Charles Calvert, 3rd Baron Baltimore

Charles Calvert, 3rd Baron Baltimore (August 27, 1637 – February 21, 1715) was an English colonial administrator. He inherited the province of Maryland in 1675 upon the death of his father, Cecil Calvert, 2nd Baron Baltimore. He had been his father's Deputy Governor since 1661 when he arrived in the colony at the age of 24. However, Charles left Maryland for England in 1684 and would never return. The events following the Glorious Revolution in England in 1688 would cost Calvert his title to Maryland; in 1689 the royal charter to the colony was withdrawn, leading to direct rule by the British Crown. Calvert's political problems were largely caused by his Roman Catholic faith which was at odds with the established Church of England.

Calvert married four times, outliving three wives, and had at least two children. He died in England in 1715 at the age of 78, his family fortunes much diminished. With his death he passed his title, and his claim to Maryland, to his second son Benedict Calvert, 4th Baron Baltimore (1679–1715), his eldest son Cecil having died young. However, Benedict Calvert would outlive his father by just two months, and it would fall to Charles' grandson, Charles (1699–1751), who converted to the Anglican faith, to see the family proprietorship in the Province of Maryland restored by the king.

Early life

Charles was born in England on August 27, 1637, and witnessed the religious conflicts of the English Civil War. His father, Cecil Calvert, 2nd Baron Baltimore (1605–1675), was the first Proprietor Governor of Maryland, and 9th Proprietor Governor of Newfoundland (including "Avalon", the Calvert's earliest colony). His mother was Anne Arundell, (/16–1649), daughter of the 1st Baron Arundell of Wardour (1550–1639).

Anne and Cecil were married in 1627 or 1628, and had nine children. However, only two of Charles' siblings survived to adulthood, and Anne herself died in 1649 when the young Charles was just 12 years old.

Maryland

Political background

The Calvert family were Roman Catholics and had founded Maryland as a colony where Catholics and Nonconformist Protestants as well as members of the established Church of England could live together in peace. Cecil Calvert, 2nd Baron Baltimore (1605–1675), had received the proprietorship that was intended for his father, George, who died in 1632 at age 53, shortly before it was granted. Cecil established his colony in Maryland from his home in England, (but sent his younger brother Leonard (1606–1647), as first colonial governor, and as a Roman Catholic continued the legacy of his father by promoting religious tolerance in the colony. He governed Maryland for forty-two years, though he never visited his colony in person.

In 1649, the General Assembly of Maryland, the decade-old colonial legislature passed the Maryland Toleration Act, also known as the "Act Concerning Religion, a law mandating religious tolerance for trinitarian Christians". Passed on September 21, 1649 by the Assembly of the Maryland colony, it was the first law requiring religious tolerance in the British North American colonies. The Calvert family sought enactment of the law to protect Catholic and other Trinitarian Christians who did not conform to the established Church of England. Religious toleration lasted for approximately 40 years until it was revoked during the Protestant Revolution of 1689. From 1689 until 1776, Maryland was officially Anglican.

Arrival in Maryland

Charles Calvert sailed to Maryland in 1661 as a young man of 24, becoming the first of the Barons Baltimore to take personal charge of the colony. He was appointed deputy governor by his father and, when Cecil Calvert died in 1675, Charles inherited Maryland, becoming governor in his own right. Some time before 1666 he was married to Mary Darnall, daughter of Ralph Darnall, and the first of Calvert's four wives. The Darnall family were wealthy Maryland planters, and also Roman Catholics. Tragically, Mary did not live long; she died in childbirth sometime before 1667.

Charles was not slow to find a new bride. In 1667, he was married a second time, to Jane Lowe (1644–1693/4), the widow of Colonel Henry Sewall of St Mary's County, Maryland, daughter of Vincent Lowe and his wife Anne Cavendish. In late 1667 or early 1668, they had a son, Cecil.

