Talk:Philip Wharton, 1st Duke of Wharton

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[edit] Inuse and revision

Performing a major rewrite now. I hope not to have the inuse tag go stale, but the edit will take the better part of a day. For the changes already made, all are derived from the 2004 Dictionary of National Biography. It turns out that "Honest Tom" needs even more of a rewrite than "Philip James" (you'll see why he gets that middle name in a bit). Geogre 15:19, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

  • The rewrite is now done, and the article doesn't look very much like it did. There were no substantial errors in the prior version, and I mean no criticism, but the political career of this guy is sort of important for understanding the anti-Walpolean movements of the 1720's. Geogre 22:18, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Gormogons

What about his connections with this secret society? He was one of its most ardent supporters.--Alexvonf (talk) 11:09, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Do you have a citation that shows how he supported them? Secret societies are secret. When we have documentary evidence, we can talk about it. As for Wharton, he supported all sorts of satirical societies, and that's what the first Hell-fire clubs were. <shrug> We'd need serious evidence that these amounted to much beyond the many parties he attended. Geogre (talk) 13:46, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
It was invented to ridicule Wharton's resistance to modernisation of Freemasonry, which makes him a target of its mockery rather than an ardent supporter. Hogarth (who else?) has a rather nice early print on the subject: The Mystery of Masonry brought to Light by ye Gormogons (1724). Our article on them appears to claim it really existed and has a Grandmaster named. I'd be interested to see the paper cited, but I am one of the few denied JSTOR. Yomanganitalk 16:05, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
Philip James Wharton? Odd. I can easily imagine his father being a mason and wanting the good old form, but Jr.? He went reactionary Tory, but, if he did hold onto some antique Masonic stuff, it would have been part of his "Scottish" allegiance, I would suppose. You know, I have Uglow. I really should read it. Geogre (talk) 19:04, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
Yes, I have ample sources in a German publication from 1900: Allgemeines Handbuch der Freimaurerei, herausgegeben vom Verein deutscher Freimaurer, Band 1-2, Leipzig 1900, where they expressly state that Duke Wharton was one of the pillars of Gormogon society. The Germans are known to be thorough, and the book (very carefully edited) was probably a half-secret publication, distributed only to Freemasons.--Alexvonf (talk) 15:01, 12 January 2008 (UTC)