396 BUCKINGHAM he was removed, 7 June following, to Westm. Abbey, when the Barony of Ros, inherited from his mother, fell into abeyance, and the Peerages con- ferred on his father (excepting, perhaps, as to the reversion of the Earldom, Viscountcy and Barony under the patent of 14 Mar. 161 6/7) became extinct. Admon. as "late of Helmsley, co. York," 2 May 1687, and 5 Mar. 1719/20. His widow, who was b. 30 July, and bap. i Aug. 1638, at St. Mary's, Bishophill, York, d. 20, and was bur. 30 Oct. 1704, at Westm. Abbey, in her 67th year. Admon. 7 Nov. 1704. EARLDOM . 3. John Villiers, otherwise Danvers, calling yj himself Viscount Purbeck. and Baron Stoke, and, subsequently (1687) Earl of Buckingham, ^c., being, 1687. if the legitimacy of his descent be allowed, cousin and h., according to the spec. lim. in the patent of that Earldom, dat. 14 Mar. 1616/7. He was s. and h. of Robert Villiers, also styling himself Viscount Purbeck, ^c, who was s. and h. of Robert Danvers, otherwise Villiers, otherwise Wright, who disclaimed his right to the Peerage; the said last-named Robert being son (though said to be a bastard) of Frances, Viscountess Purbeck (da. of Sir Edward Coke, Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench), born in the lifetime of her husband, John (Villiers), ist Viscount Purbeck, on whom and the heirs male of his body the reversion of the Earldom of Buckingham, i^c, was entailed by the patent of i6i7.(^) He was h. 1677, and, when 7 years old, was, on his father's death, styled " Viscount Purbeck, 6t'c." Ed. at Eton. In a petition to the House of Commons, dat. 6 May 1702, he describes himself as "John Villers," claiming the title He was utterly ruined in reputation, and probably, very considerably, in means, though not to the extent attributed in the effective lines on his death-bed in Pope's Moral Essays : — " In the worst Inn's worst room, with mat half hung, The floor of plaster, and the walls of dung, On once a flock bed but repaired with straw, With tape-tied curtains never meant to draw, The George and Garter dangling from that bed, Where tawdry yellow strove with dirty red, Great Villiers lies." In Spence's Anecdotes a still more discreditable death-bed is attributed to him. But the fact appears to be that " He died in the best house in Kirkby Moorside, which neither is nor ever was an alehouse." (J. Gibson to Brian Fairfax, 27 Feb. 1706/7. Hist. MSS. Com., 6th Rep., App., p. 467). G.E.C. and V.G. C) See under " Purbeck," Viscountcy {cr. 1619), an account of the attempt to bar the right of [that] Peerage by a fine, a right not acknowledged by the House of Lords, which, however, somewhat inconsistently, refused to recognise any succession to that dignity. It must, however, be admitted that their ground for so doing appears to have been (the debatable one of) adulterine bastardy.
