BRADDON, William (d. 1694), of Treworgey, St Gennys, Cornw.

William Braddon came from a minor gentry family seated in the parish of St Gennys, and with landed interests in Devon; his great-grandfather, Stephen Braddon†, had been MP for Bossiney in 1563.16HP Commons, 1558-1603. Braddon’s early career is entirely obscure, but in the later stages of the civil war he served as a captain with the Plymouth regiment, the regiment of Colonel Knighton in Waller’s army, and Sir Francis Drake’s regiment under Sir Edward Massie; in December 1646 he petitioned for the payment of arrears as one of the ‘reduced officers’ who had lost their jobs when Massie’s brigade was disbanded.17SP28/266, ff. 159-62; SP28/144/10, p. 21. The payment of this money may have allowed Braddon to begin a series of purchases that suddenly made him a substantial landowner in Cornwall and Devon. Before 1650 he apparently held property in Stoke Clymesland in Cornwall, where he resided, and to this he added such bargains as the fee-farm rents for Withiel manor, and sequestered recusant lands in Little Petherick; but his main target in the early 1650s was the land of the duchy of Cornwall, and he soon acquired Cornish estates such as Calstock manor, part of Trematon Castle, and Treworgey manor, and Devon estates at Lydford Castle and South Teign manor.18E315/140, f. 36v; CCC, 3059; E320/D14, D32, D40, E13, E15; E315/173, ff. 13v, 49, 52-4; Cornw. RO, ME/510. Some (perhaps most?) of these lands were purchased on behalf of, or sold on to, other parties. This was certainly the case with the Lydford and South Teign lands, which were bought by Braddon on behalf of himself, Moses Goodyear, and the old soldiers of the Plymouth regiment.19E121/2/2. Braddon was also working closely with the governor of Plymouth, Henry Hatsell* (whom he described as his ‘brother’), in 1656, procuring estates for others and buying up property, apparently as part of a syndicate.20CSP Dom. 1655-6, pp. 163-4; Plymouth and West Devon RO, 69/M/2/670.

Increased landed wealth and proven loyalty helped Braddon to become an important player in local politics during the mid-1650s. He was appointed to the assessment commissions from November 1653; he was added to the commission of the peace for Devon in March 1656 and for Cornwall in the following July; and in August 1657 he was chosen to administer the oath to new justices of the peace in Cornwall.21An Act for an Assessment; A. and O.; C231/6, pp. 329, 345, 374. Most importantly, Braddon was closely associated with the rule of John Disbrowe* as major-general in 1655-7. He was appointed as one of the commissioners for securing the peace of the commonwealth in the closing weeks of 1655, and was active in this capacity in the spring of 1656.22TSP iv. 451, 497. By November 1655 he was in command of a militia troop, and had started to requisition horses from known royalists.23Cornw. RO, ME/3022. He received pay as a troop commander in January, May, June and September 1656.24SP46/98, ff. 3, 24, 27. Braddon was also a key figure in the monitoring of ‘suspected persons’ travelling from Cornwall to London, granting passes (as Disbrowe’s ‘deputy’) in February, April, May and June 1656, and engaging in related correspondence from February 1656 until January 1657.25Add. 19516, ff. 12v, 15, 54v, 66, 84, 88v, 93, 126, 131-2; Add. 34014, ff. 13v, 21v, 24v, 39-v, 41v, 50, 59, 63, 76, 80, 83v.

During this period, Braddon also became involved in religious controversy, when, as a justice of the peace in the east of Cornwall, he defended George Fox and other Quakers against less sympathetic gentlemen on the bench. According to Fox, Braddon ‘assured those Friends’ that reported the plight of the Quakers in Launceston gaol, that he would ‘acquaint the justices therewith’, and ‘publicly declared that he would be security for their true imprisonment, that so they might be delivered out of that noisome den and from out of the keeper’s power and cruelty’. Braddon also promised to put up £100 as a surety for them if they were released. Fox had nothing but praise for Braddon’s actions, saying that he was one of those magistrates who ‘carry themselves like men, who had a sense of the injurious sufferings of others, and like ministers of the law, whom the spirit of justice ruleth, which is noble, honourable, and gives a good favour’.26G. Fox, The West Answering to the North (1657), 39-40, 49 (E.900.3). Interestingly, Braddon appears to have acted as a go-between for Disbrowe and the Quakers, and this suggests that his actions were officially sponsored by the major-general.27West Answering to the North, 124.

