Sir John Rous, MP, 3rd Baronet

Family and Education b. aft. 1676, 1st s. of Sir John Rous, 2nd Bt.†, of Henham by his 1st w. Philippa, da. of Thomas Bedingfield of Darsham Hall, Suff. and coh. to her bro. Thomas Bedingfield. educ. St. Catharine’s, Camb. 1695. unm. suc. fa. as 3rd Bt. 8 Apr. 1730.1

Offices Held

Freeman, Orford 1709; common councilman, Dunwich 1710.2

Biography A keen huntsman, Rous was returned for Dunwich in 1705, partly through his father’s influence and partly on the interest of his colleague Sir Charles Blois, 1st Bt.* He was listed as a ‘Churchman’, and voted against the Court candidate as Speaker on 25 Oct., writing home soon afterwards that he was ‘not pleased’ with the course political events were taking. Classed as a Tory in early 1708, he stood down at the election of that year. Rous eventually succeeded his father in April 1730, but died less than a year later on 3 Feb. 1731, at Henham. His great-nephew, the 6th baronet, was raised to the peerage in 1796 and was later created Earl of Stradbroke.3

Ref Volumes: 1690-1715 Author: D. W. Hayton Notes 1. Collins, Peerage, viii. 478–9. 2. W. Suss. RO, Shillinglee mss Ac.454/1083, John Hooke to Sir Edward Turnor*, 28 Sept. 1709; Suff. RO (Ipswich), Dunwich bor. recs. EE6/1144/14. 3. Cal. Le Neve Corresp. 72, 104–5, 124, 180, 182–4; Boyer, Pol. State, xli. 212