Family and Education

b. c.1642, 2nd s. of Thomas Reynolds, clothier, of Colchester by Margery, da. of Samuel Decoster, merchant, of London. m. by 1666, Judith, da. of Thomas Samford of Colchester, 4s. 2da. suc. bro. 1665.1

Offices Held

Commr. for assessment, Essex 1673-80, Colchester 1673-4, 1679-80, Essex and Colchester 1689-90; j.p. Essex 1673-80; capt. of militia horse by 1676-9; recorder, Colchester, Feb.-May. 1688.2

Biography

Reynolds’s father settled in Colchester where he prospered in the manufacture of bays. He is not known to have been active in the Civil War, but held municipal office during and after the Interregnum, though he was initially less prominent than another clothier of the same name. About 1650 he bought Peldon, some five miles from Colchester, from the trustees of the second Earl Rivers.3

Reynolds does not appear to have been in trade himself. He stood unsuccessfully as an exclusionist at the second election of 1679, and was dismissed as a militia officer and a j.p. Nevertheless he was elected in 1681, partly as a result of the intervention of Titus Oates, but he played no part in the Oxford Parliament. He was defeated in 1685, petitioning unsuccessfully. Appointed recorder of Colchester in February 1688, he was regarded as a probable Whig collaborator, and in April James II’s agents reported that the borough would elect him or his deputy to the abortive Parliament. Almost simultaneously an order in council directed his removal as recorder, though this did not take effect till 31 May, after which the King’s electoral agents stated that he had ‘no interest here’. Nevertheless he was successful at the election of 1689, surviving a petition from Sir Walter Clarges. He was moderately active in the Convention, serving on 14 committees, of which the most important were for restoring corporations. Nevertheless, he did not vote for the disabling clause, and was presumably a moderate Whig. He died on 23 Aug. 1694, aged 52, and was buried in St. James, Colchester, the only member of his family to sit in Parliament.4

Ref Volumes: 1660-1690

Authors: Gillian Hampson / Geoffrey Jaggar

Notes

• 1. Morant, Essex, i. 419; Trans. Essex Arch. Soc. xiii. 272.
• 2. CSP Dom. 1676-7, p. 115; Colchester Castle, Colchester assembly bk. 2, ff. 295, 297; PC2/72/651.
• 3. Morant, i. 419; CSP Dom. 1655, pp. 203-4, 354, 378; Trans. Essex Arch. Soc. xiii. 272.
• 4. Jones, First Whigs, 164-5; CJ, ix. 726; x. 11; Colchester assembly bk. 2, f. 293; Morant, i. 419.