After years of directing seminars for doctoral dissertation students, it has become a truism that the ‘problem’, or thesis statement of a project can almost always be found in the last two pages of a draft text. This proves to be the case for this revised 2011 DPhil thesis, which is an impressive, archive-based project. It is, in many of its parts, a gripping read and a paradigm-shifting account of the life and work of Archbishop George Errington. Dr Serenhedd James’ problem statement is this: ‘The part played by [George] Talbot in the removal of Errington from [the coadjutorship of] Westminster, and the motives behind his actions, leads to the question …: what had changed that meant that men who had been regarded as unequivocally Roman in their outlook in the 1830s were able to be accused of anti-Roman sentiment by the 1850s?’ (p. 248) His answer is as old as Cuthbert Butler’s argument: that the moderate ecclesiological views of men like George Errington, John Henry Newman, William Clifford, and Thomas Grant were displaced by the neo-ultramontane agenda of Henry Manning, George Talbot, and other Englishmen who gained papal favor during the 1850s and 1860s. Yet this monograph adds depth and clarity that Butler could not have achieved, because of the inaccessibility of evidence that James uses.
While his answer is not new, Dr James proves his case using evidence from an impressive array of archives, located in Great Britain, Europe, and the United States. During the period of revision for publication, Henry Manning’s Catholic papers (after almost eighty years in private hands) found a permanent home in the Westminster Diocesan Archives. Key elements of Dr James’ argument rest on evidence finally available to scholars in that collection. Yet most importantly, this study took seriously the abundant evidence of curial intrigue found among the papers of George Talbot, the Oxford Movement convert who served as chamberlain to Pope Pius IX, and during the 1850s and 1860s became the pope’s trusted guide in all matters related to the United Kingdom. His psychological imbalance, resulting in his 1868 confinement to a Parisian asylum, were reflected in Talbot’s actions, and decisions made by Pius IX at Talbot’s urging. Using these rich veins of archival evidence, Dr James convincingly argues that George Talbot engaged in a relentless campaign of character assassination against George Errington, coadjutor archbishop of Westminster, tarring the Roman trained moderate ultramontane cleric with the accusation of anglo-gallican sympathies—an assertion that, until this study, has rarely been questioned.
This study is at its best in chapter six, in which Dr James provides a detailed and engaging account of ‘The Errington Case’. He carefully explores the breakdown in relations between Archbishop Nicholas Wiseman and Errington, Wiseman’s long-time friend and handpicked co-adjutor/successor for the see of Westminster. During the prolonged Roman proceeding that ended in a judgment made by the pope himself, Errington took a firm stand and defended his integrity against attacks engineered by George Talbot to discredit him. This will undoubtedly displace previous narratives of these events, and become essential reading on this subject for years to come. We owe a great debt to Dr James for this ground-breaking work of scholarship.
Despite these many virtues, this work suffers from a variety of problems that must be noted. Some challenges reflect its original structure as a DPhil thesis. The opening chapter’s detailed account of the Errington family from the Reformation to the nineteenth century seems a strange start to the narrative that emerges later in the book. The second chapter, which amounts to a literature review, is overly focused on scholarship from the first half of the twentieth century. More recent works are lightly treated or ignored. While the great value of this study is its archive-grounded accounts, a more intentional engagement with scholarship of recent decades would have improved the analysis. One example was the author’s evident fascination with Errington’s 1850 argument against the validity of Anglican orders, based on defect of form in the ordination rite. Yet the author seems unaware of a recent study, by Kenneth L Parker and Daniel Handschy, of the source of that argument, an 1841 polemic written by the archbishop of Saint Louis, Peter Kenrick.
A striking problem for this work is the absence of any careful examination of the subjects of ultramontanism and gallicanism. Despite the importance of these issues for Dr James’ argument, no serious effort to define ultramontanism can be found, much less a review of the vast literature on that subject. Part of one paragraph (p. 130) is devoted to the nature of ‘gallicanism’, and this appears to be based on a single source. One cannot assume an understanding of the history and development of either of these concepts on the part of even well informed scholars. Because the nature of these concepts is crucial to understanding the premise of this book, the absence of this critical context diminishes the impact of this otherwise promising book.
Also concerning are numerous oversights in proofreading, of which ‘man oevring’ instead of ‘manoeuvering’ (p. 210) is but the most comical example. Oxford University Press should exercise greater oversight to ensure such mistakes do not happen. Self-evident footnote errors call into question the accuracy of other sources cited in the footnotes. As one who looks to recent works as guides to new archival resources, the accuracy of footnotes is at least as important as the argument in the text. At other times sources are referenced in the text, for which no footnote is provided. These are oversights that a competent copy editor should have caught. OUP should do better by its authors.
Despite these limitations, the importance of the archival content of this volume makes it essential for any library or personal collection that takes nineteenth-century Roman Catholicism in England seriously.
