Add MS 78256-78257

EVELYN PAPERS. Vols. LXXXIX, XC. Letters and papers of Robert Long (afterw. 1^st Bart) as secretary of state and privy councillor to Charles II when Prince of Wales; 1646-1649, n.d. The status of these as confiscated royalist papers amongst Council of State records is more certain. A trunk of Long’s papers was seized when Jersey (where Charles II had stayed on his flight from England in 1646) fell to the parliamentary forces in December 1651, and referred by the Council of State to the Committee of Examinations (CSPD 1651-1652, p. 223: 20 April 1652). Two itemized lists are at Stowe MS 184, ff. 189-223; the corresponding numbers, where these are endorsed, are noted in brackets against the documents listed below. Several are docketed ‘Pervsed’. A further item from this source is now amongst the albums of William Upcott in Add. MS 78690 below. Long was appointed secretary to the Prince in 1646, but came under recurrent suspicion of disloyalty. His dismissal, and replacement by Sir Edward Hyde, was precipitated by the seizure of his papers at Jersey. He was restored to Exchequer office and created baronet after the Restoration. For further correspondence and papers of Long, see Add. MS 37047, including papers relating to the seizure of the trunk and his dismissal, and HMC Pepys MSS, including some of the papers seized, possibly deriving from Sir Richard Browne’s collection of these.

Two volumes.