FRY, John (1609-57), of Burseye, Tarrant Gunville, Dorset

Although of a reasonably prosperous gentry family, John Fry became a prominent sectarian MP during the Rump Parliament, and has been described as ‘the outstanding example in Dorset of a man who suffered for his beliefs’.17Brunton and Pennington, Long Parliament, 174. Fry’s ancestors came from Somerset, and were apparently of lowly stock (John’s grandfather, William senior, was unable to sign his name), but by the end of the sixteenth century the family had acquired substantial landholdings and social standing in the parish of Iwerne Minster, near Blandford in Dorset.18PROB11/125/40. Their local influence was bolstered by the marriages of John’s father, William, to Milicent Swaine, and of his uncle, Robert, to Margery Lanning, whose families owned land in Iwerne Minster and neighbouring Tarrant Gunville.19Vis. Dorset, 1623, 42-3. John Fry was educated at the Middle Temple and married into the Lindsay family of Poole, a town which was to become renowned for its puritanism and staunch opposition to the king in the 1640s.20M. Temple Admiss. i. 125; Oxford DNB. As well as his connections among the minor gentry, it is possible that as a young man Fry had dealings with William Cecil*, 2nd earl of Salisbury over lands in Cranborne Chase. In 1633 Salisbury sold his rents in Iwerne Minster to three local men: John Fry, John Freke and John Squibb.21Hutchins, Dorset, iii. 540. Fry’s relationship with Salisbury was not always amicable, however. In the same year, the recorder of Dorchester noted that ‘John Fry of Woodcutts, gent.’ had been bound over to appear at the Blandford quarter sessions, ‘upon suspicion of killing deer in Cranborne Chase’.22Casebook of Sir Francis Ashley JP, recorder of Dorchester, 1614-35 ed. J.H. Bettey (Dorset Rec. Soc. 1981), 105. This miscreant may well have been the future MP, as Woodcutts (or Woodcottes) was the estate of Fry’s aunt, Anne Edmondes, in the parish of Handley.23Vis. Dorset 1623, 42-3.

Fry owed his rise to prominence after 1642 to the parliamentarian army. It is possible that he was the John Fry paid as a gunner under Sir Walter Erle* in September 1642, and he had certainly risen to the rank of captain by August 1644, when he was among the Dorset commanders ordered to march his men westwards in support of the beleaguered 3rd earl of Essex.24Bodl. Gough Dorset 14, f. 98; Bayley, Dorset, 212. Fry was present at the fall of Corfe Castle in March 1646, and was a signatory of the articles of surrender of Portland a month later.25Bodl. Tanner 60, f. 510; Bayley, Dorset, 480. Fry’s later political and religious opinions grew from his experiences in this period. He was later to claim that his involvement with the parliamentarians in Dorset was as a result of his losses at the hands of Prince Maurice’s troops in 1643, and this is supported by his petition to Parliament in the spring of 1645, complaining that he had lost £450 through the sequestration of his lands by the royalists.26Brunton and Pennington, Long Parliament, 174; Add. 29319, f. 31. The local parliamentarians had also treated him unfairly. In the same petition that his house in Weymouth and farm at nearby Wyke Regis nearby had been requisitioned for the free quarter of parliamentarian soldiers.27Add. 29319, f. 31. In April 1645 the Committee of Both Kingdoms acceded to his request for relief, and issued an order for compensation to Colonel William Sydenham*, governor of Weymouth.28Add. 29319, ff. 29-30. This order may not have done much to relieve Fry’s already fragile finances, as he was unable to repay money he had borrowed from his cousin, Francis Fry, before the civil war. In an attempt to satisfy his cousin, in February 1643 he sold off his tenancy of impropriated church lands in Iwerne Minster; and in May 1647, unable to pay another instalment, he mortgaged his lands at Ebsborne in Wiltshire.29C6/141/57.