Braddon’s role in local government and his position as Disbrowe’s client probably explain his return as MP for Cornwall in the elections of August 1656. Four of his six committee appointments fit with what we know of his interests and preoccupations, whether in land transactions, religion or local politics. In October 1656 he was added to the committee on a case involving the sale of sequestered estates and the abuse of the system, and in the same month he was named to another committee to consider the selling of Catholic estates to raise more money for the government.28CJ vii. 433a, 444a. On 31 October Braddon was named to the important committee to consider ways to maintain ministers in England and Wales.29CJ vii. 448b. In December he was appointed to the committee on the bill enabling one of his colleagues in Cornwall, Richard Carter*, to sell lands to pay off the debts left by his father.30CJ vii. 466a. Braddon does not seem to have attended the Commons regularly after December 1656, although he was appointed to another committee in February 1657, and there is no indication of his stance on such issues as the correct punishment to be imposed on the Quaker, James Naylor, the Militia Bill (which decided the fate of the major-generals), or the constitutional changes associated with the Humble Petition and Advice.31CJ vii. 485b. Indeed, apart from another land purchase, and his continued involvement in local commissions, there is little evidence for Braddon’s activities in the last years of the protectorate.32E320/D10; A. and O.; C231/6, p. 374. Although he was elected for the borough of Camelford for Richard Cromwell’s* Parliament, there is no record of his attendance at Westminster in 1659.

Braddon’s religious views (and at the very least his toleration of radicalism) made him acceptable not only to Disbrowe but also to Colonel Robert Bennett* and his friends in Cornwall. After the collapse of the protectorate in May 1659, Braddon was encouraged to play a full part in local government during the restored Rump. He continued to command a militia troop, and in July 1659 was sent letters warning of a royalist rising, as a trusted lieutenant of the council of state.33Cornw. RO, B/LIS/296; CSP Dom. 1659-60, p. 16. In August, Richard Lobb* told Bennett that Braddon was one of those he would like to see retained as captain of a foot company in Cornwall.34FSL, X.d.438 (127). Braddon did not support the military coup in the autumn of 1659, and at the end of December he joined the (mostly Presbyterian) gentry who met at Truro to sign a declaration in favour of reviving a ‘free Parliament’.35Publick Intelligencer no. 27 (2-9 Jan. 1660), 998 (E.773.41).

Despite this last-minute change of heart, Braddon was heavily penalised after the Restoration. In October 1660 Richard Arundell* and John Coryton – two of the former tenants of the duchy lands acquired by Braddon – moved against him, pointing out Braddon’s service of the usurping regime during the 1650s and his collaboration with the council of state in 1659.36CSP Dom. 1660-1, p. 330. The hearth tax records suggest that Braddon had been stripped of most of these lands by 1664.37Cornw. Hearth Tax, 144. Despite losing his duchy estates, Braddon clung on. According to one estimate, he was worth £150 a year after 1670, and in 1677 he was still calling himself ‘William Braddon of Treworgey’.38Add. 18448, f. 24v; MT Admiss. i. 196. He had been removed from the Cornish bench by March 1660, but was restored at some point before 1693, when he was removed again.39C231/8, p. 303.

Braddon died in 1694, and was buried in St Gennys church, where his monument celebrated his earlier career wearing ‘both gown and sword’.40Magna Britannia, iii. 112. He was succeeded by his eldest son, Henry, who also acted as executor for his modest estate under his will of June 1685; other beneficiaries included his daughter, Ann, her husband Sir Edward Harrington, and their five children, who received nominal sums.41Cornw. RO, AP/B/2405. Braddon’s younger son, Laurence, was admitted to the Middle Temple in 1677 and called to the bar in November 1693.42Devon RO, J R Powell MS Notes, vol. 25, p. 343; MT Admiss. i. 196. None of Braddon’s immediate family sat in Parliament.