John Hampden: Difference between revisions

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'''John Hampden''' (c. 1595—1643) was an English statesman, the eldest son of William Hanipden, of Great Hampden in [[Buckinghamshire]], a descendant of a very ancient family of that county, said to have been established there before the [[Norman conquest]], and of Elizabeth, second daughter of Sir Henry Cromwell, and aunt of [[Oliver Cromwell]].

By his father’s death, when he was but a child, he became the owner of a large estate and a ward of the crown. He was educated at the grammar school at [[Thame]], and on [[March 30]] [[ 1610]] became a commoner of [[Magdalen College, Oxford]]. In [[1613]] he was admitted as a student of the [[Inner Temple]]. He first sat in parliament for the borough of [[Grampound]], [[Cornwall]] in [[1621]], later representing [[Wendover]] in the first three parliaments of [[Charles I of England|Charles I]], Buckinghamshire in the [[Short Parliament]] of [[1640]], and Wendover again in the [[Long Parliament]]. In the early days of his parliamentary career he was content to be overshadowed by [[John Eliot]], as in its later days he was content to be overshadowed by [[John Pym]] and to be commanded by [[Robert Devereux, 3rd Earl of Essex|Essex]]. Yet it is Hampden, and not Eliot or Pym, who lives in the popular imagination as the central figure of the English revolution in its earlier stages. It is Hampden whose statue rather than that of Eliot or Pym has been selected to take its place in [[Westminster]] as the noblest type of the parliamentary opposition, as Falkland’s has been selected as the noblest type of parliamentary royalism.

Something of Hampden’s fame no doubt is owing to the position which he took up as the opponent of [[ship money]]. But it is hardly possible that even resistance to ship money would have so distinguished him but for the mingled massiveness and modesty of his character, his dislike of all pretences in himself or others, his brave contempt of danger, and his charitable readiness to shield others as far as possible from the evil consequences of their actions. Nor was he wanting in that skill which enabled him to influence men towards the ends at which he aimed, and which was spoken of as subtlety by those who disliked his ends.