Thomas Tipping 1653-1718

From Book Owners Online

Sir Thomas TIPPING, 1st baronet 1653-1718

Tipping's bookplate (British Museum Franks Collection *158)

Biographical Note

Son of Sir Thomas Tipping of Wheatfield, Oxfordshire. Matriculated at Trinity College, Oxford 1669, but did not graduate; admitted at Lincolns Inn 1672. MP for Oxfordshire 1685, for Wallingford 1689-98. He was a JP for Oxfordshire, and held other local administrative offices. He drew prominence for promoting a proviso to the bill for preserving James II’s person, which would allow clergymen to critique the Roman Catholic Church. In 1686, Tipping fled to Holland and was outlawed following his efforts to marry his ward, Silverlock, to a woman of ill repute. He was listed as being opposed to the King in 1687-88 and returned with William of Orange’s invasion fleet in 1688. He was made a baronet in 1698. He got into financial difficulties towards the end of his life, and died in a debtors' prison. The Wheatfield estate was sold in 1727.

Books

Tipping used an engraved armorial bookplate, dated 1698, and probably commissioned around the time he was given his baronetcy (Franks *158). The extent and disposition of his library are not known. His younger brother George (b.1655/6), who became a barrister, also used a slightly re-engraved version of the bookplate (Franks *276).

Sources

  • History of Parliament.
  • Gambier Howe, E. R. J. Franks bequest: catalogue of British and American book plates bequeathed to the ... British Museum. London, 1903-4.
  • Information from Naomi Hart.
  • Information from Vanessa Wright.