Stephen Beckingham

Stephen Beckingham
1729 portrait of Beckingham by William Hogarth
Personal details
Bornc. 1690s
London
DiedOctober 5, 1756
Resting placeSt. Mary's Church
Bishopsbourne
OccupationBarrister, judge, hospital governor

Stephen Beckingham (c. 1690s – October 5, 1756) was an English barrister, member of the gentry, and jurist who served as the justice of the peace of Kent.

He is now best known as the bridegroom in William Hogarth's 1729 painting The Wedding of Stephen Beckingham and Mary Cox.

Life

Beckingham was born in the 1690s into the prominent Beckingham family who were associated with London's Inns of Court. Several members of the family accumulated considerable landed wealth in Essex and Kent.[1][2] He grew up in Beckingham Place.[3][4][5]

He was apprenticed in 1715 to George Wheeler of the Inner Temple and educated at Lincoln's Inn, where he was admitted on January 8, 1717.[6][1][2] He later was commissioned as the justice of the peace and presiding judge of Kent.[7] As county magistrate he participated in the administration of justice through the Quarter Sessions, which exercised extensive judicial and administrative authority over eighteenth-century Kent.[8][9][10]

Beckingham was a friend of Thomas Cooke who dedicated his 1753 Ode on Benevolence to him.[4]

Outside of his judicial obligations, Beckingham was also an early patron and governor of the Foundling Hospital, chartered by George II.[11][12] Beckingham is listed in records as "Sir Stephen Beckingham" after 1740.[13][14]

Marriages

In January 1729, Beckingham married Mary Cox at St. Benet's, Paul's Wharf.[15][16][17] Their wedding was a prominent society event at the time, widely attended, and was painted by William Hogarth.[18][19][6] In 1730, Beckingham and Cox had one son, Stephen Beckingham VI who also worked as a lawyer.[20][21][22] Mary Cox Beckingham died in 1738.[2]

In October 1739, Beckingham married his second wife, Mary Catherine Corbett at the Bishopsbourne church in Kent.[23][24][25] After marrying Corbett, Beckingham moved to her family's ancestral home of Bourne Place.[1][26] Together, they had one son, Reverend John Charles Beckingham, who entered the Church of England and became rector of Upper Hardres.[27][28] They also had two daughters, Catherine and Charlotte.[7]

When he purchased the remaining shares of Bourne Place in 1752, he was styled as Lord of the Manor of Bourne. As lord of the manor, he exercised the traditional manorial rights attached to the estate, including the holding of the Court Baron and Court Leet.[7]

Death

Beckingham died on October 5, 1756, and is interred at St. Mary's Church in Bishopsbourne.[29] His obituary appeared in The London Magazine shortly after his death.[9][1][30]

His granddaughter, Louisa, married Edward Taylor, the member of parliament for Canterbury.[31][28]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Baetjer, Katharine (2009). British Paintings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1575-1875. Metropolitan Museum of Art. ISBN 978-1-58839-348-7.
  2. 1 2 3 "Stephen Beckingham the Elder, 1693-1756". Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art.
  3. ↑ Foster, Joseph (1889). The Register of Admissions to Gray's Inn, 1521-1889. Priv. print. by the Hansard Pub. Union.
  4. 1 2 The Gentleman's Magazine and Historical Chronicle. 1797.
  5. ↑ Tymms, Samuel; White, Charles Harold Evelyn (1896). The East Anglian, Or, Notes and Queries on Subjects Connected with the Counties of Suffolk, Cambridge, Essex and Norfolk. S. Tymms.
  6. 1 2 "The Wedding of Stephen Beckingham and Mary Cox". Metropolitan Museum of Art.
  7. 1 2 3 Hasted, Edward (1800). The History and Topographical Survey of the County of Kent (PDF). Vol. 9 (2nd ed.). W. Bristow.
  8. ↑ The Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Museum. 1937.
  9. 1 2 The London Magazine, Or, Gentleman's Monthly Intelligencer. R. Baldwin. 1756.
  10. ↑ Ireland, William Henry. "A new and complete history of the County of Kent; Embellished with a series of views". Bibliotheca Fictiva. 2.
  11. ↑ McClure, Ruth K. (1981). Coram's Children: The London Foundling Hospital in the Eighteenth Century. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-02465-4.
  12. ↑ You are Desired to Meet the Rest of the Governors and Guardians of the Hospital for the Maintenance and Education of Exposed and Deserted Young Children. Foundling Hospital. 1756.
  13. ↑ The Gentleman's and London Magazine: Or Monthly Chronologer, 1741-1794. J. Exshaw. 1741.
  14. ↑ Farrell, James P. (1891). History of the County Longford. Dollard.
  15. ↑ Dobson, Austin. William Hogarth. London, 1902, p. 168
  16. ↑ Georgian England. Exh. cat., Whitechapel Art Gallery. [London], 1906, p. 92, no. 129
  17. ↑ The New Encyclopaedia Britannica. Encyclopaedia Britannica. 1974. ISBN 978-0-85229-290-7.
  18. ↑ "Royal Academy.—Winter Exhibition. (First Notice.—English Pictures.)." Athenæum no. 3454 (January 6, 1894), pp. 21–22
  19. ↑ Masters in Art: Hogarth 3 (1902), p. 39
  20. ↑ "Pompeo Batoni | Portrait of Stephen Beckingham (1730 or 1731–1813) |". Sotheby's. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  21. ↑ Ingamells, John (1997-01-01). A Dictionary of British and Irish Travellers in Italy, 1701-1800. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-07165-8.
  22. ↑ The Record of Old Westminsters: A Biographical List of All Those who are Known to Have Been Educated at Westminster School from the Earliest Times to 1927. Printed at the Chiswick Press. 1928.
  23. ↑ Old Masters. Exh. cat., Royal Academy of Arts. London, Winter 1894, p. 24, no. 98
  24. ↑ Notes and Queries. Oxford University Press. 1933.
  25. ↑ Burke, Bernard (1858). Royal Descents and Pedigrees of Founders' Kin. Harrison.
  26. ↑ Country Life. 1922.
  27. ↑ Burke, John (1838). A genealogical and heraldic history of the extinct and dormant baronetcies of England, by J. and J.B. Burke.
  28. 1 2 Hardy, William John (1909). The Home Counties Magazine: Devoted to the Topography of London, Middlesex, Essex, Herts, Bucks, Berks, Surrey, Kent and Sussex. F.E. Robinson.
  29. ↑ "Some Monumental Inscriptions of Bishopsbourne Church". Kent History & Archaeology. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  30. ↑ Musgrave, Sir William (1899). Obituary Prior to 1800: (as Far as Relates to England, Scotland, and Ireland). Harleian Society.
  31. ↑ "Taylor, Edward (1774-1843), of Bifrons, nr. Canterbury, Kent. History of Parliament Online". historyofparliamentonline.org.
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