After the end of the first civil war, Fry became increasingly involved in county politics. He was an assiduous member of the Dorset county committee from September 1646 until March 1647.30Dorset Standing Cttee. ed. Mayo, 10-198. In June 1646 he presided over the confiscation of the Bankes’s family estates, after the fall of Corfe Castle.31G. Bankes, The Story of Corfe Castle (1853), 223. Fry also served as justice of the peace for Dorset from the later 1640s until February 1651.32C231/6, p. 210. Fry’s diligence in the county administration, and his local military service, probably influenced his election as recruiter MP for Shaftesbury in October 1647.33Som. and Dorset N. and Q. xxix (1974), 245-7. The election process was highly irregular, provoking a petition from the borough complaining that the day had been changed at the last moment and the return arranged in secret, with even the mayor being unable to vote.34Recs. of the Borough of Shaftesbury ed. C.H. Mayo (Sherborne, 1889), 65. The Commons eventually referred the matter to the committee of privileges in March 1648 and Fry was only admitted to the House by the end of September.35CJ v. 560b; vi. 34a; Shaftesbury ed. Mayo, 66. In the meantime, he continued to be active in Dorset, where he was appointed to the local assessment commission in February 1648 and continued to be a regular attender at the county committee between May and July, during the crisis months of the second civil war.36A. and O.; Dorset Standing Cttee. ed. Mayo, 374-412.

After Pride’s Purge, Fry suddenly became a major figure at Westminster. In December 1648 he was named to two committees which concerned the army: to enquire into the publication of a scandalous tract attacking the army’s purge of Parliament and the imprisonment of its enemies (15 Dec.), and to examine the petition of the widow of the prominent Leveller, Colonel Thomas Rainborowe* (19 Dec.).37CJ vi. 97b, 102a. On 21 December he was appointed to a committee to investigate the payment of money and on 23 December to the committee on bribes, where he was ordered ‘to take care of it’.38CJ vi. 102a, 103a. On 6 January 1649, Fry was added to a series of key executive bodies, including the Army Committee, the Committee for Compounding and the Committee for Advance of Money.39CJ vi. 112a, 112b, 113b. Fry was not an active member of these committees, although he played some role in the business of the Committee for Compounding, attending occasional meetings and, on 17 January, being given charge of an investigation into the payments made to Scotland by the treasurers at Goldsmiths’ Hall.40SP23/5, f. 61v; CJ vi. 120a. He continued to be active in Parliament in the new year, being named to committees to appoint a new clerk of the Commons (1 Jan.) and to design a new great seal (6 Jan.).41CJ vi. 107b, 112b. Later in the month he was appointed to committees to consider raising money for the navy from dean and chapter lands (12 Jan.) and to consider a petition from the Portsmouth garrison (17 Jan.).42CJ vi. 116a, 120b.

Fry was also notable for his zeal in bringing Charles I to trial. He signed the dissent against the treaty of Newport negotiations on 20 December 1648.43PA, Ms CJ xxxiii, pp. 473-4; [W. Prynne], A Full Declaration of the True State of the Secluded Members Case (1660), 21 (E.1013.22). On 23 December he was named to the committee to consider how to bring the monarch to justice, and this was followed by appointments to consider an ordinance concerning the king on 29 December and the erection of a high court of justice on 3 January.44CJ vi. 103a, 106a, 110b. Fry was appointed as a commissioner for the high court and he attended the trial of the king from 8 January until 25 January.45A. and O.; Muddiman, Trial, 195-222. On 17 January he was named to the committee led by Henry Marten* to discuss the seizure of royal houses and possessions.46CJ vi. 120b. Fry’s support for the purge and the subsequent proceedings against the king brought him into direct conflict with the Presbyterian, William Prynne*. On 5 January Fry and Humphrey Edwardes* were ordered to confront Prynne about his authorship of a tract entitled A Brief Memento, which dismissed the Rump as an illegitimate body, and attacked its moves to bring the king to trial.47CJ vi. 111b. Their investigation provoked another blistering attack from Prynne, his Vindication of 10 January, in which he denounced the warrant to interrogate him, and questioned the right of Fry and Edwardes to sit in Parliament, as (he claimed) their returns had been disputed and voted void by the committee of privileges.48W. Prynne, The Vindication of William Prynne (1649, 669.f.13.69). On the same day, Edwardes, ignoring the personal attacks in Prynne’s reply, reported to the Commons Prynne’s denial of the authority of the House, leading to the resolution that he should be arrested.49CJ vi. 115b.

