop Twysden died on 2 November 1752 at home in Jermyn Street, St James's, London."(Thursday) morning died at his House in Jermyn-Street, the Right Rev. Dr. Philip Twisden, Bishop of Raphoe in Ireland, and nearly related to Sir Roger Twisden, Bart. Knight of the Shire for the County of Kent." London Evening Post, 2 November 1752 – 4 November 1752; Issue 3903. However, writing almost a century later, Henry Cotton incorrectly thought he died at Roydon Hall, East Peckham, his father's country house. Twysden was buried in the south chancel of St Michael's Church, East Peckham, under a plain stone with no inscription.
A story grew up that, having been made bankrupt, he was shot while attempting to rob a stagecoach. The location of his alleged attempted career as a highwayman was either Hounslow Heath (west of London)"A mysterious affair, which has never been properly cleared up, was the death of Twysden, Bishop of Raphoe, in 1752. An Irish Bishop, even although a Kentish man of ancient descent, did not perhaps rank very high upon the Episcopal bench, but he was sufficiently exalted to make the innuendo that he had died from being shot on the Heath while taking purses at the pistol-muzzle a very startling one. Grantley Berkeley says: "The Lord Bishop Twysden, of Raphoe, a member of the old Kentish family of that name, was found suspiciously out at night on Hounslow Heath, and was most unquestionably shot through the body. A correspondent of the Gentleman's Magazine asked, 'Was this the bishop who was taken ill on Hounslow Heath, and so carried back to his friend's house (? Osterley Park), where he died of an inflammation of the bowels?'" Half-hours with the highwaymen; picturesque biographies and traditions of the knights of the road by Charles George Harper (1908) Volume 1 or Wrotham Heath in Kent.
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