Constituency Dates
West Looe 20 Mar. 1782
Grampound 1784
Reigate 1802 – 30 Jan. 1806
Family and Education
b. 6 May 1760, 1st s. of Charles Cocks by his 1st w. Elizabeth, da. of Richard Eliot, M.P. educ. Harrow 1770-1; Westminster 1774; St. Alban Hall, Oxf. 1778. m. (1) 19 Mar. 1785, Margaret (d. 9 Feb. 1831), da. of Rev. Treadway Russell Nash, historian of Worcs., 3s. 1da.; (2) 3 June 1834, his cos. Jane, da. of James Cocks, London banker, wid. of Rev. George Waddington, rector of Northwold, Norf. suc. fa. as 2nd Lord Sommers 30 Jan. 1806; cr. Earl Sommers 17 July 1821.
Offices Held

Ld. lt. Herefs. 1817 – d.

Address
Main residence: Castleditch, Herefs.
biography text

In 1782 Cocks was returned for West Looe on the interest of John Buller. In Parliament he supported Shelburne’s Administration, and when on 18 Dec. 1782 Lord John Cavendish moved to lay before the House that part of the peace which recognized American independence, Cocks said (in his only reported speech before 1790) ‘that in such a moment as the present we should have confidence in ministers and not call upon them to report progress, since it might materially affect the negotiations about which they were employed’.1Debrett, ix. 117. Cocks voted against Fox’s East India bill, 27 Nov. 1783. In Robinson’s list of January 1784 and Stockdale’s of 19 March he was classed as ‘Administration’. At the general election he was returned on the interest of his uncle Edward Eliot at Grampound as a supporter of Administration. His only recorded vote during this Parliament was with Pitt on the Regency, 1788-9.

He died 5 Jan. 1841.

Author
M.M.D.
Volume
Commons 1754-1790
Notes
  • 1. Debrett, ix. 117.