STRODE, Essex (b.1646), of Westminster.

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

Constituency

Dates

Family and Education

bap. 7 Nov. 1646, 4th s. of William Strode of Barrington, Som. by Joan, da. and h. of Edward Barnard of Downside, Som.; bro. of William Strode II. educ. M. Temple 1675, called 1683. m. 17 Feb. 1675, Mary (bur. 30 May 1676), da. of Sir George Strode of St. John’s Priory, Clerkenwell., wid. of Richard Holsworthy, merchant, of London, s.p.1

Offices Held

High bailiff, Westminster 1675-80, commr. for assessment 1677-9.2

Biography

Nothing is known of Strode before his marriage to a distant cousin, the sister of John Strode II. It was presumably with her money that he bought the office of high bailiff of Westminster from the dean and chapter, undertaking to pay a further £500 in five yearly instalments to the Duke of Ormonde as high steward of the borough. Although somewhat over the usual age for commencing the study of the law, he entered himself at the Middle Temple to qualify himself for the post. As returning officer in the 1679 elections he was accused of partiality towards the court candidates. But in the following year the Privy Council ordered him to be dismissed for a forcible entry into the Savoyard Legation, and for arresting Sir James Butler, who as steward of the palace court had intervened to preserve diplomatic immunity. Ormonde, who was Butler’s patron and kinsman, ordered Bishop Dolben, in his capacity as dean of Westminster, to remove him, which he did with evident reluctance. ‘A surly blade ... they say [he] intends to stand trial, and if he fails at law to bring his case before Parliament.’ He went over to the country party, taking ‘all possible care’ to pick a grand jury of Westminster which would present the Duke of York as a Popish recusant. It was presumably because of this that the second Exclusion Parliament took no action against him for unduly returning Francis Wythens, an Abhorrer, for Westminster. He lost his case in the King’s bench, but obtained £1,000 in compensation from his successor as high bailiff.3

Strode successfully contested Stockbridge in 1681 on the interest of his brother, who owned part of the nearby manor of Kings Somborne. He was appointed to the committee of elections and privileges and to that to recommend a better place of assembly for the Oxford Parliament, but made no speeches. Re-elected after another contest in 1685, he was a very active Member of James II’s Parliament, being named to 29 committees, including the elections committee and those to peruse expiring laws, to recommend expunctions in the Journals, to estimate the yield of a tax on new buildings and to consider the bill for the general naturalization of Huguenot refugees. He was also added to the committee to bring in a bill to regulate hackney coaches on 6 June and helped to consider the bill after the second reading. He later petitioned the Treasury to be entrusted with the execution of the Act by reducing the number of coaches to 400 and making the coachmen buy licences. He was recommended as a commissioner for coalheavers in July 1688, but he relapsed into obscurity at the Revolution, and the date of his death is unknown.4

Ref Volumes: 1660-1690

Authors: Paula Watson / Basil Duke Henning

Notes

  • 1. Som. Arch. Soc. Jnl. xxx. pt. ii. 69; St. Mary le Strand par. reg.
  • 2. C10/482/178; HMC Lords, i. 45.
  • 3. C10/482/178; LJ, xiii. 659, 720; CSP Dom. 1680-1, pp. 24, 36, 44, 50; Cal. Treas, Bks. vii. 852; HMC Ormonde, n.s. v. 486, 508; Add. 28930, ff. 167, 176, 183, 187.
  • 4. Cal. Treas. Bks. viii. 1150; CSP Dom. 1687-9, p. 227.