Richard Milton

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From "The Family of Milton", by Hugh M. Milton: Richard Milton, son ofHenry and Agnes, was a loyal Pappist and throughout his life resisted the efforts to establish the Church of England. After Elizabeth "I" came to the throne, she strengthened the Church of England by insisting that people of all faiths attend ecumenical services. Attendance was mandatory, and Richard refused and was convicted and fined sixty pounds on two occasions in 1601 as a recusant (a recusant being one who refuse to obey an order or law). Richard's wife, Ellen, had apparently been married previously as record shows her as Jeffreys; nee Bradshaw, Caston, Haughton. The name Jeffreys appears twice in the Milton geology. First, a Ellen Jeffreys had daughter Sarah who became the wife of John (Scriviner) Milton, and secondly, a Ellen Jeffreys who showed to her son-in-law, John the poet, the Haughton Coat of Arms which caused the Milton's to refer to two such designs in Thier Coat of Arms. In the parish records of ALLHOLLOWS, BREAD STREET, LONDON, there appears this entry: The 22d of Feb AD 1610, was buried in this parish Mrs. Ellen J. Jeffries, the mother of Mr. John Milton's wife." (Ref. 4 p.30)

(This is confusing, but I will try to explain my theory. In a previous marriage of Ellen's, Sarah was born, which made her a step sister to John (whom he latter married). Which would mean Richard was previously married and of this marriage were born his four children. There are records in England of a Richard Milton married to Elizabeth Milton. This is all speculation.)

Richard Milton was a substantial man reportedly and under-ranger in the Shotover Forest. He is the only person recorded as being a recusant in Oxfordshire. After 1601 there is nothing recorded of Richard Milton. It is believed that he was buried at Stanton -- Saint -- John.

Richard married Elizabeth Haughton in 1563 in Stanton St. John, Oxfordshire, England. Elizabeth was born in 1535 in Stanton St. John, Oxfordshire, England; died in 1575 in Stanton St. John, Oxfordshire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Richard married Ellen Bradshaw in 1575. Ellen was born in 1540 in England; died on 22 Feb 1608 in All Hallows, Bread Street, Cheapside, London, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

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John, who was keeper of the forest of Shotover, was disinherited by hisfather because he had forsaken the religion of his ancestors. Still, John had recourse for his support to the profession of a scrivener. He was a man eminent for his skill in music, many of his compositions being still to be found; and his reputation in his profession was such, that he grew rich, and retired to an estate. He had probably more than common literature, as his son addresses him in one of his most elaborate Latin poems. He married a gentlewoman of the name of Caston, a Welsh family, by whom he had two sons, John, the poet, and Christopher, who studied the law and adhered, as the law taught him, to the kings party, for which he was a while persecuted; but having by his brothers interest obtained permission to live in quiet, he supported himself so honourably by chamber-practice, that, soon after the accession of King James, he was knighted and made a judge; but, his constitution being too weak for business, he retired before any disreputable compliances became necessary. He had likewise a daughter Anne, whom he married with a considerable fortune to Edward Philips, who came from Shrewsbury, and rose in the Crown-office to be secondary: by him she had two sons, John and Edward, who were educated by the poet, and from whom is derived the only authentic account of his domestic manners.

John had a home at Hammersmith and a country estate at Horton, near Windsor. He was disinherited by his Oxfordshire yeoman father for becoming a Protestant.

John married Sarah Jeffreys in 1600. Sarah (daughter of Paul Jeffreys and Ellen Bradshaw) was born in 1565 in St. Swithin's, London, Middlesex, England; died on 3 Apr 1637 in Horton, Buckinghamshire, England; was buried in Horton, Bucks, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

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John Milton (1608-1674) was one of the greatest poets of the Englishlanguage, best-known for his epic poem PARADISE LOST (1667). Milton's powerful, rhetoric prose and the eloquence of his poetry had an immense influence especially on the 18th-century verse. Besides poems, Milton published pamphlets defending civil and religious rights.

"Of Man's first disobedience, and the fruit
Of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste
Brought death into the world, and all our woe,
With loss of Eden."
(from Paradise Lost)

John Milton was born in London. His mother Sarah Jeffrey was the daughter of a merchant sailor, and his father had risen to prosperity as a scrivener or law writer - he also composed music. The family was wealthy enough to afford a second house in the country. Milton was educated at St Paul's School and then at Christ's College, Cambridge (1625-32), where he was called, half in scorn, "The Lady of Christ's." During his Cambridge period, while considering himself destined for the ministry, he began to write poetry in Latin, Italian, and English. He was expelled for a term after starting a fist fight with his tutor.

