MAYNE, Simon (c.1644-1725), of Dinton, nr. Aylesbury, Bucks.

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1690-1715, ed. D. Hayton, E. Cruickshanks, S. Handley, 2002
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Constituency

Dates

6 Apr. 1691 - 28 Jan. 1696
1705 - 1710

Family and Education

b. c. 1644, 1st s. of Simon Mayne† of Dinton by 2nd w. Elizabeth, wid. of Essex.  m. (1) lic. 19 Dec. 1668, aged 24, Elizabeth (d. 1683) da. of Christopher Browne of Tolethorpe, Rutland, 4s. (2 d.v.p.) 5da. (3 d.v.p.); (2) by 1688, 2s. 1da.  suc. fa. 1661.1

Offices Held

Sub-commr. prizes at Plymouth June–Oct. 1689; commr. victualling Nov. 1689–1702.2

Biography

Mayne’s grandfather purchased the manor of Dinton in 1604. His father, who represented Aylesbury in the Long Parliament, was excepted from the Act of Indemnity as one of the regicides, had his estates forfeited to the crown and died in the Tower in 1661. Mayne’s father had remarried in January 1644 and Mayne was probably born within the year. Mayne himself repurchased the lease and the great tithes of Dinton, and obtained a regrant of them for 31 years in 1694. He had been residing at Dinton from at least 1668, and from 1671 his children were regularly baptized there. He was still resident in Dinton in 1706.3

Mayne, an associate of Aaron Smith, Titus Oates’s legal adviser in the Popish Plot, was arrested during the Rye House conspiracy in 1683, and accused of collaborating with Smith in the production of treasonable pamphlets. Questioned by the Privy Council, he denied any involvement in such literature, or knowledge of a ‘design’ against the government, explained away his association with Smith as the result of a Chancery case, and protested that he was a regular attender at his parish church. He was released on bail and was not prosecuted further. Perhaps significantly, his will dates from this time and reveals his friendship with a group of radical Buckinghamshire Whigs, including Richard Beke*. Given his radical connexions he was perceived as a possible Whig collaborator by James II’s agents: in February 1688 they recommended that he be added to the Buckinghamshire commission of the peace, and he was mentioned as a possible candidate for Aylesbury later in the year.4

Mayne’s role in the Revolution of 1688 is not known, but one can assume he was favourable to the new regime for he was appointed a victualling commissioner at £600 p.a. in November 1689. Backed by Hon. Thomas Wharton*, he was returned for Aylesbury at a by-election in 1691, and in 1693 he was acting as Wharton’s* electioneering agent at Chipping Wycombe. In the Commons he was listed in 1692 as a Court supporter to be spoken to by Richard Hampden I, the Whig chancellor of the Exchequer, and he appears on various other lists as a placeman, including Grascome’s which noted him as a Court supporter with a place or pension. He spoke and acted as teller on 10 Jan. 1693 during the debate on appropriating £700,000 of the supply for the use of the navy. On this occasion he helped his colleague Thomas Papillon* to defeat an amendment aimed at forcing the victualling office to pay bills in due course, pointing out that the office was £200,000 in debt already. That same day he was granted a week’s leave. He was back at Westminster in time to attend the debate on the third reading of the triennial bill on 9 Feb., and sent Wharton, who was away from London, an account of it. On 4 Dec. 1694 he was nominated to the drafting committee on the prisons bill. During that session he was included on Henry Guy’s* list of ‘friends’, presumably those prepared to support Guy, when he was under attack in the Commons.5

Returned at Aylesbury in 1695, Mayne was unseated on petition early next year. Defeated at Aylesbury at the elections of 1698 and January 1701, he was forced to petition the Commons on 16 Apr. 1701 to protect his grant of Dinton’s tithes from the resumption bill then under consideration in the House. Defeated again in December 1701, he lost his post at the victualling office at the accession of Queen Anne. He featured in the celebrated ‘men of Aylesbury’ case as the candidate for whom Matthew Ashby had attempted to vote in January 1701, and gave evidence to the Commons on 13 Nov. 1703 on how the plaintiff had been deprived of his right of casting his vote by the returning officer (see AYLESBURY, Bucks.). On 8 Feb. 1704 he attended the Commons to offer his comments to the report of the commissioners of accounts on the victualling office. On 14 Mar. the House resolved

that the late commissioners of the victualling, in neglecting to keep regular accounts in their office, in making out perfect bills to clear imprests without vouchers, in not keeping a regular course in the payment of their bills, and not making regular assignments thereof, have been guilty of a breach of trust, and have acted contrary to their instructions.

However, since Philip Papillon* was the main target, Mayne escaped prosecution.6

Returned for Aylesbury in 1705, he was classed on one list as ‘Low Church’ and his election considered as a gain by Lord Sunderland (Charles, Lord Spencer*). He voted on 25 Oct. for the Court candidate as Speaker. The presence of General Edmund Maine in the Commons during the 1705 Parliament makes it difficult to be certain that the occurrence of ‘Mr Mayne’ in the Journals does in fact refer to Simon Mayne. Mayne supported the Court on 18 Feb. 1706 on the regency bill proceedings. Two lists of early 1708 classed him as a Whig. After his return at the 1708 election, he voted for the naturalization of the Palatines in 1709 and in the following session voted for the impeachment of Dr Sacheverell in 1710. Defeated for Aylesbury in 1710, he was removed as a j.p. in 1712 and did not stand for Parliament again. He was buried at Dinton on 7 Apr. 1725.7

Ref Volumes: 1690-1715

Authors: Eveline Cruickshanks / Stuart Handley

Notes

  • 1. IGI, London; Archaeologia, xxxvi. 225; Mar. Lic. Vicar-Gen. (Harl. Soc. xxiii), 160; Vis. Rutland 1681–2 (Harl. Soc. lxxiii.), 10; Lipscomb, Bucks. ii. 152–3; PCC 96 Romney; M. Noble, Lives of Eng. Regicides ii. 66–67.
  • 2. CSP Dom. 1689–90, pp. 172, 295; Luttrell, Brief Relation, i. 609; v. 171.
  • 3. VCH Bucks. ii. 274; DNB (Mayne, Simon); Cal. Treas. Bks. x. 663, 766; Lipscomb, 152; Bucks. Dissent and Par. Life 1669–1712 ed. Broad (Bucks. Recs. Soc. xxviii), 199.
  • 4. CSP Dom. July–Sept. 1683, pp. 42–43, 99–100, 116, 268–9; Duckett, Penals Laws and Test Act (1883), 152, 239–40.
  • 5. Bodl. Carte 233, f. 276; 79, ff. 481–2; Luttrell Diary, 358–9.
  • 6. Luttrell, Brief Relation, v. 358.
  • 7. L. K. J. Glassey, Appt. JPs, 216; Lipscomb, 153.