Economic problems

Calvert's life as governor was aggravated by growing economic problems. From the 1660s onwards, the price of tobacco, the staple crop of Maryland and its chief source of export income, began a long slide, causing economic hardship especially among the poor.

Much conflict between Calvert and his subjects turned on the question of how far English law should be applied in Maryland, and to what degree the proprietary government might exercise its own prerogative outside of the law. Delegates to the assembly wished to establish the "full force and power" of the law but Calvert, ever protective of his prerogative, insisted that only he and his councillors might decide where and when English law should apply. Such uncertainty could and did permit the charge of arbitrary government. He also restricted election to Maryland's House of Delegates to those who owned at least 1,000 acres (4 km2) of land. In 1676 he directed the voters to return half as many delegates to the assembly, two instead of four. Measures like these might make the assembly easier to manage, but they tended to strain relations between Calvert and his subjects. their legal status was initially unclear and colonial courts tended to rule that a slave who accepted Christian baptism should be freed. In order to protect the rights of their owners, laws began to be passed to clarify the legal position. However, the impact of such laws would not be felt for some time, as large scale importation of Africans to Maryland would not begin until the 1690s.

By this time the political fabric of the province was starting to tear. The governor of Virginia reported that "Maryland is now in torment...and in great danger of falling in pieces". Relations between the governing council and the assembly grew increasingly poor. Underlying much of the rancour was the continued slide in the price of tobacco, which by the 1680s had fallen 50% in 30 years. both to defend himself in the dispute with Penn as well as to answer charges that he favoured Catholics in the colony.

Protestant Revolution in Maryland

Meanwhile, Maryland Protestants, by now a substantial majority in the colony, feeding on rumors from England and fearing Popish plots, began to organize rebellion against the proprietary government. Governor Joseph did not improve the situation by refusing to convene the assembly and, ominously, recalling weapons from storage, ostensibly for repair. Darnall, heavily outnumbered, later wrote: "Wee being in this condition and no hope left of quieting the people thus enraged, to prevent effusion of blood, capitulated and surrendered."

Calvert's second wife, Jane, died around 1693 or 1694, and Calvert married a third time, to Mary Bankes, some time between 1701 and 1710. His fourth and final marriage was to Margaret Charleton, daughter of Thomas Charleton, in 1712.

Calvert may also have had an illegitimate son, Charles Calvert Lazenby, born in England in 1688, who would grow up to have a career in the army and later become Governor of Maryland in his own right.

Captain Calvert's parents have never been positively identified but it has long been assumed that his father was the 3rd Baron Baltimore. This assumption appears to be supported in scholar Anne Yentsch's book by the fact that Captain Calvert was granted lands by the 3rd Baron Baltimore, which he then exchanged for a military commission. Likewise, the 5th Baron Baltimore, son of Benedict Leonard Calvert Sr., placed his older cousin as governor of the Maryland Province after he assumed the title at the young age of 15. His mother's identity is also unknown but, judging by the Calvert family papers, she appears to have been the Countess Henrietta, also known as "Mother Calvert", who died circa 1728. However, Douglas Richardson's Plantagenet Ancestry: A Study In Colonial And Medieval Families, 2nd Edition, p. 467, does not list Lazenby as an illegitimate child of the 3rd Baron; nor any others.

Calvert's residence in England was his family's estate at Woodcote Park in Surrey. Around 1712, Woodcote was described by Celia Fiennes: Lord Baltimores in Woodcut Green encompassed with a wall at the entrance, a breast wall with pallisadoes, large courts one within the other, and a back way to the stables where there is a pretty horse pond; the house is old but low, though large run over much ground; as I drove by the side saw broad chimneys on the end and at due distance on the side on both ends the sides of a court which terminated in a building on which there is a lead with railes and barristers. Accordingly, he abandoned Rome and converted to Anglicanism, deciding to "embrace the protestant religion", and gambling that this move would win back his family's lost fortune in the New World. Unfortunately, before the king could rule on the petition, Benedict died, just two months after his father, passing on his title in turn to his son Charles.