Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Dorislaus, Isaac
DORISLAUS, ISAAC (1595–1649), diplomatist, born at Alkmaar in Northern Holland in 1595, was the second son of Isaac Doreslaer, a minister of the Dutch reformed church at Hensbrock (1627), but afterwards at Enkhuizen (1628), where he died in 1652. He was educated at Leyden, at which university he took the degree of LL.D., and for some years taught a school. Coming to England at the invitation, it would seem, of Sir Henry Mildmay, he passed some time at the latter's seat at Wanstead, Essex, and appears to have astonished the natives by his unconventional mode of life. He soon resolved to make England his home, becoming, says Fuller, ‘very much anglicised in language and behaviour’ (Hist. of Univ. of Cambridge, ed. Nichols, 229–30). In or about 1627 he married ‘an English woman about Maldon in Essex.’ During the same year another friend, Fulke Greville, Lord Brooke, founded a history lecture at Cambridge, with a stipend of 100l. per annum, and after soliciting G. J. Vossius to accept the chair, conferred it on Dorislaus (Cat. of MSS., University Library, Cambridge, v. 433–4; Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1628–9, p. 438). Taking the ‘Annaof Tacitus for his subject, Dorislaus was allowed to commence his course without interruption. In his second lecture he took occasion of Tacitus's mention of the changes in the Roman form of government ‘to vindicate the Netherlanders for retaining their liberties against the violences of Spain.’ Dr. Matthew Wren, the master of Peterhouse, deemed it his duty to complain to the vice-chancellor (Thomas Baynbrigge), and Dorislaus was in consequence silenced (December 1627). Thereupon he ‘desired to come and clear himself before the heads, and carried himself so ingenuously that he gave satisfaction to all.’ He seems, however, to have acted less ingenuously towards Lord Brooke, who, while promising to continue his stipend, intimated that Dorislaus might find it convenient to return to Holland (letter of Dr. Samuel Ward, master of Sidney College, to Archbishop Ussher, dated 16 May 1628, in Parr's Life of Ussher, p. 393, with which cf. letter of Dr. M. Wren to Bishop Laud, dated 16 Dec. 1627, in Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1627–8, p. 470). Declining to take the hint, Dorislaus retired for a while to Maldon. In 1629 he was admitted a commoner of the College of Advocates, and to full membership in 1645. In an interesting letter to Grotius dated June 1630 (Addit. MS. 29960, f. 10) he speaks of his intimacy with Philip, lord Wharton, Wotton, and Selden. At length, through the kind offices of Sir Kenelm Digby, he made his peace at court in the summer of 1632, and was permitted access to state records for some historical work (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1631–3, pp. 394, 397). ‘In one of the expeditions against the Scots’—probably the bishops' war of 1640—Dorislaus was appointed, according to Wood, judge advocate, an office for which his great knowledge of civil law eminently qualified him. Two years later, when the war between Charles and the parliament began, he filled the same post in the army commanded by Essex. By an ordinance of April 1648 he was made one of the judges of the court of admiralty. The same year he had been sent on a diplomatic errand to the States-General of Holland ‘concerning the revolted ships.’ He afterwards assisted in preparing and managing the charge of high treason against Charles I, and thus incurred the deadly hatred of the royalists. In April 1649 it was resolved by the council of state to despatch him again as special envoy to the States-General, in order to prepare with Walter Strickland, the resident, a scheme for ‘a firm peace and reciprocal alliance between the two republics’ (ib. 1649–50, pp. 99, 104–5, &c.) Although rumours of a plot against his life had reached him, he chose to disregard them, and cheerfully set out on his journey. Arrived at the Hague ‘in good equipage’ on the noon of Sunday, 10 May, he took up his quarters at the Witte Zwaan (White Swan) Inn, and there persisted in remaining, despite the entreaties of Strickland that he should reside with him. The presence of the Commonwealth's envoy in the city where the exiled Charles II was staying excited intense indignation among the royalist refugees. An attempt at assassination made on the Monday evening failed, but at ten o'clock the following night (12 May) some twelve men in masks made their appearance at the inn, and while half their number kept the door, the rest blew out the lights in the passage and burst into the public room, where the envoy, in company with eleven other guests, was having supper. Dorislaus, after vainly attempting to find a private door, returned to his chair and resolutely faced his assailants. Two of the conspirators forthwith commenced a murderous attack on a