He was born in
Irnham, Lincolnshire on 24 December 1823, the son of
Hugh Clifford, 7th Baron Clifford of Chudleigh and Mary Lucy Weld, daughter of Cardinal
Thomas Weld. He had schooling at
Hodder Place, and attended
Prior Park College, run by
Augustine Baines. He then went to the
Accademia dei Nobili Ecclesiastici in Rome.
Priest Clifford was
ordained to the
priesthood on 25 August 1850, at the
Pro-Cathedral of the Holy Apostles, by
Joseph William Hendren. In 1851 he travelled to Rome with
Herbert Vaughan and
William Maskell. From 1852 Clifford was also head of the mission at
Stonehouse, Plymouth. The formal process involved the Westminster Chapter submitting a
terna (list of three candidates, alphabetical, as suggestions with no binding effect) to the Pope. As the Chapter met, it was told by
John Morris of advice from Rome not to nominate George Errington; Errington had clashed with Wiseman in the later 1850s, causing Wiseman to ask for his removal from office, and had been in retirement from 1860. In the event, the Chapter nominated Clifford, Errington and
Thomas Grant. Further, Clifford and Grant wrote to say that they did not wish to be considered. The Pope took these proceedings very badly. In the end Manning became the new Archbishop. He made his views known on
clerical discipline, and a
catechism. He spoke against
papal infallibility as the Council would define it. In 1887 Clifford helped the nuns of
Syon Abbey to create a new monastery in his family town,
Chudleigh Abbey. He died in office on 14 August 1893, aged 69. ==References==