George Anselm Touchet
| Anselm OSB | |
|---|---|
| Chaplain to the Queen Catherine of Braganza | |
| Installed | 1671 |
| Term ended | 1678 |
| Orders | |
| Ordination | 1643 |
| Personal details | |
| Born | George Touchet Stalbridge, Dorset, England |
| Died | c. 1689 |
| Denomination | Roman Catholic |
| Parents | Mervyn Tuchet Elizabeth Brydges |
George Anselm Touchet, also spelt Tuchet, (born after 1618 – died 1689 or earlier) was an English Roman Catholic monk who was chaplain of Catherine of Braganza, consort of Charles II, from 1671 till his banishment in 1675.[1]
The second son of Mervyn Tuchet, 2nd Earl of Castlehaven, by his marriage to Elizabeth Barnham, and a younger brother of James Tuchet, 3rd Earl of Castlehaven, Touchet began life as George Tuchet in Stalbridge, Dorset. In 1631, his father was convicted and executed for various sexual crimes, including rape and sodomy.[2] In 1643 Touchet became a Benedictine at St Gregory's, Douai, and was clothed a monk under the name of Anselm. After the Restoration of the Stuarts he was made chaplain to Queen Catherine, with an apartment at St James's Palace and subsequently another at Somerset House, and with an allowance of £100 a year.
Touchet's Historical collections, a work of Catholic controversy, appeared in 1674, and he was banished from England the following year. The 1678 private act of Parliament reversing his father's attainder, Baron Audley of Hely (Restoration of Honour) Act 1677 (29 & 30 Cha. 2. c. 17 Pr.), specifically excluded him from succeeding to his elder brother's peerages and estates, which in 1684 passed to their younger brother, Mervyn.[3] An abridged version of his manuscript translation of a devotional work by the French mystic Constantine Barbanson (1581–1632) was published in 1928 as The Secret Paths of Divine Love.[4]
Works
- Historical collections out of several grave Protestant historians concerning the changes of religion and the strange confusions following from thence, 1674. Reissued 'with an Addition' in 1686.
- The Secret Paths of Divine Love, 1928. Tr. from French of Constantine Barbanson, abridged by a nun of Stanbrook Abbey, ed. with introduction by Dom Justin McCann
From the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia
George Anselm Touchet — Born at Stalbridge, Dorset; died about 1689. He was second son of Mervyn, twelfth Lord Audley, second Earl of Castlehaven, and a man of profligate life; his first wife was Elizabeth Barnham. He was professed as a Benedictine at St. Gregory's, Douai, 22 Nov., 1643, taking the name Anselm in religion. Being sent on the mission in the south of England, he was finally appointed chaplain to Queen Catherine of Braganza in 1671. In that capacity he lived at Somerset House till 1675, when he was banished.
Dodd states that he was expressly excluded from the succession to the Earldom of Castlehaven by the Act of Parliament which in 1678 confirmed the earldom to his elder brother James. While living in London he published a book called "Historical Collections out of several grave Protestant Historians concerning the Changes in religion, and the strange confusions following, etc." (1674; 2nd ed., 1686), and in 1680 he issued "The Secret Paths of Divine Love", translated by him from the French of Constantine Barbason.
DODD, Church History, III (Brussels vere Wolverhampton, 1737-1742); KIRK, Biographies of English Catholics (London, 1909); OLIVER, Collections (London, 1857); WELDON, Chronological Notes (London, 1881); SNOW, Necrology of the English Benedictines (London, 1883); COOPER in Dict. Nat. Biog.; GILLOW, Bibl. Dict. Eng. Cath.
Edwin Burton.
References
- Back to citation George Anselm Touchet
- Back to citation Thompson Cooper, ‘Touchet, George (d. before 1689?)’, rev. Dom Aidan Bellenger, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004, accessed 10 Jan 2009
- Back to citation 29 & 30 Cha. 2. c. 17 Pr.; printed as "Fourth Report, Appendix no. 3", Lords Committees Touching the Dignity of a Peer of the Realm (18 May 1829) Reports Vol II, p. 346; The Complete Peerage 2nd ed. Vol 1 p 394
- Back to citation Michael Mullett, in his introduction to facsimile extracts from Historical collections, claims The Secret Paths of Divine Love was published by the Ascetical Society in 1858. Mullett, Michael A., ed., English Catholicism 1680-1830. Volume I. English Catholic Writings on Religious Controversies 1685-1736, 2006, pp. 217-8