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WELSH MEMBERS DURING THE COMMONWEALTH.

GENTLEMEN,

As your valuable publication has already made known some of my communications, I shall feel obliged (should you think it worthy of a place,) by the publication of the accompanying list of the members who served in Parliament, for the Principality, during the early part of Cromwell's usurpation. It is copied from Oldfield's Representative History, and headed thus:

"Equal Representation of the People in the Time of the Commonwealth."

This Parliament appears to have begun at Westminster, September 3, 1654, and lasted until the 23d of January, 1655. The rotten boroughs were excluded from sending representatives; the two members sat for the county, excepting, as is now the case, (and I will venture to add, very improperly so,) Merionethshire only sends one. Why the maritime interests of that county, which has greatly increased and improved, is so left, is to me a political mystery.

I am in hopes that some of your numerous correspondents will furnish us with some anecdotes and pedigrees of the gentry so elected during that memorable period.

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Brecknockshire, 3. Henry Lord Herbert.

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4. Edmund Jones, esq.

Cardiganshire, 5. James Phillips, esq.

Caermarthenshire,

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6. Jenkin Lloyd, esq.
7. John Cleypool, esq.
8. Rowland Dawkins, esq.

Carnarvonshire, . 9. John Glynn, esq.

10. Thomas Mostyn, esq.

Denbighshire,. 11. Colonel Simon Thelwall.

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Colonel John Carter.

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Merionethshire, . 15. John Vaughan, esq.
Montgomeryshire, 16. Sir John Price, bart.

Charles Lloyd, esq.

Pembrokeshire, 17. Sir Erasmus Phillips, bart.

Haverfordwest,
Radnorshire, .

18. Arthur Owen, esq.
19. John Upton, esq.

George Gwynne, esq.
Henry Williams, esq.

ANNOTATIONS.

1. Mr. Twisleton was a branch of the ancient family of Twisleton, of Barrow Hall, in the county of York. He was an active officer in the Parliament army, of which he was a colonel, and governor of Denbigh Castle. He was brought into Wales, by marrying the heiress of the Glynnes of Lleuar, in the parish of Clynnog. There are memorials to the families of Glynne and Twisleton in that venerable and beautiful edifice, Clynnog church.

2. William Foxwist, esq. There is scarcely an old deed relating to property at Carnarvon, in which the name of Foxwist does not appear. Their pedigree will be found, if I recollect rightly, in Harl. мss. 1794, and in Lewis Dwnn's Visitation of North Wales.

3. Henry Lord Herbert, eldest son of Edward, second Marquis of Worcester. After his father's death, he was created Duke of Beaufort; and the present illustrious Duke of that title is lineally descended from him.

4. Mr. Edmund Jones was of Buckland, in the county of Brecon he was Recorder of the town, and His Highness's Attorney-General for South Wales. "Notwithstanding that " (according to Burton's Diary,)" a party in the House suspected him of loyalty, and preferred that as a charge against him, and he was expelled, it was moved and seconded that he be also sent to the Tower; whether that punishment was inflicted or not, the Diary does not furnish an account. He made a very good defence of himself, which availed not." Vol. iii. p. 241. He does not appear to have been a speaker on any particular subject: he was, on the restoration of Charles II., restored to his Recordership of Brecon, and also made Recorder of Caermarthen. An excellent good character: how he became once a republican is unknown.

5. Mr. James Phillips resided at the Priory at Cardigan. The then residence of this gentleman was a part of the ancient religious cell modernized it has long since been pulled down, and a neat building erected thereon by the late John Bowen, esq., of Trocdyraur, in this county. Mr. Phillips was a great partisan of his day, one of the Conservators of the Peace for the counties of

Caermarthen, Pembroke, and Cardigan: his family nearly allied to those of Picton Castle, the first we know was Einon, the grandson of Sir Thomas Phillips of Picton. This family, doubtless, purchased the Priory estate in consequence of its political contingency, commanding, by its tenantry, the return of a member for the borough. Cromwell having excluded the boroughs from sending representatives, Mr. Phillips appears here as a county member. By this gentleman's pedigree, as given in Sir S. R. Meyricke's History of Cardiganshire, he appears to have married three wives, first, his near relation, Miss Francis Phillips, daughter of Sir Richard Phillips, bart., of Picton Castle, by whom he had no issue; secondly, to Catharine, daughter to John Fowler, of London, merchant. This lady excelled in poetry and learning, and was one of the most celebrated women of her day; she was well known to all the noble and learned authors, as appears by her Life, which was published a few years after her death, with a likeness. I was once possessed of a copy, which I gave to the late Admiral Sir Erasmus Gower, G. C. B., who was a connection of this family, by the marriage of Mr. Hector Phillips with the widow Stedman. Mrs. Catharine Phillips translated the plays of Corneille, and other works; and dedicated some of her poems to Mrs. Anne Owen, of Orielton, and Mrs. Meyricke, of Bodorgan, in Anglesea. Her poetic name was Orinda," and often called the "Matchless Orinda." She died, I believe, at the age of thirty-two, of the small-pox, and left a daughter, who afterwards became the wife of Lewis Wogan, esq., of Whiston, in the county of Pembroke; she had more children, but they died young. Mr. Phillips's character is thus given, in a мs., entitled, "A true Character of the deportment, for these eighteen years last past, of the principal Gentry within the counties of Carmarthen, Pembroke, and Cardigan, in South Wales," written about the year 1661.

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"James Phillips, one that had the fortune to be in with all tymes, yet thrived by none; an argument, that covetousness (the root of evil) was not the motive for him to take employments. His genius is, to undertake publique affairs; regarding sometimes more the employment than the authority from whom received the same. He hath done much good, and is ill rewarded by those he deserved most of."

