Vice Admiral Sir John Mennes (with variant spellings, 1 March 1599 – 18 February 1671) was an English naval officer, who went on to be
Comptroller of the Navy
The post of Controller of the Navy (abbreviated as CofN) was originally created in 1859 when the Surveyor of the Navy's title changed to Controller of the Navy. In 1869 the controller's office was abolished and its duties were assumed by that of ...
. He was also considered a wit. His comic and satirical verses, written in correspondence with
James Smith, were published in 1656. He figures prominently in the
Diary of Samuel Pepys
Samuel Pepys (; 23 February 1633 – 26 May 1703) was an English diarist and naval administrator. He served as administrator of the Royal Navy and Member of Parliament and is most famous for the diary he kept for a decade. Pepys had no mariti ...
, who reported directly to Mennes at the Navy Office and thought him an incompetent civil servant, but a delightful social companion.
Career
Mennes was the third son of Andrew Mennes of
Sandwich, Kent
Sandwich is a town and civil parish in the Dover District of Kent, south-east England. It lies on the River Stour and has a population of 4,985. Sandwich was one of the Cinque Ports and still has many original medieval buildings, including sev ...
and Jane Blechnden.
[
Educated at his local grammar school in Sandwich, and ]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 12th ...
, Mennes went to sea and in 1620 saw action off Dominica
Dominica ( or ; Kalinago: ; french: Dominique; Dominican Creole French: ), officially the Commonwealth of Dominica, is an island country in the Caribbean. The capital, Roseau, is located on the western side of the island. It is geographically ...
, fighting Spanish warships.[John Mennes at Oxford Dictionary of National Biography]
In 1628 he was given command of and later of , HMS ''Red Lion'', , , and .[ In August 1641 he took ]Queen Henrietta Maria
Henrietta Maria (french: link=no, Henriette Marie; 25 November 1609 – 10 September 1669) was Queen of England, Scotland, and Ireland from her marriage to King Charles I on 13 June 1625 until Charles was executed on 30 January 1649. She was ...
to safety in Hellevoetsluis
Hellevoetsluis () is a small city and municipality in the western Netherlands. It is located in Voorne-Putten, South Holland. The municipality covers an area of of which is water and it includes the population centres Nieuw-Helvoet, Nieuwenhoorn ...
in the Netherlands
)
, anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau")
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, subdivision_type = Sovereign state
, subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands
, established_title = Before independence
, established_date = Spanish Netherl ...
and was knighted by King Charles I for doing so. In July 1642 he refused to accept the parliamentary takeover of the fleet.[
In 1643, once the King had lost the Navy, Mennes transferred to the Army and became a general of artillery and in 1644 he became Governor of North Wales.][ In 1645 he was appointed Commander-in-Chief at the Downs until 1649. In 1650 he left England to join the exiled Court abroad.][
]
Mennes and Pepys
In November 1661, after the Restoration of the monarchy, Mennes was appointed Vice Admiral and Commander in Chief in the Narrow Seas, Captain of and commander of the fleet taking the Earl of Peterborough to occupy English Tangier
English Tangier was the period in Moroccan history in which the city of Tangier was occupied by England as part of the English colonial empire from 1661 to 1684. Tangier had been under Portuguese control before King Charles II acquired the c ...
. This appears to have been his last active commission. Before the voyage he had been appointed Comptroller of the Navy
The post of Controller of the Navy (abbreviated as CofN) was originally created in 1859 when the Surveyor of the Navy's title changed to Controller of the Navy. In 1869 the controller's office was abolished and its duties were assumed by that of ...
.[ ]Samuel Pepys
Samuel Pepys (; 23 February 1633 – 26 May 1703) was an English diarist and naval administrator. He served as administrator of the Royal Navy and Member of Parliament and is most famous for the diary he kept for a decade. Pepys had no mariti ...
as Clerk of the Acts
The Clerk of the Acts, originally known as the Keeper of the King's Ports and Galleys, was a civilian officer in the Royal Navy and a principal member of the Navy Board. The office was created by King Charles II in 1660 and succeeded the earlier ...
reported directly to Mennes, whom he described as "ill at ease" in this role, which in fairness to Mennes was described as "impossibly burdensome". When Pepys was exasperated by Mennes's incompetence, as he all too frequently was, he would refer to him in his Diary as a "coxcomb", "dolt", "dotard" and "old fool". Outside office hours, however, Pepys admitted that Mennes's skills as a poet and mimic made him the best of company. He describes a memorable evening when Mennes and John Evelyn
John Evelyn (31 October 162027 February 1706) was an English writer, landowner, gardener, courtier and minor government official, who is now best known as a diarist. He was a founding Fellow of the Royal Society.
