TAYLOR, John Bladen (1764-1820).

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1790-1820, ed. R. Thorne, 1986
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Constituency

Dates

1818 - May 1819

Family and Education

b. 2 July 1764, at Calcutta, 2nd s. of John Taylor of Townhead, Lancs. and Abbot Hall, Kendal, Westmld. by Dorothy, da. of William Rumbold, E.I. Co. naval service, wid. of Capt. Northall. m. 1 Aug. 1808, Rachel, da. of Sir William Dunkin, judge of supreme ct., Calcutta, wid. of George Elliot of Bengal, 1da.

Offices Held

Cadet, E.I. Co. (Madras) 1778, ensign 1778, lt. 1783, capt. 1796, maj. 1799, lt.-col. 1804, ret. 1805.

Maj. 3 R.E.I. vols. 1811, lt.-col. 1812.

Dir. E.I. Co. 1810-19.

Biography

Taylor’s parents were married in India in 1762, his father being then in the Company marine service. His mother’s brother had been governor of Madras. He himself retired from the Madras military establishment in 1805 and in May 1809 was a candidate for an East India Company directorship, but withdrew ‘this time’. He succeeded in 1810. Before the election of 1818 he appeared as a candidate at Hythe, often contested by well-to-do outsiders. He was returned in conjunction with another ministerialist Sir John Perring, a London merchant who owed his fortune to a family association with Sir Thomas Rumbold in Madras. Taylor himself was a member of the company of merchants of England trading to the East Indies.

Taylor made no mark in the House, where his support of government, if any, was silent. On 4 Mar. 1819 he took a month’s leave for illness and on 7 May another. Soon afterwards he resigned through ill health. He died at Ambleside, 4 Aug. 1820.

Kent AO, Harris mss C67/47,48; Gent. Mag. (1820), ii. 189-90.

Ref Volumes: 1790-1820

Author: J. W. Anderson

Notes