His third wife was a daughter of Sir Reece Rudd, baronet, of Aberglasney, in the county of Caermarthen, by whom he had no issue. In 1649, he was High Sheriff for the county of Cardigan, and called in the Roll "of Tregibby," a fine farm near the town, where there was a respectable residence for the eldest son of the Priory during the lifetime of his father, who was Hector Phillips, esq., who also had served the office of Sheriff, and had been M.P. for the borough. His mother

was a daughter of Sir William Wogan, of Whiston, knight. I believe these Phillips's of the Priory lie buried near the chancel in St. Mary's Church at Cardigan: there are no monuments erected to their memory.

6. Mr. Jenkin Lloyd was of Llanvair, Clydogau, in the county of Cardigan. He appears, by his pedigree in Dr. Meyricke's interesting History of Cardiganshire, p. 358, to have married a daughter of John Stedman, esq., of Strata, Florida, by whom he appears to have had issue. There is nothing particularly noticed of this gentleman, saving that not being re-elected, we may conjecture he was a royalist, as were his descendants, who appear to have paid fines: some of them represented the county and borough after him. This fine estate came to the possession of the late Colonel Johns's father by a marriage: the Colonel sold it afterwards.

7. Mr. Cleypool married one of Cromwell's daughters, and was afterwards called Lord Cleypool, and sat in the "tother House;" the Protector's influence, of course, was the means of his representing this county: he afterwards sat for Northamptonshire.

8. Mr. Rowland Dawkins came into Wales as a major in Cromwell's army: he afterwards became a colonel. He was one of those who participated with Colonel Horton in a share of the Slebech estate: both he and Mr. Cleypool often spoke in the House. He once had a contest for the borough with David Morgan, esq., and was returned; but Mr. Morgan, on petitioning, gained the seat. See Burton's Diary, vol. iv. p. 275. I believe he intermarried with some family in Caermarthenshire. Why Cromwell's friends and favourites should have a preference of being returned for Caermarthenshire, is a circumstance I cannot account for; had it been Glamorganshire, I could readily do it, for his ancestors were of that county.

9. Mr. John Glynn, afterwards Chief Justice of the Common Pleas. He was born at Glynllivon, in Carnarvonshire, was a very learned lawyer, and a great political character; he was the youngest son of Sir William Glynn, by Jane, daughter of John Griffith, esq. of Carnarvon; he joined in the restoration of Charles II. He was a constant speaker in the House, was a King's Serjeant, and died in Portugal Street, Lincoln's Inn-fields, and was buried with much splendour, in Westminster Abbey. His pedigree is given more at large in Noble's Memoirs of Cromwell, vol. 1. p. 391.

10. Thomas Mostyn, the member for Carnarvon was, probably, the second and youngest brother of Sir Roger Mostyn, the first Baronet of that family.

11. Colonel Simon Thelwall, of Plas y Ward, near Ruthin.

His second wife was the Lady Margaret Sheffield, daughter of Edmund, Earl of Mulgrave. Their grand-daughter Jane, daughter and heiress of Edward Thelwall, of Plas y Ward, married Sir William Williams, of Llanvorda, bart. eldest son of the Speaker Williams, and to their descendant Sir Watkin Williams Wynn, bart. the Plas y Ward estate now belongs. Colonel Simon Thelwall died in 1655.

12. John Trevor, esq., of Brynkinalt, afterwards Master of the Rolls, and progenitor of the present Viscount Dungannon, and of the late Countess of Mornington, mother of His Grace the Duke of Wellington.

13. Colonel Philip Jones. He was of Pen-y-wain, in Lange-· velach parish, in the county of Glamorgan, an ancestor of the present Jones's of Fonmon castle, in that county. It appears in "Noble's Memoirs of the Protestant House," that Colonel Jones had no more than £20 a year, at the commencement of the Civil War, and he increased it to £4000, this must have included the offices he held.* Oliver Cromwell made him Comptroller of the Household, a Privy Counsellor, and Steward of the lands he held in Wales, and a Member of the House of Lords; he sat in Parliament for the counties of Brecon, Monmouth, and Glamorgan, in turn: he was, it appears by Mr. Jones's History of Breconshire, greatly assisted in obtaining the seat for the latter county, by a Colonel Jenkin Jones, a noted puritan.

There is an anecdote of Colonel Jenkin Jones, the friend of the M.P., inserted in Mr. Theophilus Jones's excellent and invaluable History of Brecknockshire, pp. 527, 528, that, when he was informed of the landing of Charles II., he mounted his horse and rode through the churchyard, exclaiming, as he discharged his pistol against one of the doors of the edifice, Ah, thou old whore of Babylon, thoul't have it all thy own way now.' The mark of a pistol-ball perforating the door, certainly appears at this moment, and in some measure corroborates this story. Mr. Jones goes on and believes that this Colonel Jones afterwards fled to England, when he was taken and imprisoned, his estates were confiscated and sold: his son was the last sheriff of Brecknockshire during Cromwell's usurpation.

14. Mr. Edmund Thomas. This ancient and most respectable family were for many years seated at Wenvoe. The original name was Harpwaye, of Tresimont, in Herefordshire: they took the name of Thomas, in consequence of a marriage with Catherine,

⚫ It is stated in Burton's Diary, page 331, vol. I. that Colonel Jones had as much as £7,000 a year, and that he had begun with only £8 or £10 a year. He appears to speak out boldly in his place in Parliament, whenever he addresses the House. I have no account of what became of him after the restoration. This is highly desirable to be known.

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