SMELT, Leonard (c.1683-1740), of Kirkby Fleetham, nr. Northallerton, Yorks.

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1715-1754, ed. R. Sedgwick, 1970
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Constituency

Dates

6 May 1709 - 1710
1713 - 30 May 1740

Family and Education

b. c.1683, 1st s. of Leonard Smelt of Kirkby Fleetham by Grace, da. of Sir William Frankland, 1st Bt. M.P., of Thorkleby, Yorks.; bro. of William Smelt. educ. Jesus, Camb. 1700. m. Elizabeth Whitaker,1 s.p. suc. fa. 1710.

Offices Held

Commr. for stating army debts 1715-22; clerk of deliveries in the Ordnance 1722-33; clerk of the Ordnance 1733-d.

Biography

Returned for Thirsk on the interest of the Franklands in 1709, Smelt sat from 1713 for Northallerton, voting with the Government except on Lord Cadogan in 1717 and on the peerage bill in 1719. In 1721 he applied to Lord Sunderland for a vacant place in the victualling office, writing:

I have the misfortune to be very little personally known to your Lordship, but I flatter myself that my behaviour in Parliament (where I have sat many years and have interest enough to sit there as long as I live) has been in no respect undeserving of his Majesty’s favour and of your Lordship’s patronage.2

Given a post in the Ordnance, he died 30 May 1740.

Ref Volumes: 1715-1754

Author: Romney R. Sedgwick

Notes

  • 1. PCC 184 Browne.
  • 2. 28 June 1721, Sunderland (Blenheim) mss.