[3] Cornbury involved himself in a Jacobite intrigue and went with James II's daughter, the Duchess of Buckingham, to Rome to meet the Pretender secretly in January 1731.
Walpole's Excise Bill of 1733 provoked great political unrest, and Cornbury thought the time right for a French-sponsored invasion by the Old Pretender.
However, the scheme was quashed in the royal cabinet by Cardinal Fleury, and Chavigny, some of whose activities had come to the attention of the British government, was recalled.
After being returned unopposed at the 1747 British general election he became disillusioned by the House of Commons, and took a year abroad for the sake of his health.
In 1750, he applied to the King for a peerage and he was elevated to the House of Lords by a writ in acceleration in his father's title of Baron Hyde.