Sir John Fryer, 1st Baronet (14 September 1671 – 11 September 1726) was a prominent
Presbyterian layman, London pewterer, merchant and
Lord Mayor of London. The baronetcy became extinct on his death in 1726.[1] He was created a
baronet on 13 December 1714.[2][3]
"The King was pleased to make me a Barronett & my patent was ordered accordingly it bears date
This favour was conferred on me for my fidelity to the
Protestant Succession in the
House of Hanover & not laying down my Gown(?) when the
Torie Ministry had made the
Law against Occasional Conformity contrived on purpose to throw & exclude
Dissenters out of Publick places."[4]
Biography
Born in Buckinghamshire, the son of Francis Fryer, he believed his family came from Oxfordshire and his grandfather (known as Francis Freer) settled in Little Marlow settling in the dissolved nunnery there called The Abbey and renting a farm of 50 acres. John was the only surviving child of his father's third wife, Susannah, daughter of maltster John Boulter, twice mayor of
Abingdon, county town of Berkshire. Susannah's marriage portion had been £100 but her mother's brother was rich London merchant and baronet
Sir John Cutler and when Cutler's heirs died young his estates fell back to his sister's numerous Boulter children.
These estates included
Wimpole Hall in Cambridgeshire and Gawthorpe Hall and
Harewood Castle near Leeds in Yorkshire,
Little Haseley Oxfordshire, estates in Lincolnshire, the manor of
Deptford near London, and estates in Hampshire
Wherwell and
Goodworth Clatford. Fryer was to receive Wherwell through his uncle Edmund Boulter, build a mansion there, Wherwell Priory, and make it his home. He was succeeded there by his Iremonger descendants.[4]
John Fryer was a
Pewterer by trade and (in his last few years so as to be eligible for the mayoralty) a member of the
Fishmongers. He obtained election to
Alderman of
Queenhithe from 7 February 1710 retaining it until his death, and was created a baronet on 21 December 1714. He was a
Sheriff of the City of London for 1715–16, and 386th
Lord Mayor for 1720–21. The next year, he was Prime Warden of the Worshipful Company of Fishmongers. He was elected a director of the
East India Company and the
South Sea Company and inherited an estate at
Wherwell,
Hampshire.[1]
He married three times. Katherine née Weedon died 12 November 1718 and Dorcas née Roberts 17 August 1723. He married thirdly Isabella Gerard on 11 March 1725 and she survived him.[4]
In 1715 he began to enter in a small leather-bound ledger a note of the major events of his life making additions from time to time and he maintained this until near his end.
His only son who survived to adulthood, John Fryer by Katherine Weedon, died at Wherwell two years before him on 16 August 1724 aged 24.[4] His daughter Delicia, by Dorcas Roberts, was adopted by
Obadiah Hughes[5] husband of her mother's sister, Delicia Roberts.
14 September 1671, "on a
Thursday at 4 in the afternoon" – birth at Well End,
Little Marlow, Buckinghamshire. Nephew of
Edmund Boulter. "The house being the second from the lane which goeth up to a place called
Flackwell Heath".[4]
attended the Grammar School in the parish taught by Minister Mr Thomas Beesly. "a very solid preacher and a good liver".[4]
10 June 1685, Whitsuntide – sent to London to be improved in writing and accounts so might be fitted to be apprenticed to some trade.[4]
1 March 1686 – bound to Mr Harford a pewterer in Bishopsgate (next house to corner house of Cornhill) for seven years.[4]
"naturally of a weak constitution & being the only surviving child my dear mother had not inured me to any hard labour &, which was worse, in my infancy I had been cured of a rupture & I found such carrying or burdens strained which part and did me much hurt . . . my master put me on doing the servile part of the trade . . . not commonly done by other apprentices."[4]
7 April 1696 – first marriage by Mr Meriton at
St Nicholas Acons,
London[7] to Katherine Weedon 1677–1718, daughter of Nathaniel Weedon, gentleman, previously tanner, of Denham Buckinghamshire.[4]
15 February 1708/1709 – uncle Edmund Boulter dies and Fryer "rashly" parts with his own business in
Fenchurch Street ultimately receiving only part payment.[4]
Boulter has left him his house in
Prince's Street (to which Fryer moves his family) and, amongst other things, estates in Hampshire and Fryer soon starts building
Wherwell Priory.[4]
19 July 1720 – translated (from Pewterers) to the
Fishmongers' Company in order to qualify for the lord mayoralty.[1]
27 July 1720 – second marriage at the Chapel in
Lincoln's Inn to Dorcas Roberts ~1682–1723, daughter of Alderman Sir Gabriel Roberts 1629–1715 and Mary née Bulam, and granddaughter of
Sir Lewis Roberts.[4]
3 August 1720 – took (20-year-old) son John to Calais as it appeared he might have a consumption (and toured the great churches, convents and nunneries. It seemed a misery of a kingdom except their wine which was very good.)
29 October 1720 – travelled by the City Barge to Westminster attended by the Livery Companies, took the oaths at the Exchequer Bar and returned by water as the Guns were fired divers times to
Black Fryers (sic) and proceeded to
Goldsmith's Hall where attended by the
Lords Justices and the
Privy Councillors. As he passed along there were loud acclamations of long live King George and Sir John Fryer. There were a few Jacobite incendiaries who had the insolence to hiss as his lordship passed along.[11]
4 June 1721 – the Lady of Sir John Fryer, Lord Mayor of this city was delivered of a son and a daughter, Gabriel John and Dilitia.
28 October 1721 – at Guildhall surrendered to Sir William Stewart, lord mayor elect, the Chair and other Ensigns of Mayoralty.[12]
30 October 1721 – at the installation of the new lord mayor there was a Tory mob who had the insolence to hiss the Rt. Honourable Sir John Fryer, the late Lord Mayor but they were well Drubbed.[13]
1721–1722 – Prime Warden of the Fishmongers' Company.
16 August 1723 – second wife, Dorcas née Roberts dies, he narrowly recovers from the same illness.[4]
16 August 1724 – son John dies aged 24 at Wherwell.[4]
11 March 1724/1725 – third marriage to Isabella Gerard, daughter of
Sir Francis Gerard 4th Baronet, at Lincoln's Inn Chapel by Mr Burroughs.[4] She is a near relation to Sir Gerard Conyers, lord mayor of London.
11 September 1726 – died at Wherwell[14] in his 55th year. Without surviving male issue being predeceased by three sons and one daughter.[4]
He was survived by:
daughters by Katherine Weedon:
Bithia Brassey 1698–1742, his eldest daughter, whose own daughter married Quaker
Thomas Dimsdale MD, Baron of the Russian Empire
Susannah Fryer 1712–1731, who died unmarried
daughter by Dorcas Roberts:
Dilitia Iremonger 1721–1744, whose descendants remained at Wherwell Priory
^page 5, British Mercury, 17 November 1714 – 24 November 1714; Issue 490
^
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzaaabSir John Fryer, Autobiography or Some account of the Life &c of John Fryer & of severall of his Relations written by himself 1715 &c; G.L., MS. 12,017.
^Debrett's Peerage pp. 662 col 1 and
Kearsey's Peerage (1804) vol, 2 p. 546 both state that Isabella Gerard married Lord Palmerston in 1738 (not 1728), and this matches the death date of his first wife Anne nee Houblon (she died 1735). Arthur Collins's
The English Baronetage: Containing a Genealogical and Historical ..., Volume 1 (1741), in the entry "Gerard of Bryn" p. 53, closest in date to the event, gives no date for Lady Fryer's remarriage. Cokayne's Complete Baronage is not always correct on dates, although generally more reliable than others.