John Evelyn's diary, or memo ...
engaged in a mimicry contest; Mennes with generosity admitted that Evelyn was the winner. Pepys's kindest judgement on him (when he was wrongly thought to be dying in 1666) was that he was a "good, honest, harmless gentleman, but not fit for office". Dissatisfaction with Mennes became general and sporadic efforts were made by his colleagues to have him removed, but without success. It is generally thought that he owed his survival to the increasingly bitter attacks on the Navy Board in the House of Commons
The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. ...
: the King was reluctant to sacrifice Mennes, as this might have facilitated an all-out attack on the administration of one of the most important Departments of State. Even Pepys was prepared in 1670 to defend Mennes in public before the House of Commons as a man of great integrity, who had worn out his health in the service of the Crown.
He died in London in 1671, aged 71, while still in the post of Controller. The bulk of his estate passed to his nephew Francis Hammond.[
]
Poetry
Mennes's verses appeared in 1656 in a collection entitled ''Musarum Deliciæ or the Muses's Recreation''. They appear to have been written for amusement in correspondence with James Smith, whose replies were included, both being light and satirical in tone. The publisher, Henry Herringman
Henry Herringman (1628–1704) was a prominent London bookseller and publisher in the second half of the 17th century. He is especially noted for his publications in English Renaissance drama and English Restoration drama; he was the first publis ...
, stated that he collected the poems from "Sir John Mennis " ic and Dr. Smith's drollish intercourses". Another anthology, ''Wit Restored'', appeared in 1658, with verse letters from Smith to Mennes, "then commanding a troop of horse against the Scots". Another piece was written to Mennes "on the Surrender of Conway Castle".
A satirical poem on John Suckling's feeble military efforts at the Battle of Newburn
The Battle of Newburn, also known as The Battle of Newburn Ford, took place on 28 August 1640, during the Second Bishops' War. It was fought at Newburn, just outside Newcastle, where a ford crossed the River Tyne. A Scottish Covenanter army o ...
is attributed to Mennes. Mennes was himself satirised by John Denham John Denham may refer to:
* John Denham (died 1556 or later), English MP for Shaftesbury
* John Denham (judge), (1559–1639), father of the poet below, and one of the Ship Money judges
* John Denham (poet) (1615–1669), English poet
* John Denham ...
, whose poem about Mennes going from Calais to Boulogne to "eat a pig" is mentioned by Samuel Pepys
Samuel Pepys (; 23 February 1633 – 26 May 1703) was an English diarist and naval administrator. He served as administrator of the Royal Navy and Member of Parliament and is most famous for the diary he kept for a decade. Pepys had no mariti ...
in his diary.
Shakespeare anecdote
According to Thomas Plume
Thomas Plume (1630 – 20 November 1704) was an English churchman and philanthropist, and founder of a library in Maldon, Essex which still exists. The Plume School in Maldon is named after him.
Family life
The Plume family settled in the county ...
, Mennes told him he had once met William Shakespeare's father John Shakespeare
John Shakespeare (c. 1531 – 7 September 1601) was an English businessman in Stratford-upon-Avon and the father of William Shakespeare. He was a glover and whittawer ( leather worker) by trade. Shakespeare was elected to several municipal ...
– a "merry cheeked old man" who said of his son that "Will was a good honest fellow, but he durst have cracked a jest with him at any time". Katherine Duncan-Jones
Katherine Dorothea Duncan-Jones, (13 May 1941 – 16 October 2022) was an English literature and Shakespeare scholar. She was a Fellow of New Hall, Cambridge (1965–1966) and then Somerville College, Oxford (1966–2001). She was also Professo ...
points out that this is impossible, as Mennes was two years old when John Shakespeare died. She thinks Plume may have been recording an anecdote related by Mennis about his father.[Katherine Duncan-Jones, ''Ungentle Shakespeare: Scenes from His Life'', Cengage Learning EMEA, 2001, p. 8.]
Family
In 1641 Mennes married Jane Liddel (died 1662), perhaps as his second wife. They had no children.[ In his later years, according to Pepys, Mennes's widowed sister Mary Hammon or Hammond (died 1668), mother of Francis Hammond, kept house for him. In addition to his nephew Francis, he had at least two nieces to whom he left legacies; his niece Elizabeth Hammond was his ]executrix
An executor is someone who is responsible for executing, or following through on, an assigned task or duty. The feminine form, executrix, may sometimes be used.
Overview
An executor is a legal term referring to a person named by the maker of a ...
.
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mennes, John
1599 births
1671 deaths
17th-century Royal Navy personnel
Royal Navy vice admirals
Alumni of Corpus Christi College, Oxford
English male poets
Knights Bachelor