Bertram Ashburnham, 5th Earl of Ashburnham
| Bertram Ashburnham, 5th Earl of Ashburnham | |
|---|---|
| Born | 28 October 1840 |
| Died |
15 January 1913 (aged 72) Paris |
| Title | Earl of Ashburnham |
| Tenure | 1878–1913 |
| Other titles | Viscount St. Asaph Baron Ashburnham |
| Residence | Ashburnham Place |
| Predecessor | Bertram Ashburnham, 4th Earl of Ashburnham |
| Successor | Thomas Ashburnham, 6th Earl of Ashburnham |
| Spouse(s) | Emily Chaplin (1888–1900) |
| Issue | Lady Mary Catherine Charlotte Ashburnham |
Bertram Ashburnham, 5th Earl of Ashburnham (28 October 1840 – 15 January 1913) was a British peer. He was the English agent for the Spanish Carlist cause, and a supporter of Irish Home Rule. He sold off the Ashburnham collection of manuscripts which the 4th Earl had collected.
Bertram Ashburnham was born on 26 October 1840, the eldest son of Bertram Ashburnham, 4th Earl of Ashburnham. He was educated at Westminster School and in France. He was a convert to Roman Catholicism, and was formally received into the Church in 1872. On the death of his father in 1878, he became the 5th Earl of Ashburnham, Viscount St. Asaph and Baron Ashburnham, and inherited the family property of about 24,000 acres in England and Wales, including the main family seat of Ashburnham Place in Sussex. In 1888 he married Emily Chapman, whose father was a tradesman. Their only child, Lady Mary Catherine Charlotte Ashburnham, was born in 1890. His wife died on 12 February 1900. His daughter became a nun, entering the Sacred Heart Convent at Roehampton in 1912.
Soon after inheriting his titles and property in 1878, the 5th Earl began negotiations for the sale of his father's collection of manuscripts. The 4th Earl of Ashburnham had been a bibliophile who amassed an important collection of books and manuscripts, most of which were acquired in the 1840s in three separate large purchases. The Stowe collection consisted of almost 1,000 items from the auction of the contents of Stowe House in 1847, and the Libri and Barrois collections, numbering 1923 and 702 respectively, had been purchased in 1848. Another group of 250 manuscripts, called the Appendix, was acquired over the course of the 4th Earl's life.
The sale was complicated by the fact that many of the items in the Libri and Barrois collections had been stolen from French libraries by Count Libri, who then sold them under false pretences to the 4th Earl. Lord Ashburnham originally offered to sell the whole collection to the British Museum for £160,000 in 1879. He refused to consider lowering the price or selling off part of the collection, and the British Museum trustees declined his offer. When he renewed it in 1883, the French government objected on the grounds that between 160 and 170 of the manuscripts, valued at £24,000, had been stolen from French public libraries and therefore belonged to France. Ashburnham denied that any of the manuscripts were stolen, but was obliged to sell the collections separately, starting with the Stowe collection, which the British government purchased for £45,000 in 1883. The other manuscripts were sold off over the following years, with most going to the French and Italian governments and to the collector Henry Yates Thompson. The last of the Barrois collection was finally sold in 1901.
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