Hellfire Club

Georgian elites at ritual play in the caves — with Benjamin Franklin on the guest list.

Sir Francis Dashwood's Order of the Friars of St Francis of Wycombe (1749-60s) met in caves at West Wycombe for feasts, mock rituals, and libertinage; membership included the Earl of Sandwich and, on visits, Benjamin Franklin (documented friendship with Dashwood; they co-edited a prayer book). Political business was certainly conducted socially. The node functions as the Grove's Georgian ancestor: documented elite ritual play, and the standing question of what fraction was theater.