John Rolle, 1st Baron Rolle (1750 – 3 April 1842) was a British politician and peer who served as a Member of Parliament in general support of William Pitt the Younger and was later an active member of the House of Lords. His violent attacks on Edmund Burke and Charles James Fox in the early 1780s led to his being the target for satirical attack in the Rolliad. He was colonel of the South Devon Militia and was instrumental in forming the Royal 1st Devon Yeomanry and the North Devon Yeomanry.
Rolle was a slave owner, and at emancipation he presented his estate on the island of Exuma in the Bahamas in perpetuity to his freed slaves, whose descendants still lived in what became known as Rolleville as late as the 1920s.Alan Burns, Colonial Civil Servant (1949). London: Allen and Unwin, p.96.
He was the largest landowner in Devon, with about 55,000 acres centred on his seats of Stevenstone in the north and Bicton House in the south-east, and thus was highly influential in that county. He promoted and financed several large engineering projects, including the Rolle Canal in North Devon, Rolle Quay in Pottington, Barnstaple, and two road bridges over the River Torridge near Torrington, at Town Mills and Weare Giffard and the sea-wall at Exmouth. He was an active donor to charitable works in Devon, being patron of his family's almshouses at Livery Dole, Exeter, Otterton, Great Torrington and St Giles in the WoodCommissioners for inquiry into charities. "The report of the Commissioners concerning charities; containing that part which relates to Devon (With) Appendix and index" (1830). Oxford: Oxford University, p.204. and of two schools in Otterton. Physically he was a large man, and made no pretension to an intellectual approach. Nathaniel William Wraxall wrote of him: "Nature had denied him all pretension to grace or elegance. Neither was his understanding apparently more cultivated than his manners were refined. He reminded me always of a Devonshire rustic, but he possessed plain common sense, a manly mind, and the faculty of stating his ideas in a few strong words." In later life he caused a disturbance at the coronation of Queen Victoria when he fell on the stairs of the throne.
Origins
John Rolle was the only son of Denys Rolle (1725–1797), of Hudscott, Chittlehampton, Devon, by his wife Anne Chichester (born 1721), a daughter by his second wife of Arthur Chichester (1670–1737/8) of Hall, Bishop's Tawton, Devon,J. L. Vivian. "The Visitations of the County of Devon: Comprising the Herald's Visitations of 1531, 1564, and 1620" (1895). Exeter: H. S. Eland, p.177. Pedigree of Chichester of Hall. a junior line of the prolific Chichester family of Raleigh, Pilton. Denys Rolle owned large estates in Florida which he attempted to colonise and was heir to his elder brother John Rolle Walter (1712–1779), MP, of Bicton and Stevenstone, both sons of John Rolle (1679–1730), MP, of Bicton and Stevenstone. On 27 July 1781 Denys "Walter" Esq. obtained royal licence "to take the surname and bear the arms of Rolle, pursuant to the will of the late John Rolle Walter Esq. of Stevenstone".Robert Dymond. "Exeter, 1780 to 1799" (2012). Originally published in Trewman's Flying Post (29 January 1879). Via Old Mersey Times.] His brother John Rolle Walter (died 1779) had become the heir of his uncle Sir Robert Walter, 4th Baronet (1680–1731) and had been required to adopt the surname of Walter. Denys Rolle (died 1797) had been left Hudscott and the lordship of the manor of Chittlehampton by his distant childless cousin Samuel Rolle (died 1747), only son of Samuel Rolle (1669–1735), MP, by his wife Dorothy Lovering. Samuel Rolle (died 1735) had himself inherited Hudscott from his mother Jane Lovering. He was the son of Dennis Rolle (died 1671) of Great Torrington (whose tombstone exists in Torrington Church), the younger brother of Robert Rolle (died 1660), MP, who had married Lady Arabella Clinton, both sons of Sir Samuel Rolle I (died 1647), of Heanton Satcheville, MP for Barnstaple.
Career He was educated at Winchester College and Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and became a country gentleman in Devon. He lived at Tidwell, within the family owned manor of East Budleigh on the south Devon coast, certainly between 1786 and 1796.Devon Record Office, several deeds, ref DRO 48/22 The estate of Tidwell had been purchased by the Walrond family in about 1730,Bridget Cherry and Nikolaus Pevsner. "The Buildings of England: Devon" (2004). New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, p.347. . and hence it may have been the property of Rolle's first wife Maria Walrond. This Georgian country house is now a hotel, in the renamed parish of Budleigh Salterton. When his uncle John Rolle Walter died in November 1779, he was put forward to take up his seat in parliament. At this time, the seat of Devon was controlled by a group of large landowners principally in the families of Courtenay of Powderham, Bampfylde of Poltimore and Rolle, who had so many supporters that no other challenge was possible. Due to the prohibitive expense of mounting an opposition, the county had not seen a contested election since 1712. Rolle was duly elected unopposed on 4 January 1780.
House of Commons
Because of the control of his county, Rolle was not under any political obligations. Although his family were traditionally Tory, Rolle was not a reliable vote for the Tory Prime Minister of the day, Lord North. He sometimes supported the government but just as often opposed it. However, following North's resignation, Rolle developed a vehement dislike of Charles James Fox for recalling George Rodney to a Naval command. When Fox, attempting to delay Parliamentary proceedings to get in more of his supporters, put off the Call of the House, Rolle attacked his supporters' unpunctuality.
