 When dying, Francis asked Burgoyne to endeavour, on his return to England, to procure preferment for his brother, who had taken orders.The twelfth Earl of Derby, at the instance no doubt of General Burgoyne, who had married the earl's aunt, presented Clerke to the rectory of Bury, to which he was instituted 6 February 1778, taking his Bachelor of Civil Law degree at Oxford in the October following.He paid much attention to the physical health of his parishioners, vaccinating the children of the poor, and even going to Rochdale once a week for a considerable time to perform the same operation.