Some accounts say he returned from his Grand Tour to complete his father’s work on Melbourne Hall. George Lewis Coke was born in 1715 to Thomas Coke and his wife Mary (née Hale). His father had been Vice-Chamberlain of the Household to Queen Mary and George I. Thomas Coke had also been Teller of the Receipt of the Exchequer briefly in 1704.
His father died when he was twelve and he was taken care of by his uncle, John Coke, in London.
He attended Oxford University in 1732 and property at Kings Newton was purchased for him by his uncle.
When Coke was nineteen he embarked on the traditional Grand Tour of Europe, despite being appointed Surveyor-General of His Majesty"s Customs two years before when he was just 17. In the first year he visited Paris and ?? after staying over the winter in Montpelier, he visited Rome, Venice. Whilst in Italy he had his portrait made by the Italian painter, Pompeo Batoni – who made a good living from young English aristocrats.
Like other Grand Tour portraits, Coke appears amongst antiquities.
In this case the Coliseum is in the background of Batoni"s composition. In 1860, the fabric of Melbourne church was restored and this involved the removal of "hundreds of skulls".
The first coffin to be removed was that of George Lewis Coke which was unusual in shape. This was recorded by the local historian John Joseph Briggs who also noted the story about his valet, John Lewis Pasteur.
According to Briggs, Coke had returned from abroad in the coffin, 109 years before, with Pasteur as velet.
lieutenant was Pasteur who went on to be a shepherd in Bredon. Briggs indicates that Coke never returned alive from his foreign tour and that his coffin was of "foreign" construction. Others agree with Briggs and say that "J.L.Pasteur" set out on the journey with him.
