Family and Education

bap. 30 Oct. 1766,1 2nd s. of Thomas Williams* by Catherine, da. of John Lloyd of Llanfihangel-tre’r-Beirdd, Anglesey; bro. of Owen Williams*. educ. L. Inn 1788. m. 24 Oct. 1803, Elizabeth, da. of William Currie, MD, of Boughton Hall, Cheshire.2.

Offices Held

Receiver-gen. Anglesey 1796-1802; capt. Buckingham vols. 1803.

Biography

Williams, the younger son of the great copper industrialist, successfully contested Windsor at the general election of 1802, after eight months’ assiduous cultivation of the borough. Though nominally independent, he joined forces with the official court candidate and his election addresses emphasized his ‘sincere attachment to the King’ and ‘firm regard to the constitution’. He was unseated on petition, on the ground of bribery, 16 Feb. 1804, and no recorded speech or vote is attributed to him during his brief tenure of the seat.

Williams received shares in the Stanley copper smelting company shortly before his father’s death in November 1802, when the latter’s will provided him with £20,000 and an equal share in the profits of the family copper mills in the Thames valley. He withdrew from the Anglesey mining concerns in 1810 and his later life remains obscure.3 He may have been the John Williams who is listed in the directories between 1812 and 1817 as the owner of a copper warehouse at 71 Wapping Wall, an establishment connected with the Upper Thames Street copper office run by his brother Owen and Pascoe Grenfell*.

Ref Volumes: 1790-1820

Author: David R. Fisher

Notes

• 1. J. E. Griffith, Peds. Anglesey Fams. 68.
• 2. Gent. Mag. (1803), ii. 987.
• 3. Windsor Election Handbills (1802), 33, 40; J. R. Harris, Copper King (1964), 137, 145, 182; PCC 945 Kenyon.