Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 23.djvu/437

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
Haddon
429
Haddon

much more extensive account has been recently printed in Dixon's Hist.of Ch. of Engl. vol. iv., from the Foxii MSS. in the Harleian Library. This original is entitled 'Part of the Disputation upon the Sacrament, an. 1553, between Watson and Haddon.') In 1554 Haddon left England, with a letter to Bullinger from the imprisoned Hooper, in which Hooper highly commends him (Orig. Lett. p. 103). He went, however, not to Zurich, but to Strasburg, whence he forwarded Hooper's letter to Bullinger (ib. p. 291). To Bullinger he continued to write from Strasburg for two or three years down to March 1556. He complains of the poverty to which he was reduced in exile. The date of his death is unknown. His epitaph was written by his brother Walter (Poemata, p. 100), with whom he has been occasionally confounded (cf. Philpot, Examinations, published by the Parker Society). His name is omitted by Le Neve in the list of deans of Exeter, and he may perhaps never have entered upon that dignity. Among the manuscripts at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, is a letter 'De Matrimonio' addressed to him, probably by Bucer (Nasmith, Catalogue, p. 134).

[Cooper's Athenæ Cantabr. i. 164, 549; works cited.]

R. W. D.

HADDON, WALTER, LL.D. (1515–1572), civilian, son of William Haddon, by his wife Dorothy, daughter of Paul Dayrell, and brother of James Haddon [q. v.], was born in Buckinghamshire in 1616. He was educated at Eton under Richard Cox [q. v.], ultimately bishop of Ely. In 1633 he was elected from Eton to King's College, Cambridge. He declined an invitation to Cardinal College, newly founded by Wolsey at Oxford, and proceeded B.A. at Cambridge in 1537. He was one of the promising scholars who about this period attended the Greek lecture read in the university by Thomas (afterwards Sir Thomas) Smith. He excelled as a writer of Latin prose, commenced M.A. in 1541, and read lectures on civil law for two or three years. He sent to his friend Cox, the prince's tutor, an interesting account of a hasty visit paid to Prince Edward at Hatfield about 1546. He was created doctor of laws at Cambridge in 1549, and served the office of vice-chancellor in 1549-50 (Cooper, Athenæ Cantabr. i. 299). He was 'one of the great and eminent lights of the reformation in Cambridge under King Edward' (Strype, Life of Parker, ii. 365, fol.) With Matthew Parker, then master of Benet College, he acted as an executor of his friend Martin Bucer, and both delivered orations at his funeral in March 1550-1. Soon afterwards he was dangerously ill, and received a pious consolatory letter from John Cheke (19 March). Two days later he was appointed regius professor of civil law, in accordance with a petition from the university, drawn up by his friend Roger Ascham. Haddon and Cheke were chiefly responsible for the reform of the ecclesiastical laws, prepared under Cranmer's superintendence, and with the advice of Peter Martyr, in accordance with the act of 1549, which directed that the scheme should be completed by 1552. The work was not finished within the specified time. A bill introduced into the parliament of 1552 for the renewal of the commission was not carried, and Edward's death put an end to the scheme, but Haddon and Cheke's 'Reformatio Legum Ecclesiasticarum' appeared in 1571. On the refusal of Bishop Gardiner, master of Trinity Hall, to comply with the request of the Duke of Somerset, lord protector, to amalgamate that college with Clare Hall, the king in February 1551-2 appointed Haddon to the mastership of Trinity Hall (Addit. MS. 5807, f. 106). On 8 April 1652 he, Parker, Ralph Aynsworth, master of Peterhouse, and Thomas Lever, master of St. John's, were commissioned to settle a disputed claim to the mastership of Clare Hall (Strype, Life of Parker, i. 30. fol.) When Cheke was lying desperately ill in 1552, he recommended Haddon to the king as his successor in the provostship of King's College.

At Michaelmas 1552 the king and council removed Owen Oglethorp, president of Magdalen College, Oxford, who was opposed to further religious changes, and Haddon was appointed to succeed him. The fellows in vain petitioned the king against this flagrant breach of the college statutes. Oglethorp, finding the council inflexible, made an amicable arrangement with Haddon. He resigned on 27 Sept., and Haddon was admitted president by royal mandate on 10 Oct., Michael Renniger, one of Oglethorp's strongest opponents, addressing him in a congratulatory oration. The new president 'contrived, during his short and unstatutable career, to sell as many of the precious effects of the chapel as were valued at about a thousand pounds' for 52l. 14s. 8d., which sum he is said to have consumed on alterations, as also nearly 120l, of the public money' (Ingram, Memorials of Oxford, Magd.Coll., p. 16n.) Some libellous verses against the president, affixed to various parts of the college, were attributed Julius Palmer [q. v.], who was expelled on the ground of 'popish pranks.'

On Mary's accession (August 1553) Haddon wrote some Latin verses congratulating her majesty (Strype, Eccl. Memorials, iii. 14,