Family and Education

b. 1686, o.s. of Sir Thomas Rolt of Sacombe and Harrowby, sometime pres. of Surat, by Mary, da. of Dr. Thomas Cox, physician in ordinary to Charles II, wid. of Thomas Rolt of Milton Ernest, Beds.1 educ. Merton, Oxf. 7 Nov. 1701, aged 15; L. Inn 1702. m. c.1708, Anne, da. of Henry Bayntun, M.P., sis. and h. of John Bayntun of Spye Park, 6s. 2da. suc. fa. 1710.

Offices Held

Biography

Rolt’s father was the son of Edward Rolt of Pertenhall, Bedfordshire, by Mary, daughter of Sir Oliver Cromwell of Hinchingbrooke, Huntingdonshire, the Protector’s uncle.2 After many years in the service of the East India Company, he came home in 1682, buying the Sacombe estate in 1688 for £22,500.3 Returned in 1715 as a Tory for Grantham, where he owned property, he voted against the Government, except on the septennial bill, when he was absent. He is mentioned in the 6th report of the South Sea committee as having accepted £5,000 stock from the Company on 1 Mar. 1720, in the same circumstances as Sir Robert Chaplin, and another £800 on 23 Mar.4 In 1721 his name was sent to the Pretender as a probable supporter in the event of a rising.5

Before the 1722 election Lord Cardigan wrote to Lord Gower:

I am apt to believe that £300 will do, in case Rolt can be brought to join heartily with anyone ... I have a project in my head to turn out Rolt, in case he does not do us justice.6

He was defeated at Grantham, where he stood jointly with Lord Cardigan’s candidate,7 but was returned for Chippenham, near which his wife had inherited from her brother in 1716 an estate said to be worth nearly £3,000 a year.8 He died of smallpox 22 Dec. 1722.

Ref Volumes: 1715-1754

Author: R. S. Lea

Notes

• 1. Lics. Vic.-Gen. (Harl. Soc. xxx), 206; Lics. Fac. Office (Harl. Soc. xxiv), 79; Beds. N. and Q. iii. 58, 365.
• 2. Genealogist, n.s. xvii. 145-9; Cussans, Herts. Broadwater, 161.
• 3. HMC Lords, ii. 353-4.
• 4. CJ, xix. 574, 578.
• 5. Stuart mss 65/16.
• 6. Undated, Leveson Gower letter bk. vii. f. 16.
• 7. I. Garner to John Heathcote, 18 Mar. 1722, I Ancaster 13/B/2, Lincs. Archives Office.
• 8. Bland-Burges Pprs. ed. Hutton, 6.