On leaving Cambridge Milton had given up his original plan to become a priest. He adopted no profession but spent six years at leisure in his father's home, writing during that time L'ALLEGRO, IL PENSEROSO (1632), COMUS (1634), and LYCIDAS (1637). In 1635 the Miltons moved to Horton, Buckinghamshire, where John pursued his studies in Greek, Latin, and Italian. He traveled in France and Italy in the late 1630s, meeting in Paris the jurist and theologian Hugo Grotius and the astronomer Galileo Galilei in Florence - there are references to Galileo's telescope in Paradise Lost. His conversation with the blind scientist Milton recorded in AREOPAGITICA, which attacked censorship. Milton returned to London in 1639, and set up a school with his nephews and a few others as pupils. The Civil War silenced his poetic work for 20 years. War divided the country as Oliver Cromwell fought against the king, Charles I.

Concerned with the Puritan cause, Milton wrote a series of pamphlets against episcopacy (1642), on divorce (1643), in defense of the liberty of the press (1644), and in support of the regicides (1649). He also served as the secretary for foreign languages in Cromwell's government. After the death of Charles I, Milton published THE TENURE OF KINGS AND MAGISTRATES (1649) supporting the view that the people had the right to depose and punish tyrants.

In 1651 Milton became blind, but like Jorge Luis Borges is our century, blindness helped to stimulate his verbal richness. "He sacrificed his sight, and then he remembered his forst desire, that of geing a poet," Borges wrote in one of his lectures. After the Restoration of Charles II in 1660, he was arrested as a noted defender of the Commonwealth, but was soon released. Besides public burning of EIKONKLASTES and the first DEFENSIO in Paris and Toulouse, Milton escaped from more punishment after Restoration, but he became a relatively poor man. In the 1660s Milton moved with his third wife to what is now Burnhill Row. He spent there the remaining years of his life, apart from a brief visit to Chalfont St Giles in 1665, to avoid the plague. His late poems were dictated to his daughter, nephews, friends, disciples, and paid amanuenses.

Milton was married three times (Mary Powell, 1642; Katherine Woodcock, 1656; Elizabeth Minshull, 1662). His marriages were unhappy. Mary Powell grew bored with the life of a poet soon after the honeymoon was over and went back home where she stayed for three years. Milton wrote his famous essays on divorce. In THE DOCTRINE AND DISCIPLINE OF DIVORCE (1643) Milton argued that a true marriage was of mind as well as of body, and that the chaste and modest were more likely to find themselves 'chained unnaturally together' in unsuitable unions than those who had in youth lived loosely and enjoyed more varied experience. Though Milton was Puritan, morally austere and conscientious, some of his religious beliefs were unconventional to the point of heresy, and came into conflict with the official Puritan stand.

"By labor and intent study (which I take to be my portion in this life), joined with the strong propensity of nature, I might perhaps leave something so written to after-times, as they should not willingly let it die." (from The Reason of Church Government, 1641)
Milton died from 'gout struck in' on November 8, 1674 in Chalfont, St. Giles, Buckinghamshire. He was buried beside his father in St Giles', Cripplegate. Many writers believe that Milton's grave was desecrated when the church was undergoing repairs. All the teeth and 'a large quantity of the hair' were taken as souvenirs by grave robbers. As a writer, Milton's towering figure was recognized early, but his personality and works have continued to arouse discussion. Even T.S. Eliot has attacked the author and described him as one whose sensuousness had been 'withered by book-learning.' Eliot claimed that Milton's poetry 'could only be an influence for the worse.'

The theme of Fall and expulsion from Eden in PARADISE LOST had been in Milton's mind from 1640s. His ambition was to compose an epic poem to rival the works of ancient writers, such as Homer and Virgil. The poem was originally issued in 10 books in 1667, and in 12 books in the second edition of 1674. The troubled times, in which Milton lived, left their mark on his theme of religious conflict.

