HYDE (HIDE), William (1600-62), of Hurst, Berks.

There had been Hydes living at Hyde manor in Denchworth in north-west Berkshire since the fourteenth century.16VCH Berks. iv. 280; Vis. Berks. i. 35, 98, 99-100; Ashmole, Antiquities, iii. 322. This MP’s paternal grandfather, Thomas Hyde, was only a younger son of William Hyde (d. 1557) of Denchworth and, having married Elizabeth Barker of Wokingham, he settled at Hurst in the eastern corner of the county.17Vis. Berks. i. 98-9; Ashmole, Antiquities, ii. 219-20. William Hyde senior, the MP’s father, was born in about 1555.18Ashmole, Antiquities, ii. 418. At some point William senior acquired Hinton Hatch, part of the manor of Hinton Pipard, and Hinton House may have been the family’s principal residence at Hurst throughout this period.19C142/417/33; VCH Berks. iii. 255. In the meantime, the senior branch had declined. In 1617 they were forced to sell their estates at Denchworth, leaving the Hydes of Hurst as the most prominent members of the family in the county.20VCH Berks. iv. 283.

It was one mark of their secure position within Berkshire society, as a relatively minor but well-established county family, that William Hyde senior was sheriff of Berkshire at the time of his death in 1624.21CSP Dom. 1623-4, p. 312; List of Sheriffs (L. and I. ix), 6; Ashmole, Antiquities, ii. 418. His eldest son, William junior, then in his mid-twenties, was appointed to serve for the remainder of his father’s year in office.22CSP Dom. 1623-4, p. 316. William junior had previously attended Oxford and the Middle Temple, where his surety had been their kinsman and neighbour, William Barker (elder brother of Anthony*).23Al. Ox.; M. Temple Admiss. i. 109; MTR ii. 639-40. Barker now served with his father, Sir Anthony†, as the overseer of the will of William Hyde senior. Under the terms of that will, William junior received the lands at Hurst.24PROB 11/143, f. 206; C142/417/33. He may have retained rooms in the Middle Temple until the late 1630s, although, as there were other William Hydes who were members of that inn at that time, this is uncertain.25MTR ii. 658, 665, 781, 864.

Hyde’s unexpected period as sheriff in 1624 would prove to be his only local office for the time being. It was not until 1647, when he was added by Parliament to the Berkshire assessment commission, that he can be said to taken any noticeable part in public affairs.26A. and O. But he soon seems to have shown himself to be a willing local servant for Parliament and the king’s execution in 1649 evidently did not diminish his willingness to serve. Having been added to the Berkshire commission of the peace in 1647, he and his kinsman William Barker were tasked by the council of state in July 1649 to question several Berkshire men for falsely imprisoning suspects allegedly on the council’s authority.27C231/6, p. 73; CSP Dom. 1649-50, pp. 541, 542. (His appointment as a Wiltshire justice of the peace in 1652 was probably just a technicality, as parts of Hurst were an exclave of that other county.) He made himself useful in other ways as well. In 1650 the council of state probably turned to him to investigate illicit timber-felling in Windsor Forest and in March 1654 the protectoral council would ask him to work with the governor of Windsor Castle, Christopher Whichcote*, for the same purpose.28CSP Dom. 1650, p. 171; CSP Dom. 1654, p. 10. Barker had meanwhile bought the former episcopal manor of Ruscombe Southbury, which he then sold to Hyde.29PROB11/308/556; VCH Berks. iii. 204.

Hyde was one of the five men elected to the second Protectoral Parliament as MPs for Berkshire by the indenture drawn up on 20 August 1656.30CP40/2703, rot. 560 dorse; CJ vii. 599a. However, for reasons that are unclear, he then found himself among those whom the council of officers deemed to be unfit to be allowed to take their seats.31CJ vii. 425b. But in his case, that exclusion was to be short-lived, for by late October he was sitting in the House and being named to committees. Those committee appointments, his only known involvement in this Parliament’s proceedings, were not numerous. As has been noted, he knew something about timber-felling at Windsor, which doubtless explains why he was interested in the bill for the preservation of timber (23 Oct. 1656), and, given his links with Wiltshire, it is not too surprising that he was included on the committee considering the bill about the location of the shrieval court for that county (25 Dec.).32CJ vii. 444b, 475a. His only other committee appointment concerned the bill against vagabonds (13 Nov.).33CJ vii. 453b. It is striking that, after this initial burst of (rather modest) activity, he played no known part in the House throughout the rest of that first session before the recess in June 1657 or in the brief second session in early 1658. He was however said to have supported the offer of the crown to Oliver Cromwell* in the vote on 25 March 1657.34Narrative of the Late Parliament (1657), 22 (E.935.5).

There is little indication that Hyde had any difficulty adjusting to the turbulent events of 1659 or to the Restoration of the monarchy in 1660; he continued to be named to all major local commissions between then and his death.35A. and O.; SR; C231/7, p. 123. Hyde was dead by the summer of 1662 and was buried close to his father in the parish church at Hurst.36PROB11/308/556; Ashmole, Antiquities, ii. 418. He and his wife (whose identity remains unknown) left no children, so his lands at Hurst and Ruscombe passed first to that wife as a life interest and then to his only brother, Humphrey Hyde.37PROB 11/308/556. But Humphrey did not long survive him, for he died in 1665. However, Humphrey had secured the future of the Hyde male line by leaving three sons, although none sat in Parliament.38Ashmole, Antiquities, ii. 418.