Beilby Porteus (1731 - 1809)

Born 8 May 1731 in York, Yorkshire, England

Ancestors

Died 13 May 1809 at age 78 in Fulham Palace, Fulham, Middlesex, England

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Biography

Beilby Porteus is Notable.

Beilby was born in 1731. He was the son of Robert Porteus and Elizabeth Jennings. He passed away in 1809.

He was married to Margaret Hodgson. There is no record of them having any children.

Beilby is the 5th Great Grand Uncle of Queen Elizabeth II and the 6th Great Grand Uncle of current King Charles III.^[1]

Porteus was born in York on 8 May 1731, the youngest of the 19 children of Elizabeth Jennings and Robert Porteus (d. 1758/9), a planter. Although the family was of Scottish ancestry, his parents were Virginian planters who had returned to England in 1720 as a result of the economic difficulties in the province and for the sake of his father's health. Educated at York and at Ripon Grammar School, he was a classics scholar at Christ's College, Cambridge, becoming a fellow in 1752. In 1759 he won the Seatonian Prize for his poem Death: A Poetical Essay, a work for which he is still remembered.

He was ordained as a priest in 1757, and in 1762 was appointed as domestic chaplain to Thomas Secker, Archbishop of Canterbury, acting as his personal assistant at Lambeth Palace for six years. It was during these years that it is thought he became more aware of the conditions of the enslaved Africans in the American colonies and the British West Indies. He corresponded with clergy and missionaries, receiving reports on the appalling conditions facing the slaves from Revd James Ramsay in the West Indies and from Granville Sharp, the English lawyer who had supported the cases of freed slaves in England.

In 1769 Beilby Porteus was appointed as chaplain to King George III. He is listed as one of the lenten preachers at the Chapel Royal, Whitehall in 1771, 1773 and 1774. He was also Rector of Lambeth (a living shared between the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Crown) from 1767 to 1777, and later Master of St Cross, Winchester (1776–77).

He was concerned about trends within the Church of England towards what he regarded as the watering-down of the truth of Scripture and stood for doctrinal purity and opposed the anti-subscription movement, composed of theologians and scholars who, as he saw it, would have watered down cardinal Christian doctrines and beliefs and were also in favour of allowing clergy the option of subscribing to the Thirty-Nine Articles. At the same time he was prepared to suggest a compromise of a revision to some of the Articles. Always a Church of England man, he was, however, happy to work with Methodists and dissenters and recognised their major contributions in evangelism and education.

In 1787, Porteus was translated to the bishopric of London on the advice of Prime Minister William Pitt, a position he held until his death in 1809. As is customary, he was also appointed to the Privy Council, and Dean of the Chapel Royal. In 1788, he supported Sir William Dolben's Slave Trade Bill from the bench of bishops, and over the next quarter century he became the leading advocate within the Church of England for the abolition of slavery, lending support to such men as Wilberforce, Granville Sharp, Henry Thornton and Zachary Macaulay to secure the eventual passage of the Slave Trade Act in 1807.

In view of his passionate involvement in the anti-slavery movement and his friendship with other leading abolitionists, it was especially appropriate that, as Bishop of London, he should now find himself with official responsibility for the spiritual welfare of the British colonies overseas. He was responsible for missions to the West Indies, as well as to India, and towards the end of his life personally funded the sending of scriptures in the language of many peoples as far apart as Greenland and India.

Sources

1. ↑ https://www.wikitree.com/index.php?title=Special:Relationship&action=calculate&person1Name=Porteus-157&person2Name=Windsor-21

• Wikipedia: Beilby Porteus

• Dictionary of National Biography: Beilby Porteus

• Oxford Dictionary of National Biography: Porteus Beilby (1731–1809) Andrew Robinson