He supported the Shelburne government's peace proposals in 1783, although he had not been a consistent supporter of that ministry (being rated by Robinson, the Parliamentary manager, as 'doubtful'). During the Fox-North Coalition, Rolle was appalled when Edmund Burke reappointed two Pay Office officials called Powell and Bembridge who were under suspicion of embezzlement, and made vituperative attacks until Burke agreed to accept their resignations.
Military career
John Rolle joined the South Devon Militia as an ensign and in 1796 as its commanding officer he took it to Ireland to help to suppress the rising which occurred when Britain was at war with France.
On his return to Devon he displayed a great interest in the Volunteer Cavalry known as the Yeomanry, and in 1801 he was instrumental in reorganising various south Devon independent units into the Royal 1st Devon Yeomanry, and in 1802 he instituted another corps of north Devon units into the North Devon Yeomanry (later designated the Royal North Devon Hussars) under his command.Henry Walrond. "Historical Records of the 1st Devon Militia (4th Battalion the Devonshire Regiment): With a Notice of the 2nd and North Devon Militia Regiments" (1897). London: Longmans, Green and Company, p..
In February 1812 it appears Lord Rolle led his regiment to Nottingham as part of a larger force to suppress a Luddite rebellion. During the march his quartermaster-serjeant Richard I Braginton (1752–1812) died suddenly at Leicester, and Rolle erected a gravestone to his memory in St Martin's Church, Leicester inscribed thus:BereniceUK. "Gravestone - St Martin's, Leicester Cathedral" (20 August 2011). Via Midlands Heritage [forum]. Archived 3 December 2013.
Rolle appointed his son Richard II Braginton (1784–1869) as steward of Stevenstone, and the latter's son George Braginton (1808–1886), a merchant and banker, mayor of Great Torrington, was in 1830 Lord Rolle's agent for the Rolle Canal of which he purchased a lease in 1852, ten years after Lord Rolle's death.
At the age of 90 Rolle had sufficient vitality to ride at the head of the 1st Devon Yeomanry at its annual inspection.Henry Walrond. "Historical Records of the 1st Devon Militia (4th Battalion the Devonshire Regiment): With a Notice of the 2nd and North Devon Militia Regiments" (1897). London: Longmans, Green and Company, p..
The Rolliad The violence of his attack led the supporters of Fox and Burke to make him the chief object of the Rolliad, which purported to be a literary criticism of an epic poem but was actually a vehicle used by the authors to insult all their opponents. The dedication of the Rolliad reads:
It gives a spoof pedigree of the Rolle family, which cannot in reality be traced further back than 16th-century Dorset, as sprung from "Rollo, Duke of the Normans". Although Rolle seemed to be an opponent of Fox, he was not a true supporter of Pitt. He opposed Pitt on parliamentary reform and on the Duke of Richmond's fortifications plan, and was a member of the St. Alban's Tavern group which tried to create a united Ministry involving both Pitt and Fox. He consistently described himself as an "independent country gentleman".
Regency crisis Rolle backed Pitt on the regency crisis in 1789, making a direct attack on the Prince of Wales' relations with Maria Fitzherbert which was thought inappropriate by the Whigs. Rolle responded by saying that he would have made the same speech if the whole House was against him. In the general election in 1790 he was forced into a token contest against a Bampfylde Whig and declared his "firm attachment to Mr Pitt, founded on personal esteem as well as public principles", and was returned with a healthy majority.
His opposition to Parliamentary reform continued and intensified due to the French Revolution of 1789; he spoke against Thomas Paine's doctrines and supported the repressive legislation aimed at damping down revolutionary sentiment in Britain. He supported moves to abolish slavery and campaigned for a reduction of duty on horses (suggesting a heavy tax on the employment of foreign servants be used to replace the revenue). He bestowed all of his significant land holdings in Exuma, Bahamas, to his slaves, in gratitude for which a number of towns on Great Exuma have been named after him, such as Rolleville and Rolletown. A large proportion of the inhabitants today are surnamed Rolle, some of the famous ones amongst whom are Esther Rolle, actress; Myron Rolle and Magnum Rolle, American football and basketball players respectively.
Peerage The 1790s saw him attempting to obtain a peerage for himself or his father who had returned to the life of an English country gentleman after the failure of his American colonisation schemes. His father was uninterested but Pitt made a firm promise to Rolle himself, so long as a problematic by-election in Devon was not thereby caused by his removal to the House of Lords. At the dissolution of Parliament in 1796, Rolle was duly ennobled as Baron Rolle, of Stevenstone in the County of Devon.
In 1797 Rolle's father died and he inherited all of the family's extensive estates, which were reckoned in 1809 to be worth £70,000 per annum. He was an active member of the House of Lords, and became increasingly conservative: he was one of 22 'stalwarts' to vote against the third reading of the Reform Bill of 1832. During a parliamentary debate in July 1834 the Lord Chancellor, Lord Brougham, attacked Rolle in a speech. When Brougham sat down, Rolle came up to him at the Woolsack and told him: "My Lord, I wish you to know that I have the greatest contempt for you both in this House and out of it".Philip Whitwell Wilson (ed.). "The Greville Diary. Volume I" (1927). New York: Doubleday, Page & Company, p. 481.
Coronation accident
On 28 June 1838, the infirm Lord Rolle attended the coronation of Queen Victoria. What happened was later described by the Queen in her diary:
The diarist Charles Greville, who was present at the coronation, described the scene: