Family and Education

b. bef.1666, 2nd s. of Thomas Lloyd (d. by 1680), sheriff, Carm. 1655–6, of Llanllawddog, Carm. by Anne, da. and coh. of Henry Vaughan of Plas Cilcennyn, Cilcennin, Card.  educ. ?Emmanuel, Camb. 1669; I. Temple 1675, called 1682, bencher 1705.  unm.1

Offices Held

Serjeant-at-law 1705.

?Freeman, Carmarthen 1699.2

Biography

Lloyd, a practising barrister, was the first of his family to enter Parliament. It is possible that he was launched on his legal career by the kinsmen and associates of his maternal great-uncle Sir John Vaughan† of Trawscoed, chief justice of common pleas under Charles II. He may also have owed his parliamentary seat to this connexion, or at least his original election; he was in due course to differ sharply from the Whiggish Vaughans in his politics. In November 1701 he successfully fought an election contest against a prominent Tory, Sir Thomas Powys*, and in so doing possibly represented the Vaughan interest. Once in Parliament, however, he was classed with the Tories by Robert Harley*, and was listed as having favoured the motion of 26 Feb. 1702 vindicating the proceedings of the Commons over the impeachments of the four Whig lords. The following month he wrote to the Speaker requesting to be excused from a forthcoming call of the House in order to attend the assizes in Wales. Re-elected in 1702, Lloyd was included in March 1704 in a list drawn up by Lord Nottingham (Daniel Finch†) of likely supporters in the proceedings upon the Scotch Plot. Later that year he was forecast as a likely opponent of the Tack, and despite being lobbied by Thomas Mansell he joined the other Tackers in the crucial division on 28 Nov. 1704. Otherwise his parliamentary activity was of a routine nature, reporting upon three private bills between 1702 and 1704, two concerning his fellow Welsh MP Sir Edward Williams.3

Lloyd stood down at the 1705 general election, and thereafter seems to have abandoned any parliamentary ambitions. In 1711 the Tory ministry contemplated appointing him to a Welsh judgeship: there was local backing for him, but Lord Keeper Harcourt (Simon I*) could only give him a lukewarm endorsement. Subsequently he may perhaps have been the ‘Mr Lloyd’ whose name was sent to the Pretender in 1721 as one of the ‘principals’ in Cardiganshire to be relied on in the event of a rising. Lloyd was buried at Carmarthen on 4 May 1721. His will, drawn up as early as 1702, left Carmarthenshire property, part of his deceased elder brother’s estate which he himself had bought back for the family, to his younger brother, with a charge of £200 to be raised for each of his two unmarried sisters.4

Ref Volumes: 1690-1715

Author: D. W. Hayton

Notes

• 1. Williams, Parl. Hist. Wales, 39; W. Wales Hist. Recs. i. 80; F. Green, Crosswood Deeds, 93, 112; PCC 182 Buckingham; Hist. Carm. ed. Lloyd, ii. 458; NLW Jnl. viii. 242; Meyrick, Card. 259.
• 2. Trans. Carm. Antiq. Soc. iii. 2.
• 3. HMC Lords, iv. 96; Ceredigion, v. 404; Add. 70037, f. 120; Bull. IHR, xxxiv. 95.
• 4. HMC Portland, iv. 694; P. S. Fritz, Ministers and Jacobitism 1715–45, p. 154; W. Wales Hist. Recs. xiv. 43; PCC 182 Buckingham.