![MillesArms2](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ec/MillesArms2.PNG)
Rev. Jeremiah Milles (1714–1784)
Bodleian Library, Oxford. Accessed 26 November 2016. was President of the
Society of Antiquaries and
Dean of Exeter
The Dean of Exeter is the head of the Chapter of Cathedral Church of Saint Peter in Exeter, England. The chapter was established by William Briwere, Bishop of Exeter (1224–44) who set up the offices of dean and chancellor of Exeter Cathedr ...
between 1762 and 1784. He carried out much internal renovation in
Exeter Cathedral. As part of his antiquarian research into the history of the parishes of Devon he pioneered the use of the research questionnaire, which resulted in the "Dean Milles' Questionnaire", which survives as a valuable source of historical information.
Origins
Jeremiah Milles' father was Rev. Jeremiah Milles (1675–1746), who was a fellow and tutor at Balliol College, Oxford from 1696 to 1705; became Rector of Riseholm, Lincolnshire in 1704; and was rector of
Duloe, Cornwall for 42 years from 1704 until his death. The elder Jeremiah was the son of Rev.
Isaac Milles (1638–1720) (youngest son of Thomas Milles of Carrington's Farm, Cockfield, Suffolk.
[Pishiobury]
Accessed 26 November 2016.), vicar of
Highclere, Hampshire, who was considered the model parish priest of his age – there is a monument to him in Highclere Church. Isaac Milles' eldest son was
Thomas Milles (1671–1740),
Church of Ireland
The Church of Ireland ( ga, Eaglais na hÉireann, ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Kirk o Airlann, ) is a Christian church in Ireland and an autonomous province of the Anglican Communion. It is organised on an all-Ireland basis and is the secon ...
Bishop of Waterford and Lismore
The Bishop of Waterford and Lismore is an episcopal title which takes its name after the city of Waterford and town of Lismore in Ireland. The title was used by the Church of Ireland until 1838, and is still used by the Roman Catholic Church.
Hi ...
. Jeremiah Milles was his nephew and heir.
Youth
Milles was educated at
Eton College
Eton College () is a public school in Eton, Berkshire, England. It was founded in 1440 by Henry VI under the name ''Kynge's College of Our Ladye of Eton besyde Windesore'',Nevill, p. 3 ff. intended as a sister institution to King's College, ...
and
matriculated
Matriculation is the formal process of entering a university, or of becoming eligible to enter by fulfilling certain academic requirements such as a matriculation examination.
Australia
In Australia, the term "matriculation" is seldom used now. ...
in 1729 as a gentleman-commoner at
Corpus Christi College, Oxford
Corpus Christi College (formally, Corpus Christi College in the University of Oxford; informally abbreviated as Corpus or CCC) is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1517, it is the 12t ...
(BA 1733, MA 1735, BD and DD 1747).
In 1733 he went on his first
grand tour
The Grand Tour was the principally 17th- to early 19th-century custom of a traditional trip through Europe, with Italy as a key destination, undertaken by upper-class young European men of sufficient means and rank (typically accompanied by a tut ...
of Europe visiting France and Italy with his cousin, the Rev. Dr.
Richard Pococke
Richard Pococke (19 November 1704 – 25 September 1765)''Notes and Queries'', p. 129. was an English-born churchman, inveterate traveller and travel writer. He was the Bishop of Ossory (1756–65) and Meath (1765), both dioceses of the Church ...
,
anthropologist, travel writer and diarist, later
Bishop of Ossory
The Bishop of Ossory () is an episcopal title which takes its name after the ancient of Kingdom of Ossory in the Province of Leinster, Ireland. In the Roman Catholic Church it remains a separate title, but in the Church of Ireland it has been ...
and
Meath. The two returned from their travels in 1734 earlier than planned to allow Milles to take up Holy Orders and to assume the position of Treasurer of
Lismore Cathedral
St. Moluag's Cathedral is located on the Scottish island of Lismore just off the coast of Oban. As a congregation of the Church of Scotland, which is Presbyterian, the present-day parish church of 1749 stands on the site of the choir of the ab ...
