Peniston Booth


Penyston Booth, , also Peniston Booth, was an 18th-century Anglican priest, who hailed from the minor gentry, and served as Dean of Windsor from 1729 to 1765.

Family

Born at Lusby, Lincolnshire, he was the son of Thomas Booth and his wife Elizabeth and a cousin of Sir Fairmeadow Penyston. His family were lords of the manor of Killingholme, originally from Barton in Lancashire. An elder brother, Captain Robert Booth, married in 1725 Lady Susannah Clinton, daughter of Francis, 6th Earl of Lincoln, and sister-in-law of Thomas Pelham-Holles, 1st Duke of Newcastle.
Booth married Katherine, daughter of the Revd Canon Edward Jones, in 1728. Their only child, Katherine Booth is an ancestor of the 16th and present Baroness Berners.
The Lincolnshire family are progenitors of Sir Felix Booth and a cadet branch of the Booth family which inherited the Dunham Massey estates via marriage in the 15th century; they were created Earls of Warrington in 1690.

Education

Booth was educated at Lincoln School and Magdalene College, Cambridge, receiving a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1702, proceeding Master of Arts in 1705.
Elected a Fellow of Magdalene College in 1702, Booth was ordained in 1703 by Dr James Gardiner, Bishop of Lincoln. He was conferred with the degree of Doctor of Divinity by Cambridge University in 1728, having been elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1703.

Ecclesiastical ministry

Booth was a Canon of Windsor from 1722 to 1729, before serving as Dean until his death in 1765.
During his ministry in the Church of England, he held the following ecclesiastical appointments:
Appointed Canon of the Second Stall of Windsor in 1722, Booth relinquished this sinecure upon becoming Dean following the death of Lord Willoughby de Broke in 1728.
Dean of Windsor and ex-officio of the Order of the Garter from 1729 until his death in 1765, Booth was succeeded by former Bishop of Exeter, Dr. Frederick Keppel.
Dr Booth was buried at St George's Chapel, a week after his death, on 29 September 1765.