Paradise Lost is not easy to read with its odd syntax, difficult vocabulary, and complex, noble style. It tells a biblical story of Adam and Eve, with God, and Lucifer (Satan), who is thrown out of Heaven to corrupt humankind. Satan, the most beautiful of the angels, is at his most impressive: he wakes up, on a burning lake in Hell, to find himself surrounded by his stunned followers. He has been defeated in the War of Heaven. "All is not lost; th' unconquerable Will, / And study of revenge, immortal hate, / And courage never to submit or yield... /" Milton created a powerful and sympathetic portrait of Lucifer. This view influenced deeply Romantic poets William Blake and Percy Bysshe Shelley, who saw Satan as the real hero of the poem and a rebel against the tyranny of Heaven. In The Marriage of Heaven and Hell Blake stated that Milton as 'a true Poet, and of the Devil's party without knowing it.' Many other works of art have been inspired by Paradise Lost, among them Joseph Haydn's oratorio The Creation, Alexander Pope's The Rape of the Lock and The Dunciad, John Keat's poem Endymion, Lord Byron's The Vision of Judgment, satanic Sauron in J.R.R. Tolkien's saga The Lord of the Rings.

For further reading: The Miltonic Setting by E.M.W. Tillyard (1938); The Living Milton, ed. by F. Kermode (1960); Milton's Grand Style by C. Ricks (1963); Milton and the English Revolution by C. Hill (1977); also full biographies by D. Masson (1859-94) and W.R. Parker (1968); John Milton, a Literary Life by Cedric C. Brown (1995); Divided Empire: Milton's Political Imagery by Robert Thomas Fallon (1996); Milton Unbound by John P. Rumrich (1966); Eden Renewed: The Public and Private Life of John Milton by Peter Levi (1997); John Milton: The Prose Works by Thomas N. Corns (1998); John Milton: A Comprehensive Research and Study Guide, ed. by Harold Bloom (1999) - Note: Milton appears himself in William Blake's visionary Milton (c. 1814) and in Rober Graves's Wife to Mr Milton (1944) - Note: Alastair Fowler's annotated edition of Paradise Lost is considered among the best guides to Milton's poem - first edition in 1968, second edition in 1998.

Selected works:

ODE ON THE MORNING OF CHRIST'S NATIVITY, 1627
L'ALLEGRO, 1632
IL PENSEROSO, 1632
EPITAPH ON SHAKESPEARE, 1632
ARCADES, 1633
COMUS, 1634
LYCIDAS, 1637
THE REASON OF CHURCH GOVERNMENT, 1641
THE DOCTRINE AND DISCIPLINE OF DIVORCE, 1643
AREOPAGITICA, 1644
POEMS, 1645
THE TELENURE OF KINGS AND MAGISTRATES, 1649
EIKONOKLASTES, 1649
PRO POPULO ANGLICANO DEFENSIO, 1651
THE SECOND DEFENCE OF THE PEOPLE OF ENGLAND, 1654
A TREATISE OF CIVIL POWER IN ECCLESIASTICAL CAUSES, 1659
THE READY AND EASY WAY TO ESTABLISH A FREE COMMONWEALTH, 1660
PARADISE LOST, 1667 - Kadotettu paratiisi, suom. Yrjö Jylhä (1933)
HISTORY OF BRITTAIN, 1670
SAMSON AGONISTES, 1671
PARADISE REGAINED, 1671
A BRIEF HISTORY OF MOSCOVIA, 1682
DE DOCTRINA CHRISTIANA, 1825
COMMONPLACE BOOK, 1874
COMPLETE ENGLISH POEMS, OF EDUCATION, AREOPAGITICA, 1919

John married Mary Powell in May 1642. Mary (daughter of Richard Powell) was born in 1625; died on 5 May 1652. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

John married Katherine Woodcock on 12 Nov 1656. Katherine died on 3 Feb 1658. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

John married Elizabeth Minshull on 24 Feb 1663. Elizabeth died in 1727 in Nantwich. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

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From "A Milton Encyclopedia", vol 5, by Hunter: Lord Christopher had foursons who survived infancy: Christopher, b. 1638 / d. 1668; John, b. 1643 / d. 1669; Thomas, b. 1647; and Richard, b. 1648-52. He was christened on 3 Dec 1615 All Hallows, Bread St. Cheapside, London, England. Christopher was a Judge & Knight for King James II. He was also a Royalist, which his brother John the Poet, was certainly not. Christopher was born a member of the Church of England, but later changed to Roman Catholic.

Christopher married Thomasina Webber about 1635. Thomasina was born in 1617 in London, Middlesex, England; died before 1686 in Ipswich, Suffolk, England; was buried in St. Nicholas Church, Ipswich, Suffolk, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Living. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Unknown. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]