WARNEFORD, Sir Edmund (d.1700), of Warneford Place, Highworth, Wilts.

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

Constituency

Dates

Family and Education

2nd s. of Edmund Warneford of Warneford Place by 2nd w. Margaret. m. May 1681, Bridget (with £1,900), da. of William Paul, bp. of Oxford 1663-5, 1s. 2da. suc. bro. John 1662; kntd. 11 Nov. 1681.1

Offices Held

Commr. for assessment, Wilts. 1663-80, 1689-90, j.p. 1680-June 1688, Oct. 1688-d., sheriff 1682-3, dep. lt. 1683-June 1688, Oct. 1688-?d.

Biography

Warneford came of an ancient but undistinguished family, seated in North Wiltshire since the 14th century, and probably much earlier. His father was appointed to three local parliamentary commissions in 1644 and to the commission of the peace in 1649, dying shortly afterwards and leaving an estate of £700 p.a. to Warneford’s elder brother, who was the intimate friend (until his premature death) of the Tory antiquary Anthony à Wood. Warneford was also a Churchman and presumably opposed exclusion, since he was added to the county bench in 1680. He evaded the lord lieutenant’s questions on the repeal of the Test Act and Penal Laws by going to London, and was dismissed from local office. No direct connexion with Great Bedwyn can be discovered, but his estate adjoined that of John Wildman I, his colleague in 1689, or he may even have benefited from confusion with his cousin and namesake who was baptized there in 1652, and was later to marry a daughter of his Whig neighbour, Richard Southby. He voted to agree with the Lords that the throne was not vacant, and gave evidence in the Cricklade election case; but he obtained leave to go into the country on 21 Feb., and left no other trace on the records of the Convention. He signed the Association as a deputy lieutenant in 1696. He died between 14 July and 7 Aug. 1700, the only member of his family to enter Parliament.2

Ref Volumes: 1660-1690

Author: John. P. Ferris

Notes

  • 1. Misc. Gen. et Her. (ser. 2), ii, 236; PCC 70 Coker, 26 Mico; Le Neve’s Knights (Harl Soc. viii), 359; Wood’s Life and Times (Oxf. Hist. Soc. xix), 443.
  • 2. Aubrey and Jackson, Wilts. Colls. 158-9; Wood’s Life and Times, 183; Coll. Top. et Gen. v. 35; Mar. Lic. (Index Lib. lxvi), 96; CJ, x. 73; Wilts. N. and Q. vi. 349.