and injured his health by the ‘continued bibbing of strong and high-tasted liquors,’ and died ‘in a manner distracted’ at his lodgings in Holborn, opposite Chancery Lane, on 2 Sept. 1677, and was buried in Guildhall Chapel. He was unmarried. Letters of administration were granted to his aunt (father's sister), Judith How, on 4 Sept. 1677. In person he was ‘a little, crooked man, and of a despicable presence,’ and his book on witchcraft created much mirth among the wits of Oxford, as he himself ‘looked like a little wizard.’ In his book he threw doubt on the truth of the alleged instances of contracts between spirits and men and women, pronounced them to be ‘ridiculously absurd, and some of them so impossible for all the devils in hell to accomplish.’ He considered the tales as ‘partly founded in mistaken interpretations of Scripture, partly in the knavish and gainful impostures of some men, partly in the vain, foolish credulity of other men.’ His position was assailed by Meric Casaubon [q. v.] in the second part of his book ‘Of Credulity and Incredulity,’ 1670, and in a work entitled ‘The Opinion of Witchcraft vindicated,’ by R. T., 1670. The attacks called forth a second and enlarged edition of Wagstaffe's book. He published:
- ‘Historical Reflections on the Bishop of Rome,’ Oxford, 1660.
- ‘The Question of Witchcraft debated,’ London, 1669, 1671, 1711 (in German under the title of ‘Ausgeführte Materie der Hexerey, oder die Meinung derjenigen, die glauben dass es Hexen gebe, deutlich widerlegt’).
He contributed a Greek poem to ‘Britannia Rediviva,’ Oxford, 1660.
[Harl. MS. 6670, f. 317; Gardiner's Reg. of St. Paul's School, p. 44; Foster's Alumni; Wood's Athenæ (Bliss), iii. cols. 1113–14; Admon. Act Book, September, 1677.]
WAGSTAFFE, Sir JOSEPH (fl. 1655), royalist, born about 1612, was probably the seventh and youngest son of Richard Wagstaffe of Herberbury in Warwickshire, by his wife Anne, daughter of John Hanslap of Stonythorpe in the same county (Visit. Warwickshire, 1619, p. 289; Dugdale, Warwickshire, i. 354, 531). Thomas Wagstaffe [q. v.], the nonjuror, and William Wagstaffe [q. v.] were connected with the same family.
Joseph was a soldier of fortune, and at the beginning of 1642 was major in an Irish regiment in the service of France (Cal. Clarendon State Papers, i. 222). In June 1642 he became lieutenant-colonel in the army destined by the parliament for the recovery of Ireland, and in the following autumn held the same rank in Hampden's regiment of foot in the Earl of Essex's army (Peacock, Army Lists, pp. 46, 70). Taken prisoner by the royalists in January 1643, he changed sides and accepted a commission to raise a regiment for the king (Mercurius Aulicus, 5 Jan. 1643; Black, Oxford Docquets, p. 1). Subsequently he was major-general of foot under Prince Maurice in the west of England, was knighted at Crediton on 27 July 1644, and distinguished himself by his soldierly retreat in the disastrous battle of Langport (Symonds, Diary, p. 2; Memoirs of Sir Richard Bulstrode, p. 140; Cal. Clarendon Papers, i. 263, 290).
In 1655 the western royalists asked for Wagstaffe to be their leader in their intended rising against Cromwell, he being well known to them and generally beloved. Clarendon characterises him as fitted ‘rather for execution than counsel, a stout man who looked not far before him, yet he had a great companionableness in his nature, which exceedingly prevailed with those who in the intermission of fighting loved to spend their time in jollity and mirth.’ With about two hundred Wiltshire royalists Wagstaffe entered Salisbury early on 12 March 1655, and proclaimed Charles II. The judges on circuit and sheriff were seized in their beds, and Wagstaffe thought of hanging them as a seasonable example, but was prevented by the opposition of Colonel Penruddock and the country gentlemen. Leaving Salisbury with about four hundred men, the royalists marched into Dorset, but gained few recruits on their way. When they entered Somerset their numbers began to diminish, and the few who remained were taken or dispersed by Captain Unton Croke at South Molton on the night of 14 March. Wagstaffe himself escaped all the searches made after him, and was back in Holland by July (Clarendon, Rebellion, xiv. 130–4; Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1655, p. 245; Nicholas Papers, ii. 240, 243, 259–62). He survived the Restoration, petitioned for the reversion of an office which he did not obtain, and received a small grant of some of the late king's goods in 1662 (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1660–1 p. 288, 1661–2 p. 535).
[Authorities mentioned in the article. On the rising headed by Wagstaffe, see ‘Cromwell and the Insurrection of 1655,’ in the English Historical Review for 1888–9.]
WAGSTAFFE, THOMAS (1645–1712), nonjuror, who belonged to a family long settled in the county of Warwick, was born on 13 Feb. 1645 at Binley in Warwickshire, and was named after his father, who had settled there and married Anne Avery of Itchington. He was related to Sir Joseph
