Portrait of John Lord Cutts (1661-1707) by Willem Wissing

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Signed on middle right front, "William Wissing/17" Cutts, John, Baron Cutts of Gowran, Ireland 1661-1707, lieutenant-general, was second son of Richard Cutte or Cuttes of Woodhall, Arkesden, an Essex squire of an old family owning property at Arkesden and Matching in that county, by his wife Joan, daughter of Sir Richard Everard, baronet, of Much Waltham, Essex. Cutts states (ib.) that ‘in the year Charles II died’ (1685) he broke off an engagement with Mrs. Villiers, at the express desire of William, prince of Orange, conveyed through the Duke of Monmouth, with solemn assurance of high reward in the event of the prince ever coming to England. Later in the same year Cutts, who had scholarly tastes and wrote flowing and not ungraceful verses, made his first appearance in print, in England, 10 Nov. 1685, in ‘La Muse de Cavalier; or an Apology for such Gentlemen as make Poetry their Diversion not their Business, in a letter by a scholar of Mars to one of Apollo.’ Next year Cutts was among the English volunteers serving under Charles, duke of Lorraine, against the Turks in Hungary. In March 1687 he published in London his ‘Poetical Exercises, written on several occasions,’ with a dedication to Mary, princess of Orange. A small portrait of Cutts, taken by the court painter Wissing, somewhere about this time, is now in the National Portrait Gallery, and was engraved among Richardson's portraits. It represents a handsome young fellow, with dark hazel eyes, and featuresless aquiline than in later likenesses, in silvered corslet, lace neckcloth, and dark wig. General Hugh Mackay of the Dutch service, who knew Cutts well, described him a year or two later as ‘pretty tall, lusty and well shaped, an agreable companion, with abundance of wit, affable and familiar, but too much seized with vanity and self-conceit,’ which was, no doubt, a truthful epitome of his character. Cutts was one of ‘the gentlemen of most orthodox principles in church and state’ who returned to England with William of Orange at the revolution, his rank being that of lieutenant-colonel in a regiment of English foot, formed in Holland by Colonel Sidney, afterwards Earl of Romney, and colonel 1st foot guards. In January 1690 he was ordered to complete his regiment to a hundred men per company, and in March proceeded with it to Ireland. Before leaving, ‘the king made him a grant of lands belonging to the jesuits in certain counties’ (Relation of State Affairs (1857), ii. 24). He served through the campaign of that year, signalised himself at the battle of the Boyne, and was wounded during the siege of Limerick. About the same time the university of Cambridge conferred on him the honorary degree of LL.D.On 18 Dec. 1690, Cutts married his first wife, a widow with a large jointure. She was Elizabeth, daughter of George Clark, merchant, of London, and had been twice married before, first to John Morley of Glynde, Sussex, and secondly to John Trevor, secretary of state to Charles II. Cutts returned to the army in Ireland in July 1691, and succeeded to the command of the Prince of Hesse-Darmstadt's brigade when the prince was disabled by wounds at Aughrim. He returned to England on crutches, and soon after his recovery lost his wife, who died 19 Feb. 1693, her jointure of 2,500l. a year passing away to the next heir. In July the same year he was reported to be engaged to one of the queen's maids of honour, a sister of the notorious Lord Mohun (LUTTRELL, iii. 143), but the match never took place. The same year he was appointed governor of the Isle of Wight. Cutts was one of the brigadiers in the disastrous Brest expedition of 1694. On the death of Queen Mary in December of the same year, Cutts, who appears to have indulged his poetic tastes amidst all the distractions of court and camp, wrote a monody, a rather stilted effusion, which appears in ‘State Poems,’ p. 199. In the spring of 1695 Cutts was sent to Flanders as one of the commissioners for settling the bank of Antwerp, and in the summer he was engaged at the siege of Namur, where his splendid courage throughout the siege, and particularly at the final assault, gained him the honourable nickname of ‘the Salamander’. Returning to England, the popular hero of the siege, he was in constant attendance on the king's person when not employed on military duty. In 1696, Cutts was appointed captain of thebody guard, and in January 1697 he married his second wife, Elizabeth, only daughter of Sir Henry Pickering, baronet, of Whaddon, Cambridgeshire. In the summer of 1697 he was engaged in the negotiations which led to the treaty of Ryswick, during which he was despatched on a mission to Vienna. He brought home the welcome tidings of peace, and a few weeks later had the misfortune to lose his young wife, who died on 23 Nov. 1697, after giving birth to a dead child. In March 1702 he became a major-general on the English establishment, and lieutenant-general the year after. After a brief visit to England in the spring of 1702,he returned to Holland bearing the tidings of the combined declaration of hostilities, which formally opened the war of the Spanish succession. He bore an active part in the ensuing operations, and won fresh fame by the capture of Fort St. Michael, a detached outwork of the important fortress of Venloo in Guelderland, by a sudden assault on 18 Sept. 1702. The achievement was variously regarded. In the first parliament summoned after the accession of Queen Anne he was returned for the borough of Newport, Isle of Wight, for which he sat up to the time of his death. Cutts remained in command of the English troops when Marlborough went home in the winter of 1702-3, and subsequently made the campaign of 1703. When the troops again went into winter quarters he returned home, and appears not to have rejoined the army until after its arrival in Bavaria. Queen Anne is stated to have made him a present of 1,000l. out of her privy purse before starting. He was third in command at the battle of Blenheim, where his division was hotly engaged throughout the day. An English brigade of his division, Row's, supported by a brigade of Hessians, commenced the action by an attack on the village of Blenheim. Early in the following year he was appointed commander-in-chief in Ireland under the Duke of Ormonde, a post considered to be worth 6,000l. a year (Hist. MSS. Comm. 7th Rep. 246). According to some accounts (Monthly Misc. i.) he contracted a third marriage, but of this there are no particulars. He died in Dublin, rather suddenly, on 26 Jan. 1707. The artist, Willem Wissing was born in Amsterdam. Trained at The Hague and in Paris. Arrived in London from The Hague 1676, where he had studied under W. Doudijns and A.V. Ravestyn. Became assistant to Lely, with whom he remained until Lely's death 1680. Completed many of Lely's unfinished portraits. Employed by the Court and sent by James II in 1684/5 to Holland to paint the Prince of Orange (later William III) and Princess Mary. Developed a variation of Lely's style, characterized by a brownish palette, Frenchified accessories and a large use of exotic flora in his backgrounds. Died suddenly at Burghley House 10 September 1687 aged 31.

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