Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 09.djvu/99

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Carleton
93
Carleton

low. In 1635 he was made a proctor to the university. When the civil war broke out he threw himself heartily into the king's cause. He was an excellent horseman, and followed the royal army, although he had been ordained and held two livings. In an engagement with the enemy he was taken prisoner and confined in Lambeth House. He managed, however, to escape by the help of his wife, who conveyed a cord to him, by which he was to let himself down from a window, and then make for a boat on the Thames in readiness to take him off. The rope was too short, and in dropping to the ground he broke one of his bones, but succeeded in getting to the boat, which took him to a place of concealment, where he lay till he recovered, but in such a destitute condition that his wife had to sell some of her clothes and work for their daily food. At last they contrived to get out of the country, and joined the exiled king in Holland. At the restoration Carleton was made dean of Carlisle and prebendary of Durham. In 1671 he was promoted to the bishopric of Bristol, and in 1678 translated to Chichester, but ‘he had not the name there,’ says Wood, ‘for a scholar or liberal benefactor as his predecessor and kinsman, Dr. George Carleton, had.’ In the year after his appointment, the Duke of Monmouth, being then at the height of his popularity, visited Chichester (7 Feb.) in the course of a kind of royal progress which he was making through the country (see Macaulay, Hist. i. 251, &c.). The extravagant honour paid to him, not only by some of the citizens but by the dignitaries of the cathedral, excited the indignation of the bishop, which he poured forth in a letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury (Sancroft) (preserved among the Tanner MSS. in the Bodleian, 384). ‘… The great men of our Cathedrall welcomed him with belles, and bonfires made by wood had from their houses to flare before his lodgings, personal visits made to him, with all that was in their houses proffered to his service.’ He describes the honour done the duke in the cathedral, and the ‘apocryphal anthems when the commonwealth saints appeared amongst us.’ He then relates at some length how, because he would not ‘join in these bell and bonfire solemnities,’ or ‘bow the knee to the people's Idol,’ the rabble surrounded his house at night demanding wood to make bonfires for the duke, and, when it was refused, pelted the palace with stones, and shot into it three times, shouting that he was an old popish rogue, and all the people in his family were rogues and thieves, and they should meet with him ere long. ‘Then they shott three times into my house and seconded their violence with a shower of stones so thick that our servants thought they would have broke in and cut our throats. …’ The letter is dated 17 Feb. 1679. The bishop was then about eighty-three years of age, but lived six years longer. His death occurred on 6 July 1685.

[Wood's Athenæ, iv. 866, 867.]

CARLETON, GUY, first Lord Dorchester (1724–1808), governor of Quebec, was the third son of Christopher Carleton of Newry, county Down, and his wife, Catherine, daughter of Henry Ball of county Donegal. He was born at Strabane 3 Sept. 1724. The father died when Guy was about fourteen, and the mother afterwards married the Rev. Thomas Skelton of Newry. According to Samuel Burdy, the biographer of Philip Skelton, 'Sir Guy's eminence in the world was owing in a great degree … to the care which his stepfather, Thomas Skelton, took of his education' (Complete Works of Rev. P. Skelton, 1824, pp. 30-31). On 21 May 1742 he was appointed ensign in the Earl of Rothes's regiment (afterwards the 25th foot), and obtained his promotion as lieutenant in the some regiment on 1 May 1745). Changing his regiment he became lieutenant of the 1st foot guards on 22 July 1751, and was appointed captain-lieutenant and lieutenant-colonel 18 June 1757. In June and July 1758 he took part in the siege of Louisburg, under General Amherst, and on 24 Aug. was made lieutenant-colonel of the 72nd foot. On 30 Dec. in the same year he was appointed quartermaster-general and colonel in America. He was wounded at the capture of Quebec, 13 Sept. 1759, when in command of the corps of grenadiers. In 1761 he acted as brigadier-general under General Hodgson at the siege of Belleisle, and was wounded in the attack on Port Andro, 8 April. He was raised to the rank of colonel in the army 19 Feb. 1762, and in the some year served under Lord Albemarle in the siege of the Havannah, where he greatly distinguished himself, and was wounded in a sortie on 22 July. Carleton was appointed lieutenant-governor of Quebec 24 Sept. 1766, and in the following year the government of the colony devolved on him in consequence of General Murray having to proceed to England. In 1770, having obtained leave of absence, Carleton came to England. He was appointed colonel of the 47th foot 2 April 1772, and raised to the rank of major-general on 25 May following. In June 1774 he was examined before the House of Commons regarding the Quebec bill, which, after considerable opposition, became law in the same session. This act, which it