Clayton Mordaunt Cracherode (1730-1799) was an English book and old master print collector, and a major benefactor of the British Museum.
His father, Colonel Mordaunt Cracherode, had command of the marines in George Anson's voyage round the world; his mother was Mary, daughter of Thomas Morice, paymaster of the British forces in Portugal, and sister of William Morice, high bailiff ofWestminster, who married Atterbury's eldest daughter. Clayton Cracherode was born at Taplow, Buckinghamshire, on 23 June 1730, and educated at Westminster School from 1742, and Christ Church, Oxford, from 1746. He took the degree of B A. on 4 May 1750, and that of M.A. on 5 April 1763, retaining his Studentship at Christ Church until his death.
Cracherode took Anglican orders, and for some time held the curacy of Binsey, near Oxford, but his church career went no further. On the death of his father in 1773 he inherited a fortune. He was both F.R.S. and F.S.A., and in 1784 he was elected a trustee of the British Museum. He died at Queen Square, Westminster, on 5 April 1799, and was buried on 13 April near his mother, in the east cloister of Westminster Abbey.
According to his obituary in The Gentleman's Magazine, Cracherode had never ridden a horse, which was considered remarkable for someone of his class at the time.
He had never married, and his will left 4,500 volumes, seven portfolios of drawings, one hundred portfolios of prints, with coins and gems, to the British Museum; two books only, the Complutensian Polyglot, and the editio princeps of Homer which formerly belonged to De Thou, were excepted. The former he gave to Shute Barrington, bishop of Durham, and the latter to Cyril Jackson; these volumes ultimately came to the national collection. His collection of prints included examples of Rembrandt and Dürer.
This article incorporates text from the entry Cracherode, Clayton Mordaunt in the Dictionary of National Biography (1885–1900), a publication now in the public domain.
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