SCROPE, Adrian (c.1616-66), of Cockerington, Lincs.

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1660-1690, ed. B.D. Henning, 1983
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Constituency

Dates

1661 - c. Sept. 1666

Family and Education

b. c.1616, 1st s. of Sir Gervase Scrope of Cockerington by 1st w. Catherine, da. of John Hungerford of Chisbury, Wilts. educ. Westminster; St. John’s, Camb. adm. 18 May 1632, aged 16; L. Inn 1634. m. c.1648, Mary (d.1685), da. of Sir Robert Carr, 2nd Bt., of Aswarby, Lincs., 3s. 2da. suc. fa. 1655; KB 23 Apr. 1661.1

Offices Held

Gent. of the privy chamber 1641-6.2

Col. of horse (royalist) 1642-6; capt. Earl of Cleveland’s Horse 1662-d.3

J.p. Lincs. (Kesteven and Holland) July 1660-d., commr. for oyer and terminer, Midland circuit July 1660, sewers, Lincs. Aug. 1660, assessment (Lindsey) Aug. 1660-1, 1663-4, Lincs. 1661-3, 1664-d., loyal and indigent officers 1662.

Biography

Scrope’s ancestors had held land in Lincolnshire since the 12th century, though the senior branch migrated to Yorkshire, first representing that county in 1365. Scrope’s great-grandfather, who was descended from a younger son of the 6th Lord Scrope of Bolton, bought Cockerington in 1565. Though his father was imprisoned in the Fleet for resisting ship-money, he raised a regiment for the King in the Civil War and was left for dead on the battlefield of Edgehill. Scrope saved his father’s life, and himself became a prominent cavalry officer, though he has to be distinguished from his namesake, the parliamentarian colonel and regicide. He compounded for his delinquency in 1646 for £99. His father was fined £6,066 or the equivalent, but was still able to leave him a good estate. He does not appear to have engaged in conspiracy during the Interregnum, though Roger Whitley listed him among the Lincolnshire Royalists in 1658.4

Scrope was returned for Grimsby at the general election of 1661, and given the order of the Bath for the coronation. A moderately active Member of the Cavalier Parliament, he was appointed to 53 committees, including the committee of elections and privileges in the first four sessions. In the opening session his committees included those for restoring the bishops to the House of Lords, for inquiring into the shortfall in the revenue, for considering the corporations and uniformity bills, and for the restraint of tumultuous petitioning. He also helped to consider a bill to restore rectories and advowsons, several of which his father had been obliged to alienate in his composition, and two other measures to help loyalists, by reducing interest on their borrowings to 3 per cent, and recommending reparations. His private bills included those promoted by Lord Cleveland, who gave him a commission in his regiment, and by Lady Powell’s heirs (see William Powell). In the latter measure he seems to have taken a leading part, for he was the first Member appointed to the committee on 23 Nov., and he was reported as speaking ‘very well’ in the third reading debate. In 1663 he was among those appointed to consider the petition from the loyal and indigent officers and the bill for draining Lindsey level. He was listed as a court dependent in 1664. On 26 Jan. 1665 he was named to the committee on the bill to settle his father-in-law’s estate; but there is no evidence that he attended any later session. He was on coastal defence duty in Suffolk in August 1666, but a new writ was ordered on 18 Sept. It is possible that his extravagance had not diminished with age, for administration was granted to a creditor in the following year. His son inherited an estate of £3,000 p.a.; but the next member of the family to sit was Thomas Scrope, who represented Lincoln from 1768 to 1774.5

Ref Volumes: 1660-1690

Author: Paula Watson

Notes

  • 1. Lincs. Peds. (Harl. Soc. lii), 862; Coll. Top. et Gen. v. 360; Lincs. N. and Q. ix. 155.
  • 2. Carlisle, Privy Chamber, 142.
  • 3. List of Officers Claiming (1663), 117; CSP Dom. 1661-2, p. 509.
  • 4. CSP Dom. 1638-9, p. 249; Clarendon, Rebellion, ii. 372; Bulstrode, Mems. 78-79, 85, 103, 143; Cal. Comm. Comp. 1327.
  • 5. Reymes diary, 28 Jan. 1662; CSP Dom. 1661-2, p. 509; Lincs. Peds. 862; Her. and Gen. ii. 124.