FULLER, John (1680-1745), of Brightling, Suss.

Fuller was descended from a family of yeomen settled in Waldron since the 16th century. His grandfather had held the lease of an ironworks at Chiddingley and his father purchased land for a furnace at Heathfield, but it seems to have been John jnr. who developed this latter site into a successful ironworks in the early 18th century. In 1708 Fuller was appointed as surveyor of the duty on houses in Sussex, a job he had lost by September 1710, when, in response to his petition for a place, the new Treasury lords ordered the commissioners of taxes to appoint him to the first vacancy. He was thus reappointed to his old post on 21 Nov. 1710. Successful for Sussex in the general election of 1713, he was classed as a Tory in the Worsley list. On 3 July 1714 he told in favour of his relation John Lade* in the election for Southwark. He did not stand in 1715 but from 1718 to 1744 served as chairman of the eastern division of the Sussex bench. In 1734 he unsuccessfully contested the county as a Tory. He died on 4 Aug. 1745 and was buried at Waldron. Two of his sons, John and Rose Fuller, sat in Parliament under George II and George III. Suss. Arch. Colls. 63–87; Cal. Treas. Bks. xxii. 197; xxiv. 481, 512, 589; info. from Dr P. J. Le Fevre; Vis. Eng. and Wales Notes, 40.