Sir Robert Throckmorton, 8th Baronet

Sir Robert Throckmorton, 8th Baronet (1800-1862), by Thomas Phillips, in The Saloon at Coughton Court, Warwickshire. Property of the National Trust, NTPL Ref. No.153602

Sir Robert George Throckmorton, 8th Baronet (5 December 1800 – 28 June 1862) was an English Whig and Liberal politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1831 to 1835.

Throckmorton was the son of William Throckmorton and his wife Frances Gifford, daughter of Thomas Gifford of Chillington. The Throckmortons were a prominent Roman Catholic family, who continued to hear mass at the family home Coughton Court, Alcester, Warwickshire. In 1826 the family estate at Molland in Devon devolved to Throckmorton when his uncle succeeded to the baronetcy.^[1] The Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829 allowed Catholics to hold national office for the first time in almost three hundred years.^[2]

Throckmorton took advantage of the change in the law to become one of the first Catholic MPs.^[2] At the 1831 general election he was elected MP for Berkshire, the location of his third country estate, Buckland Park (though it is now in Oxfordshire). He held the seat until 1835.^[3] He also became a JP and Deputy Lieutenant for Berkshire.^[1] He was High Sheriff of Berkshire in 1843.

Throckmorton inherited the baronetcy in 1840 on the death of his uncle Sir Charles Throckmorton, 7th Baronet. He built a new Catholic church at the end of the south drive of Coughton Court, next to the ruins of the church built by an earlier Throckmorton in the 15th century which was confiscated from the family during the Reformation.^[2]

Throckmorton died at the age of 61.

Throckmorton married Elizabeth Acton, daughter of Sir John Acton, 6th Baronet of Aldenham on 16 July 1829.^[1]

References

External links

Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Robert Throckmorton