Local Historical Figures

John Milton

John Milton was born in Bread Street in the City of London in December 1608.  He was educated at St. Paul's Church and later at Christ College, Cambridge.  After graduating, he stayed on to study for a Master of Arts Degree in preparation for the priesthood.  However, finding himself in disagreement with the Church, he chose instead to dedicate himself to God through his poetry.

Thus, in 1632 he left Cambridge to go to live with his father at his house in Hammersmith to the west of London, and at Horton, a village in what was then Buckinghamshire.  He then spent the next six years in seclusion, studying and writing the masques "Arcades" and "Comus", together with the more well-known pastoral elegy "Lycidas".

In 1638 he left for a period of travel in Europe, much of it in Italy.  This was cut short by his perception that a civil war was imminent in his homeland, and so he returned to support the puritan cause against the bishops, through a series of polemical writings.  

In the early 1640s, Milton set up his own little school, where he taught the sons of relatives and other wealthy acquaintances; the tract "Of Education" was a product of this period.  It was about this time that he married for the first time, to a sixteen year-old named Mary Powell, who was to bear him 4 children, but died during the birth of the last one. 

In 1649, Milton was appointed by the Commonwealth to be Secretary of Foreign Tongues, ostensibly as it required Milton's extensive knowledge of languages.  In reality, Milton spent much of his time in the post writing propaganda for the Commonwealth and against the monarchy.  The most well-known and celebrated of these was his Defence of the English People.

By this time Milton was feeling the full effects of what was probably glaucoma.  So it is very likely he was never actually "saw" his second wife Katherine Woodcock whom he married in 1656, but who died only two years later.  His sonnet "Methought I Saw My Late Espoused Saint" was probably written in response to her death.

The Restoration in 1660 meant Milton felt forced to go into hiding.  Despite being later imprisoned, he was released soon after.  He married for a third time in 1663, to Betty Minshull, and then retired to write in London and, briefly, Chalfont St. Giles.  It was during these final years that Milton finally found time to write his most celebrated works: "Paradise Lost" and "Paradise Regained".  These demonstrate his own anguish at the ultimate failure of both the revolution and the puritans' hopes for the establishment of Christ's kingdom on earth. 

Milton died on 8th November 1674, and is buried in St. Giles Church, Cripplegate, in the City of London.

Milton's connection with the Borough

Historians disgree about exactly when Milton moved to Horton, but letters which have been found archived at Eton College, and which were sent by Milton from 1632 onwards to Eton, give Horton as his address.  Also, the Encyclopaedia Britannica, sources at Cambridge and at his house at Chalfont St. Giles support the theory that Horton was a base for him.

At Horton, he lived in a house long since gone, but which is thought to have been on the site of what is now the Berkyn Manor Estate, and it was there that he wrote one of his most well-known poems, the pastoral elegy "Lycidas". 

Milton's mother Sara died in Horton in April 1637 and a memorial stone was placed in the floor of the parish church.  This was later moved to the Chancel in the nineteenth century, and now stands on one of the oldest of the church's walls.   

In Spring 1638 Milton left Horton for his European travels.

The 400th anniversary of Milton's birth will be celebrated through events around the country.  For more information about these please link to: -

http://milton-2008.lib.cam.ac.uk/index.html