, in the Diocese of their mutual uncle,
Thomas Milles,
Bishop of Waterford and Lismore
The Bishop of Waterford and Lismore is an episcopal title which takes its name after the city of Waterford and town of Lismore in Ireland. The title was used by the Church of Ireland until 1838, and is still used by the Roman Catholic Church.
Hi ...
.
Two years later Rev. Milles and Dr. Pococke set out on their second grand tour, this time visiting the Low Countries, Germany, Austria, Poland & Hungary. Milles returned alone in 1737 to attend the bishop, who was suffering from "the Gravel" (gallstones), leaving his cousin to continue his voyage to the East. Detailed accounts of their travels survive in a large collection of letters to Bishop Milles and Mrs. Pococke, as well as in a number of note-books, all in the
British Library
The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British ...
. Pococke published his travels in his pioneering book, ''A Description of the East'' (1743 & 1745), and the correspondence of the two cousins was published in 2011 as ''Letters from Abroad: The Grand Tour Correspondence of Richard Pococke & Jeremiah Milles''.
Career
Milles became Precentor of Exeter in 1747 and in June 1762 Dean of Exeter, in succession to Dr
Charles Lyttelton Charles Lyttelton may refer to:
* Sir Charles Lyttelton, 3rd Baronet (1628–1716), Governor of Jamaica
*Charles Lyttelton (bishop) (1714–1768), Bishop of Carlisle and antiquary
* Charles Lyttelton, 8th Viscount Cobham (1842–1922), English cric ...
(1714–1768), who had been elected in 1762
Bishop of Carlisle. Lyttelton was President of the
Society of Antiquaries, and had started a period of renovation of the fabric of
Exeter Cathedral. Milles continued the work with great vigour. He succeeded Lyttelton also as President of the Society of Antiquaries from 1768 until his death on 13 February 1784.
Milles completed the renovation of the choir and presbytery planned by his predecessor, and laid new paving in the choir and fitted new wainscotting and choir stalls. These were later removed by Sir
Gilbert Scott, and parts remain in the Deanery. In 1763 Milles removed the grave-stones of former bishops and canons from the floor of the choir and replaced them scattered throughout the aisles to replace worn paving. He was careful to be present when workmen lifted the slabs but nevertheless did not observe one of them slipping into his pocket a sapphire ring found in a coffin. The sharp-eyed bell-toller informed him of the theft and Milles wrote to Lyttleton about the incident: "The workmen I daresay took me for a conjuror for I told them there was a ring taken out of the grave, that they must produce it, and the guilty person immediately drew it out of his pocket". It is now in the collection of the Cathedral Library.
His next project was the re-glazing of the great west window with armorial glass made by William Peckitt of York between 1764 and 1767. The glass was removed in 1904 but some was replaced in the windows of the cloister room in 1922. He ordered much cleaning, colouring, gilding and varnishing in the 1770s and painted the magnificent Bishop's Throne in 1777. He donated three velvet cushions and a new Bible and Book of Common Prayer for use at the altar. In 1772 he had most of the old church plate melted down and re-made, but spared a pair of 1629 flagons and 1693 candlesticks from his renovation. In 1777 he added new pews to the nave to cater for the growing congregations. He was succeeded by Dean Buller.
Parochial Questionnaire
In 1753 when still a prebendary of Exeter
[Fox, Adam]
''Parochial Queries: Printed Questionnaires and the Pursuit of Natural:Knowledge in the British Isles, 1650–1800''
Edinburgh University he sent out a questionnaire to all parishes of the diocese of Exeter, in Devon, generally known as "Dean Milles' Questionnaire" or "Dean Milles' Parochial Questionnaire", the returns to which formed the basis for his "Parochial Collections for Devon" or "A Parochial History of Devon", compiled in 1755, but never published by him as a book as he had intended. The 120 numbered questions on two folio sheets
were very detailed and varied, and concerned the history of the parish and manors within it, the armorials of the leading families, the geology, archaeological remains, colleges, hospitals, agriculture, etc. 15 questions concerned the parish church itself, including descriptions of ancient monuments. The answers were generally supplied by the parish priest or occasionally by the schoolmaster, as for example at Pilton. The 263 returns he received, equating to a 57% response, he bound together with his annotations on each parish into five volumes arranged alphabetically by parish
and these form valuable historical records.