Dutch gentleman named Grijp van Valkensteyn, taking him to be the English envoy. Finding out their mistake, however, they set upon Dorislaus, and felled him with blow after blow, exclaiming as they did the deed, ‘Thus dies one of the king's judges’ (Strickland's letter to the council of state detailing the murder, printed in Cary, Memorials of the Great Civil War, ii. 131–3, may be compared with the deposition of three of the envoy's servants who were actually present, in Peck, Desiderata Curiosa, ii. 422). They then quietly dispersed, regretting that they had not found Strickland as well as Dorislaus. He had, in fact, left the inn an hour before. The leader of the party was Colonel Walter Whitford, a Scotchman, son of Walter Whitford, D.D., of Monkland, Lanarkshire. After the Restoration he received a pension for what Wood, and indeed Evelyn, accounted a ‘generous action.’ In their exasperation the parliament could do no better than send forth a declaration threatening to retaliate the murder upon those of the cavaliers then in their hands (A Declaration of the Parliament of England of their just Resentment of the horrid Murther perpetrated on the Body of I. Dorislaus, &c., s. sh. fol. London, 1649). The States-General forwarded through the resident a formal expression of regret, but no effort ever seems to have been made to bring the assassins to justice, although they came to be well known. The body of Dorislaus was brought to England, and after lying in state at Worcester House in the Strand was buried with much pomp in Westminster Abbey on 14 June 1649, the sum of 250l. having been voted to defray the expenses of the ceremony. His remains were afterwards disinterred by royal warrant dated 9 Sept. 1661, and buried in St. Margaret's churchyard, but not, it is said, in the common pit. By his wife, who died before him, Dorislaus had issue two sons, John (born 20 Nov. 1627, and buried at Maldon 3 Jan. 1631–2) and Isaac, and two daughters, Elizabeth (who married a Mr. Gostwick) and Margaret. To the daughters parliament presented 500l. apiece, while a pension of 200l. a year was settled on the son Isaac (Commons' Journals, vi. 209). Isaac Dorislaus the younger entered Merchant Taylors' School on 18 March 1638–9 (Robinson, Register, i. 144). In December 1649 he obtained a registrar's place for the probate of wills, having the isle of Ely and county of Cambridge assigned him as his district. In February 1651 he accompanied the English ambassadors to Holland to demand justice upon his father's murderers. His knowledge of French, Spanish, and Dutch made him especially useful to Thurloe, by whom he was frequently employed as a translator and decipherer of intercepted intelligence (Thurloe State Papers, i. 303, 480, iii. 231). In January 1653 he received the appointment of solicitor to the court of admiralty, with a salary of 250l. a year; in March 1660 he appears as one of the managers of the post office, a place he was allowed to retain after the revolution (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1649–67, passim). In 1681 he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society. He died in comfortable circumstances in September 1688, and was buried by his wife in St. Bartholomew's Church, near the Royal Exchange, leaving issue Isaac, James, and Anne (will reg. in P. C. C. 134, Exton; Probate Act Book, P. C. C. 1688, f. 151).
Dorislaus is known as an author by a brief historical essay of thirty-seven pages, ‘Prœlium Nuportanum,’ 4to, London, 1640, afterwards reprinted at page 179 of Sir Francis Vere's ‘Commentaries,’ 4to, London, 1657. His portrait was engraved by W. Richardson, after an original drawing in the possession of the St. Aubyn family of St. Michael's Mount, Cornwall; another engraving, by C. Passe, represents him standing, with emblems of Time and Truth. There is also a portrait by R. Vinkeles. A curious Dutch print of his assassination was published in quarto.
[Chester's Register of Westminster Abbey (Harl. Soc.), pp. 143, 521; Peacock's Army Lists of the Roundheads and Cavaliers, 2nd ed. p. 21, where A. J. Van Der Aa's Biographisch Woordenboek der Nederlanden, iv. 277–8, and J. L. Gollpried's Kronyck, iv. 454, are cited; Notes and Queries, 4th ser. iii. 287, 367, 491, 585, iv. 40, 253; Clarendon's History (1849), bk. xii. par. 24, 141; Wood's Athenæ Oxon. (b. liss), iii. 666–668, 1018; Thurloe State Papers, i. 174, 364; Coxe's Cat. Codd. MS. Bibl. Bodl. pars v. fasc. ii. p. 679; Caulfield's High Court of Justice, pp. 81–2; Cooper's Annals of Cambridge, iii. 201–2; Peck's Desiderata Curiosa, ii. 429; Evelyn's Diary (ed. 1850–2), i. 251, iii. 51, 53; Wilkins's Political Ballads, i. 90; Granger's Biog. Hist. of England, 5th ed. iii. 30–1; Bate's Elenchus (ed. 1676), p. 138; Burton's Diary, iii. 489 n.; Whitelocke's Memorials, p. 387; Gent. Mag. xcix. ii. 324 n.; Cat. of MSS., University Library, Cambridge, v. 413, 414.]