During this period it seems that Fry was becoming increasingly controversial for his unorthodox religious views, and in the second half of January 1649 there were moves at Westminster to silence him. The substance of the charges against Fry can be identified in his later printed justification, The Accuser Sham’d.50J. Fry, The Accuser Sham’d (1649, E.624.2). In this pamphlet, he stated that his suspension from the Commons was as a result of a request on 15 January by Cornelius Holland* that he join him in supporting the antinomian minister, John Biddle, in the Committee for Plundered Ministers. Fry agreed, and this led to a bitter argument over the divinity of Christ, with Fry being taken to task by Colonel John Downes*, who then persuaded the Speaker to charge Fry with blasphemy.51The Accuser Sham’d, 13, 16, 17. Fry emphasised his position as an honest ‘countryman’, who ‘rather chose to be seen in a true face, homely garb and russet coat than a painted face, borrowed accoutrements and a hypocritical posture’.52The Accuser Sham’d, 23. He asserted that had been attacked ‘more in policy than piety, some being glad of such an opportunity (as I have often been credibly informed) to remove me out of the way of their private ends’.53The Accuser Sham’d, 4. The sequence of events suggests that Fry may have had a point. On 26 January the Commons resolved that Fry should withdraw from both the House, and the commission for the trial of the king, until he gave better satisfaction for the accusations brought against him.54CJ vi. 123b. The investigation effectively disabled Fry during the crucial final stage of the king’s trial, and prevented him from signing the death warrant. It was no coincidence that pressure for Fry’s release came from the people of London and Southwark, led by the Leveller leader and London clothier, Thomas Prince, who petitioned Parliament on behalf of ‘Captain Fry’ on 30 January 1649 - the day of the king’s execution.55CJ vi. 125b. On 3 February, the Commons finally examined Fry, who declared that the anti-trinitarian opinions attributed to him were false, and he was immediately readmitted to the House.56CJ vi. 131a; Bodl. Nalson XV, f. 305. The delay of the Commons in absolving Fry raises suspicions that a man with strong religious views and contacts with the army Levellers, might have proved an embarrassment in Parliament’s attempts to legimitise its actions in bringing the king to trial.

After his return to Parliament, Fry seems to have been more circumspect. In February and May 1649 he was appointed to various administrative committees, including those to oversee and name new justices of the peace (8 Feb.), to alter the oath to be taken by freemen of the City of London (10 Feb.), to consider ordinances on Irish prisoners (4 May) and the draining of the Great Level (8 May) and the bill for taking the accounts of the commonwealth (8 May).57CJ vi. 134a, 137a, 200b, 204b. On 9 February he was named to a committee on the bill to prevent the printing of the proceedings of the high court of justice.58CJ vi. 135b. Fry was not regular in his attendance, however. In March and April 1649, he had returned to Dorset, where he resumed his place on the county committee, and his absence from the Journals between May and November suggests that he remained away from Westminster throughout the summer and early autumn.59Dorset Standing Cttee. ed. Mayo, 506, 513. These absences may reflect his unease with the conservatism of the Rump, and in particular its harsh policy against the Levellers. In November 1649 the situation at Westminster began to change, as Henry Marten* and his radical allies succeeded in imposing the ‘Engagement’ across the whole country. The new initiative energised Fry. On 9 November he was appointed to the committee to decide how the Engagement might be subscribed by the country, and on 27 November was appointed to another committee to consider an act for the general subscription of the Engagement.60CJ vi. 321b, 326b. At the end of November Fry was named with Henry Marten to a committee for the appointment of sheriffs’ deputies, and a committee for the advancement of the gospel in Ireland.61CJ vi. 327a, 327b. With the defeat of Marten’s reform programme a few weeks later, Fry once again lost contact with mainstream of politics. He made at least two journeys to Dorset, in January and April 1650.62Dorset Standing Cttee. ed. Mayo, 561, 570. He did not return to political activity at Westminster until October 1650, possibly influenced by Henry Marten's renewed attempts to reform the government.63CJ vi. 486b, 487b, 498a, 499a, 513a. In the next few months he was named with Marten to a committee to consider abuses in prisons (24 Oct.), he was given charge of receiving complaints about the collection of assessments (19 Nov.) and was one of those chosen to examine the accounts of the House of Commons (20 Dec.).64CJ vi. 487b, 499a, 513a. By the end of the year Parliament was becoming increasingly hostile to the radicals in both religion and politics, and it was not long before Fry was once again attracting hostile scrutiny.

