Family and Education

b. c.1643, o. s. of Anthony Rudd (d.v.p. 1648, 1st s. of Sir Rice Rudd, 1st Bt.), of Aberglasney by Judith, da. and h. of Thomas Rudd (d. 1655), chief engineer to Charles I, of Castle Yard, Higham Ferrers, Northants.  m. 7 Dec. 1661, aged 18, Dorothy (d. 1682), da. of Charles Cornwallis† of Holborn, Mdx., s.p.  suc. gdfa. as 2nd Bt. May 1664; mother in Higham Ferrers property 1682.1

Offices Held

Steward, honor of Higham Ferrers 1697–d.2

Biography

The origin of Rudd’s chronic financial problems has traditionally been located in ‘a severely contested election’, but (and this in spite of his marriage to ‘a very great fortune’) he had fallen into the habit of mortgaging his property as early as 1673, some years before he figured as a parliamentary candidate. If he did suffer through election expenses, it would have been at Higham Ferrers, and presumably in February 1679, the only contest in which he is known to have participated. In Carmarthenshire, where his candidacy almost certainly benefited from the endorsement of the Vaughans of Golden Grove, he was never faced with opposition. An Exclusionist, but a moderate or an inactive one, he was classified as a Whig by Lord Carmarthen (Sir Thomas Osborne†) in March 1690, and the next year by Robert Harley* as a supporter of the Court. He was forecast as likely to vote against the ministry on 31 Jan. 1696 over the projected council of trade, but was absent from the House through illness when the Association was signed, informing the Speaker by letter, communicated to the House on 31 Mar., of his willingness to subscribe. In the division on Sir John Fenwick’s† case on 25 Nov. 1696 he was listed as voting for the attainder. The rewards of Whiggery were modest in his case: a local stewardship under the duchy of Lancaster, and a small pension from the licensing of hackney coaches. Rudd was classed as a member of the Court party in a comparative analysis of the old and new Parliaments in September 1698, and though this judgment was later marked doubtful, he voted on 18 Jan. 1699 against the third reading of the disbanding bill. An analysis of the Commons dating from early 1700 classed him in the interest of the Junto. Rudd died in London in late July 1701, and was buried at Llangathen. Of his Carmarthenshire estates, some had already been sold; others, loaded with debts of at least £1,600, eventually passed, through a Chancery judgment, to Hon. Thomas Watson Wentworth*. The Northamptonshire property appears to have been left to a nephew, Thomas Pemberton*.3

Ref Volumes: 1690-1715

Author: D. W. Hayton

Notes

• 1. M. A. Rudd, Recs. Rudd Fam. 65, 74–76, 80–81, 103–6; Bridges, Northants. ii. 177.
• 2. Somerville, Duchy of Lancaster Official Lists, 192.
• 3. Mont. Colls. xiv. 396; Sloane 856, f. 32; Carmarthen Antiquary, i. 30–38; iv. 32; Cal. Treas. Pprs. 1697–1701, p. 253; Rudd, 65, 76–77; Luttrell, Brief Relation, v. 78; Post Boy, 9–12 Aug. 1701; Trans. Carm. Antiq. Soc. xviii. 54.