Jonathan Boucher

Invited to become vicar of a nearby Anglican church, but lacking any religious qualifications, he briefly returned to England, to be ordained by the bishop of London in March 1762.

When the struggle between the colonies and the mother country began, although he felt much sympathy for the former, his opposition to any form of illegal obstruction to the Stamp Act and other measures, and his denunciation of a resort to force, created a breach between him and his parish, and for months, he preached with a pair of loaded pistols beside him.

[2] In a fiery farewell sermon at St. Barnabas in 1775, to a hostile crowd of 200 men, he preached after the opening of hostilities he stated:[1] I will continue to pray for the King; and all who are in authority under him ... As long as I live ... will I ... proclaim: God save the King [bold added][2][5]At the conclusion and with pistol in hand, he seized the leader of the crowd, Osborn Sprigg of Northampton, Maryland, and together they walked to Boucher's horse.

[2] With George Washington forced to make a hard choice between protecting his argumentative friend and showing loyalty to the colonists' cause, in the autumn of 1775 Boucher returned to England with his wife, Eleanor Addison of Oxon Hill, Maryland, where his loyalism was rewarded by a government pension.

[6] His son, Barton Boucher (1794–1864), rector of Fonthill Bishop, Wiltshire in 1856, was well known as the author of religious tracts, hymns and novels,[1] while his daughter Eleanor married Edward Hawke Locker, Civil Commissioner of the Greenwich Hospital.