On 31 January 1651 the Commons resolved to summon Fry to attend the House to explain the views expressed in his pamphlet, The Clergy in Their Colours, which had been recently published.65CJ vi. 529b. In this book, Fry had defended his 1649 publication from the assaults of Francis Cheynell and others, and attacked the Presbyterian ministry and its teaching along rationalist lines, for ‘every man that knows anything, knows this, that it is reason that distinguisheth a man from a beast; if you take away his reason, you deny him his very essence ... and whatsoever pretence some may make of religion in this particular, certainly there is nothing in it but ignorance, or policy’.66J. Fry, The Clergy in Their Colours (1650), 49-50 (E.1378.5). Fry also attacked those Rumpers who obstructed reform ‘not upon any principles of conscience, whatsoever they pretend ... but because their interest is not at top’.67Fry, Clergy in Their Colours, 55-6. As in January 1649, Parliament’s response to Fry’s criticisms was political as well as religious. On 31 January 1651 a division was held to decide whether the book should be read in the House, with Sir Henry Vane II* and Thomas Lister* as tellers for the noes, and Sir William Armyne* and Sir Arthur Hesilrige* tellers for the yeas. The motion was passed, and in a second division the charge that the book was scandalous was defeated, and this volume, with Fry’s tract of 1649, was referred to the Committee for Plundered Ministers.68CJ vi. 529b. The committee reported to Parliament on 20 February 1651, advising that The Accuser Sham’d, was indeed blasphemous as it denied the Trinity, and that The Clergy in Their Colours should also be condemned for placing reason above faith, and undermining the doctrine of salvation.69CJ vi. 536b, 537a. On the same day, Parliament questioned Fry as to whether he was the author of the two books, and, apart from minor queries, concluded that he had indeed written both.70CJ vi. 537a, 539a-b. On 22 February the Commons resolved that the books were scandalous and erroneous, and should be burnt. Fry was immediately disabled from sitting in Parliament.71CJ vi. 539b-540a, 540a.

By expelling Fry, the Rumpers removed a troublesome religious radical and laid the foundation for the introduction of a conformity bill in the following June.72Worden, Rump Parliament, 241-2. Fry’s fellow radicals were dismayed. An anonymous correspondent complained to Oliver Cromwell* in March 1651 of ‘the severity used towards Captain Fry (chiefly, as was conceived, upon a clergy interest)’, and linked the case with that of Sidrach Simpson, an antinomian preacher, who had been attacked for advocating lay preaching.73Original Letters ed. Nickolls, 82-3. The pleas for clemency fell on deaf ears. Fry retired to Dorset, but found no succour there. There seems to have been little local interest in his conduct at Westminster, although John Fitzjames* had asked for a copy of The Clergy in their Colours, ‘by Mr Fry a Parliament-man for our shire’ to be sent to him in December 1650.74Alnwick Castle, Northumberland MS 549, f. 72. Fry was not reappointed to the assessment commissions after November 1650 and in February 1651 he was dismissed as a magistrate.75A. and O.; C231/6, p. 210. He was probably the ‘Major Fry’ suspected of plotting an insurrection in north Dorset in August 1653.76CSP Dom. 1653-4, p. 102. By the mid-1650s the financial problems so apparent in the 1640s threatened to overwhelm him, and in 1655 Francis Fry initiated proceedings in chancery to try to force his cousin to pay the outstanding debt.77C6/141/57. Despite his difficulties, John Fry remained in contact with religious radicals, and even though the hostile comment that he ‘ran through most, if not all, religions, even to Rantism’ was an exaggeration, he seems to have become a Quaker, as in early 1657 he was listed as one of the Friends capable of sitting as an alternative justice of the peace in Dorset.78Ath. Ox. iii. 705; SP18/130/46. Fry died in the same year. His principal lands at Iwerne and Tarrant Gunville and Stubhampton went to his son and heir, John Fry junior; the lands at Wyke Regis and Fonthill maintained his widow and, after her death, formed the inheritance of his second son, Thomas; his younger children were provided with cash payments.79PROB11/265/291. But these calculations proved academic: at the restoration of the king, Fry was treated as a regicide under the act of pardon and oblivion and the family estates were confiscated.80Som. and Dorset N. and Q. i. 55. One of his sons, Stephen, became a doctor and a Quaker while another was allegedly a grocer in Bristol.81Brunton and Pennington, Long Parliament, 174; Oxford DNB.