Family and Education

b. c.1558, 3rd s. of John Lawton of Church Lawton by Margaret, da. of Fulke Dutton of Chester. educ. St. Alban Hall, Oxf. 1575; I. Temple 1576, called 1584.

Offices Held

Bencher, I. Temple 1597, Autum reader 1600; j.p.q. Cheshire by 1601; recorder, Chester from 1602.

Biography

Lawton was the younger son of a minor gentry family. He practised as a London lawyer before being appointed recorder of Chester, which he represented in the 1604 Parliament. How he came to sit for the newly-enfranchised borough of Callington in 1584 is unknown, though he must have been nominated by either the 7th Lord Mountjoy or the 3rd Marquess of Winchester. He died intestate in 1606, administration of his estate being granted 30 May.

Ormerod, Cheshire, i. 221; iii. 17; Vis. Cheshire (Lancs. and Cheshire Rec. Soc. lviii), 138; PCC admon. act bk. 1606, f. 38; 1613, f. 98.

Ref Volumes: 1558-1603

Author: P. W. Hasler

Notes

• 1. Did not serve for the full duration of the Parliament.