Family and Education

b. c.1639, 2nd but 1st surv. s. of Sir Thomas Guybon of Thursford by Barbara, da. of Sir William de Grey of Merton. m. (1) 2 Feb. 1669 (aged 30), Susanna, da. of Goldsmith Hodgson of Framfield, Suss., wid. of John Byne of Rowdell, Washington, Suss., s.p.; (2) lic. 15 Feb. 1675, Isabella (d.1723), da. of Joachim Matthews of Havering, Essex, 4s. 2da. suc. fa. 1666; kntd. 19 June 1682.1

Offices Held

J.p. Norf. 1668-Feb. 1688, 1689-d.; commr. for assessment, Norf. 1673-80, Norf. and Thetford 1689-90; capt. of militia horse, Norf. by 1676-?Feb. 1688, lt.-col. Nov. 1688-d., dep. lt. by 1682-Feb. 1688, Nov. 1688-d.; freeman, King’s Lynn 1682; sheriff, Norf. 1685-6.2

Biography

Guybon’s ancestors acquired the manor of Thursford, five miles from Thetford, under Elizabeth, and one of them sat for King’s Lynn in 1597. His father was a parliamentary supporter in the Civil War and held local office throughout the Interregnum, but signed the Norfolk address for a free Parliament in 1660.3

Guybon himself helped to disarm local Papists in 1679. He signed the address abhorring the ‘Association’ in 1682 and was knighted on the recommendation of Lord Yarmouth (Robert Paston) as a gentleman of £1,200 p.a. who ‘in all instances manifests his loyalty’. He was absent from the meeting of deputy lieutenants at King’s Lynn in February 1688 on the repeal of the Test Act and Penal Laws, ‘but sent a letter whereby he desired not to answer any of the questions, not knowing but he might stand somewhere, and was resolved not to declare his opinion’. He was removed from local office, and when the King offered to restore him in October he followed the example of Sir John Holland in refusing to join with those incapacitated under the Test Act.4

Guybon apparently did not stand at the general election of 1689, but he was successful at Thetford in a by-election caused by the decision of Sir Henry Hobart to sit for the county. Although the return is dated a week after the division on the vacancy of the throne, he was blacklisted by Anthony Rowe among those who voted to agree with the Lords. A moderately active Member of the Convention, he was named to 14 committees, including those to prevent excessive expenditure at parliamentary elections (25 Oct.), and to restore corporations (20 Dec.); but he is not recorded as speaking in the House. He stood successfully for re-election in 1690 as a court Tory. He died on 23 Jan. 1705 and was buried at Thursford, the last of the family to enter Parliament.5

Ref Volumes: 1660-1690

Author: Eveline Cruickshanks

Notes

• 1. Vis. Norf. (Harl. Soc. lxxv), 91; Le Neve’s Knights (Harl. Soc. viii), 304; The Gen. n.s. xxiii. 7-8.
• 2. HMC Lothian, 127; Add. 28082, f. 79; Add. 36988, f. 305; Norf. Ltcy. Jnl. (Norf. Rec. Soc. xxx), 37, 38, 90, 124; Lynn Freemen, 193; Mason, Norf. 436.
• 3. Mason, 291; Blomefield, Norf. vii. 258; W. Rye, Address from the Gentry of Norf. (1660).
• 4. Norf. Ltcy. Jnl. 27, 89; Add, 36988, ff. 180, 187; HMC Lothian, 133, 135-6.
• 5. Le Neve’s Knigths, 304.