MARK OF EDWARD FELINE, LONDON, 1743

JOSEPH DAMER, 1ST BARON MILTON
The son of the Dorchester M.P. Joseph Damer (1676-1737), the younger Joseph was born in 1717. He married Lady Caroline, the daughter of Lionel Sackville, 1st Duke of Dorset, at Knole, her father's Kent seat in 1742. A Whig, he was M.P. for three constituencies; Weymouth from 1741 to 1747, then Bramber until 1754 and finally Dorchester until 1762. In 1753 he was created Baron Milton, an Irish creation, which meant he could remain in the House of Commons. In 1762 he was created Baron Milton of Milton Abbey, Dorset. In 1792 he was created Viscount Milton and Earl of Dorchester. In politics he was one of the section of the Party that opposed Walpole. As Horace Walpole remarked, 'Lord Milton, heir of Swift's old miser and usurer Damer, was the most arrogant and proud of men, with no foundation but great wealth and a match with the Duke of Dorset's daughter. His birth and parts were equally mean and contemptible.' [Complete Peerage]

He employed the architect John Vardy to rebuild his house on Park Lane, which was on the site of the present day Dorchester Hotel. His country seat was Milton Abbey, which he remodeled using the offices of first Vardy and then Sir William Chambers. The work was finally completed by James Wyatt. For the creation of his park he looked to Capability Brown. His surviving son succeeded as the 2nd Earl, however, on his death in 1808 the titles became extinct, the estates passing to the second earl's sister Caroline Damer (1752-1829) and on her death to her cousin once-removed John Dawson, 2nd Earl of Portarlington (1781-1845). A magnificent silver-gilt toilet service presented by the Duke of Dorset to his daughter on her marriage to Joseph Damer was sold from the collection of the late Antenor Patiño, Christie's, New York, 28 October 1986, lot 12.