Milles' manuscripts were purchased by the
Bodleian Library at Sotheby's in 1843 for £90.
The original bound returns are in the Bodleian Library, catalogued as "MSS. Top. Devon b. 1–7, c. 6, c. 8–17, c. 19, e. 7–8, Title: Milles Devonshire Manuscripts".
A microfilm copy of the returned questionnaires and a second series of "parochial collections" is in the
Devon Heritage Centre
There are three county record office, local archives covering the Historic counties of England, historic county of Devon, England. The Devon Heritage Centre in Exeter is the main archive. It has a branch office, the North Devon Record Office in ...
in Exeter.
Marriage & issue
On 29 May 1745 he married Edith Potter, youngest daughter of
John Potter (1674–1747)
Archbishop of Canterbury (1737–1747).
They had progeny including:
*Jeremiah III Milles (1751–1797), DL and
Sheriff of Hertfordshire
The High Sheriff of Hertfordshire was an ancient Sheriff title originating in the time of the Angles, not long after the foundation of the Kingdom of England, which was in existence for around a thousand years. On 1 April 1974, under the provis ...
(1786), who married Rose Gardiner (1757–1835) (whose memorial tablet exists in St Mary's Church, Sawbridgeworth), daughter and heiress of Edward Gardiner (d.1779) of
Pishiobury House,
Sawbridgeworth
Sawbridgeworth is a town and civil parish in Hertfordshire, England, close to the border with Essex. It is east of Hertford and north of Epping. It is the northernmost part of the Greater London Built-up Area.
History
Prior to the Norman ...
, Hertfordshire.
Jeremiah III Milles rebuilt the house in 1782–84 to the designs of
James Wyatt
James Wyatt (3 August 1746 – 4 September 1813) was an English architect, a rival of Robert Adam in the neoclassical and neo-Gothic styles. He was elected to the Royal Academy in 1785 and was its president from 1805 to 1806.
Early life
W ...
, and it was illustrated in Neale's ''Views of Seats'' His white marble mural monument by John Ternouth of Pimlico (1795 - 1849), showing a Grecian-style female figure in mournin
together with his funeral hatchment with
Escutcheon (heraldry), inescutcheon of pretence showing the arms of Gardiner ''Or, a chevron gules between three griffin's heads erased azure langued gules'
exists in St Mary's Church, Sawbridgeworth. A pair of portraits of the couple painted 1780–83 by
George Romney (painter), George Romney exists in the collection of the
Huntington Library Art Gallery, California. Their only son Thomas Gardiner Milles died an infant in 1786 and their sole heiress became their daughter Rose Milles (d.1824) who in 1810 married Rowland Alston (b.1782), MP for Hertfordshire 1835-41, 2nd son of Thomas Alston (d.1823) of
Odell Castle, Bedfordshire, nephew and heir of
Sir Rowland Alston, 6th Baronet (d.1790).
[Burke's Landed Gentry, 1937, pp.28–29, pedigrees of Alston of Odell & Alston of The Tofte]
Legacy
Milles was a pioneer of the circulated questionnaire, and until the end of the eighteenth century was the most successful user of the technique as a research tool.
Milles had been a fellow of the
Society of Antiquaries in London since 1741, and it was possibly from his example that James Theobald, the Society's president, proposed the production by the Society of its own questionnaire on natural and civil history "Whereby such gentlemen of learning and industry as should be disposed to promote usefull and entertaining researches of those kinds, might be directed in their choice of materials, and the Society reap the fruits of their labours and knowledge". In June 1754 he read out at the Society a pamphlet entitled "Queries Proposed to Gentlemen in the Several Parts of Great Britain, In hope of obtaining, from their Answers, a better Knowledge of its Antiquities and Natural History".
Notes
References
Further reading
*
* Details of Milles' manuscripts held by the
Bodleian Library, including a list of the questions on his questionnaire.
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Milles, Jeremiah
1714 births
1784 deaths
People educated at Eton College
Alumni of Corpus Christi College, Oxford
Deans of Exeter
English antiquarians
Historians of Devon
Topographers of Devon
Fellows of the Society of Antiquaries of London
Presidents of the Society of Antiquaries of London