“The Displeasure of our Honoured Masters”

Sir Francis Dashwood, baronet, served as chancellor of the exchequer in the government of the Earl of Bute. That went poorly for both of them, and Dashwood’s tenure lasted less than a year.

After leaving government, Dashwood made his case for inheriting the Despencer barony, the oldest in Britain not held by a peer with a higher title. That peerage gave him a guaranteed seat in the House of Lords.

Toward the end of 1766 the new Baron le Despencer was appointed one of the two postmasters general of the British Empire. This was a sinecure granted to various aristocrats, who in British society of the time usually failed upward.

In that year the other postmaster general was the Earl of Hillsborough, who was soon made Secretary of State for the colonies. The next appointee was the fourth Earl of Sandwich, who had previously been First Lord of the Admiralty and Secretary of State for the Northern Department (i.e., northern Europe) and would hold both those posts again.

Despencer, in contrast, kept the job of postmaster general until his death in 1781. He may not have totally ignored the job, though the real work was done by department secretaries Henry Potts (d. 1768) and Anthony Todd (1717–1798, shown above). That situation made Despencer a boss of the two deputy postmasters general for the colonies: John Foxcroft of New York and Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania.

Franklin had held that appointment since 1753. He had been quite successful, even making the American postal service profitable for the first time. By the mid-1760s Franklin was living full-time in London, focusing on representing Pennsylvania and other colonies to Parliament, but he continued to manage the postal system with Foxcroft. It brought him a valuable income.

Within the British government’s system of patronage appointments, that meant Franklin had a strong incentive to keep the Baron le Despencer happy. Sucking up to your bosses never hurt. Neither did sucking up to lords. And when those lords were your bosses, you went all out.

As a taste of how this worked, in February 1769 Foxcroft wrote to Franklin from Virginia, reporting that he and Gen. Thomas Gage had disagreed about when a packet ship should sail. Even though the regulations gave Foxcroft the authority to make that decision, Hillsborough took Gage’s side. “I have fallen under the Displeasure of our Honoured Masters,” Foxcroft lamented. “I hope my Dear Friend that you will be able to prevent any disagreable consequences taking place from this unfortunate mistake.”

We don’t know what happened next, but Foxcroft kept his appointment—probably because Hillsborough had moved on to the Colonial Office. Sandwich was a navy man, after all, and might not have gone out of his way for army concerns. When the system ran on personal favors and connections, a change of person could mean a lot.

As part of keeping the bosses in good humor, Franklin appears to have helped with Despencer’s agricultural experiments. He got favors in return, such as an invitation to dine on a buck from one of the postmasters’ estates. But those interactions were arranged through the secretaries, not directly.

TOMORROW: Forging a more personal connection.