Family and Education

b. c.1676. educ. Jesus, Camb. 1693. m. by 1708,1 Margaret, da. of Sir Edward Farmer of Canons, in Great Parndon, Essex, 1s. 2da.

Offices Held

Treasurer, Christ’s and St. Bartholomew’s Hospitals, 1731.

Biography

Robert Gay, an eminent doctor and F.R.S., who acquired the manor of Walcot, on the northwest side of Bath, before 1707,2 was returned as a Tory for Bath at a by-election in 1720, but was defeated in 1722. In 1725 John Wood, the architect, submitted to him plans for developing his property. He authorized Wood to go ahead, but in 1727, when he was standing again, he began to ‘discountenance’ the scheme, ‘to preserve his interest’ with the corporation, who regarded it as ‘chimerical’. After his election, however, he leased to Wood sufficient land for the building of Queen Square and Gay Street, which was named in honour of him and in which he had a house. He also gave land for a new general hospital in Bath and for a chapel in Queen Square.3 In his second Parliament he voted consistently against the Government. He did not stand again, dying 31 Oct. 1738.

Ref Volumes: 1715-1754

Author: Shirley Matthews

Notes

• 1. PCC 11 Lane; Lysons, Environs of London, iv. 238.
• 2. R. Warner, Hist. Bath, 274.
• 3. J. Wood, Bath (1749), i. 232; ii. 240-3, 284-5, 313.