Book contents
- Frontmatter
- CONTENTS
- Acknowledgements
- Dedication
- Author's Note
- Introduction
- 1 ‘So Dissipated, Though Well Born and Well-Educated a Youth’
- 2 ‘Unshap'd Monsters of a Wanton Brain!’: 1728–1731
- 3 ‘Court Poet’?: 1732–1735
- 4 ‘Dramatick Satire’: 1736–1739
- 5 ‘Writ in Defence of the Rights of the People’: 1739–1741
- 6 The Political Significance of The Opposition. A Vision
- 7 ‘There are Several Boobies who are Squires’: 1742–1745
- 8 ‘A Strenuous Advocate for the Ministry’: 1745–1748
- 9 ‘A Hearty Well-Wisher to the Glorious Cause of Liberty’: Tom Jones and the Forty-Five
- 10 ‘This Botcher in Law and Politics’: 1749–1754
- Conclusion
- Notes
- Works Cited
- Index
10 - ‘This Botcher in Law and Politics’: 1749–1754
- Frontmatter
- CONTENTS
- Acknowledgements
- Dedication
- Author's Note
- Introduction
- 1 ‘So Dissipated, Though Well Born and Well-Educated a Youth’
- 2 ‘Unshap'd Monsters of a Wanton Brain!’: 1728–1731
- 3 ‘Court Poet’?: 1732–1735
- 4 ‘Dramatick Satire’: 1736–1739
- 5 ‘Writ in Defence of the Rights of the People’: 1739–1741
- 6 The Political Significance of The Opposition. A Vision
- 7 ‘There are Several Boobies who are Squires’: 1742–1745
- 8 ‘A Strenuous Advocate for the Ministry’: 1745–1748
- 9 ‘A Hearty Well-Wisher to the Glorious Cause of Liberty’: Tom Jones and the Forty-Five
- 10 ‘This Botcher in Law and Politics’: 1749–1754
- Conclusion
- Notes
- Works Cited
- Index
Summary
The publication of Tom Jones was not the only circumstance of profound importance in Fielding's life to take place in the winter of 1748–9. ‘My brother and his family are come to Town for the winter’, his sister, Ursula, wrote on 25 October 1748, ‘and have taken a house in Brownlow Street, near Drury Lane where he intends to administer Justice’. He was hearing cases as Justice of the Peace for the City and Liberty of Westminster a week later, and they quickly began to be reported in the newspapers. In the meantime, Fielding changed his lodgings from Brownlow Street to Meard's Court, Wardour Street, in Soho before taking up residence at Bow Street on 9 December. By the end of 1748, then, he was launched on his brief career as a reforming magistrate in the metropolis.
The process had been far from straightforward. Apparently the Earl of Chesterfield had mistakenly recommended that Fielding be entered in the commission of the peace for Middlesex as early as June 1747 although, unfortunately, he was then unable to fulfil the property qualification which required J.P.s to hold property valued at £100 per annum. The matter is explained clearly in a letter from Fielding to the Duke of Bedford dated 13 December 1748:
My Lord,
Such is my Dependence on the Goodness of yr Grace that before my Gout will permit me to pay my Duty to you personally and to acknowledge yr last kind Favour to me, I have the Presumption to solicite yr Grace again.
The Business of a Justice of Peace for Westminster is very inconsiderable without the Addition of that for the County of Middlesex. And without this Addition I can not completely serve the Government in that Office. But this unfortunately requires a Qualification which I want.
Now there is a House belonging to yr Grace which stands in Bedford Street of 70£ a year value. This hath been long untenanted, and will I am informed require abt. 300£ to put in Repair. If yr Grace would have the Goodness to let me have a Lease of this House with some other Tenement worth 30£ a year for 21 years it would be a complete Qualification.
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- Information
- A Political Biography of Henry Fielding , pp. 185 - 202Publisher: Pickering & ChattoFirst published in: 2014