BASSETT, William (1627-67), of Beaupré, Glam.

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1660-1690, ed. B.D. Henning, 1983
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Constituency

Dates

aft. 24 May - 15 June 1661

Family and Education

bap. 6 Jan. 1627, 1st s. of Sir Richard Basset of Beaupré by 1st w. Mary, da. of Edmund Thomas of Wenvoe. educ. G. Inn 1655. m. settlement 20 July 1665, Martha, da. and coh. of Sir Hugh Wyndham, 1st Bt., of Pilsdon, Dorset, wid. of Edward Carne of Ewenny, Glam., s.p. suc. fa. 1664; kntd. c.1666.1

Offices Held

Commr. for militia, Glam. Mar. 1660, assessment Aug. 1660-d., oyer and terminer, Wales 1661, dep. lt. Glam. 1665-d., sheriff 1665-d.2

Lt. R. Horse Gds. (The Blues) 1661, capt. 1664-d.; lt. Lord Rutherford’s Ft. 1662.3

Biography

Bassett’s ancestors were settled at Beaupré by 1330 and first represented Glamorgan in 1563. His father, a commissioner of array and royalist governor of Cardiff during the Civil War, was taken prisoner at the fall of Hereford in 1645 and compounded at £753; but with Sir Edward Thomas he led the rising against the county committee in 1647 which was suppressed by Rowland Laugharne. Bassett himself signed the letter protesting that ‘no opposition or disrespect’ to Laugharne was intended. His late entry to Gray’s Inn in 1655 may have been devised to facilitate plotting, though it was not till after Cromwell’s death that his name was introduced into royalist correspondence by Robert Thomas.4

At the Restoration Bassett was given a commission in the guards and nominated to the order of the Royal Oak, with an income (presumably in reversion) of £800 p.a. But his father did not regain Cardiff Castle, which was given to Herbert Evans, a younger man who enjoyed the dominant interest at Neath. It was probably on this interest that Sir Richard Lloyd I was returned in 1661; but when he chose to sit for Radnorshire, Bassett was hastily elected. Before he could take any part in the proceedings of the Cavalier Parliament, it was decided to award the seat to his friend Thomas, who had contested the general election with Lloyd. Bassett’s military career was not affected by this episode. He died childless on 8 Sept. 1667, leaving to his half-brother Richard an estate which by 1677 had been reduced to £500 p.a. No later member of the family entered Parliament.5

Ref Volumes: 1660-1690

Author: Leonard Naylor

Notes

  • 1. G. T. Clark, Gens. of Glam. 351-2; Cat. Penrice and Margam Mss. ser. 3, pp. 156-7.
  • 2. CSP Dom. 1664-5, p. 466.
  • 3. CSP Dom. 1661-2, p. 305; 1663-4, p. 642.
  • 4. Clark, op. cit. 348; Cal. Comm. Comp. 1130-1; J. R. Phillips, Civil War in Wales, ii. 337, 341, Cal. Cl. SP, iv. 88, 109.
  • 5. CSP Dom. 1667, p. 448; 1670, p. 652; CJ, viii. 258, 264, 271; SP29/216/90, 398/185.