John Lea’s origins are obscure.14Sig. Dorset RO, DC/BTB/H6, unfol. His family was probably native to the town of Bridport, where Lea was living in 1614 when his eldest son, also John, was baptised in the parish church.15Dorset RO, Bridport par. reg. By 1634 he had become one of the 15 capital burgesses who governed the borough, and by the spring of 1640 had joined another prominent townsman, Stephen Colefox, as bailiff of the corporation.16Dorset RO, DC/BTB/H1, p. 449; DC/BTB/EF3, unfol. During their term of office, Lea and Colefox presided over two important borough occasions: the election of Sir John Meller* and Thomas Trenchard* as MPs for the borough in March 1640, and the replacement of Sir John Strode† by Roger Hill II* as its recorder in August 1640.17Dorset RO, DC/BTB/EF3, unfol.; BTB/J3, unfol. The choice of Hill as Bridport’s new recorder is an indicator of the puritan sympathies of the corporation, which Lea seems to have shared. Lea continued as bailiff in 1641 and 1642, and on the outbreak of the first civil war he joined his fellow townsmen in their support of Parliament against the king, serving under Sir Walter Erle* as captain of the contingent from Bridport which marched to protect the county magazine in Dorchester in the autumn of 1642.18Dorset RO, BTB/H6, unfol.; Dorset Standing Cttee. ed. Mayo, 55.
Lea’s support for the parliamentarian cause grew steadily during the civil war. In 1644 he served as a captain under Thomas Ceely in the defence of Lyme Regis against the king, and as a prominent burgess he may have influenced the election of his commander as Bridport’s recruiter MP in 1645.19Dorset Standing Cttee. ed. Mayo, 568. The county committee reimbursed Lea for money spent on quartering his troops in 1646, and by this time he seems to have transferred to William Sydenham’s regiment, which was reduced in April 1648.20Dorset Standing Cttee. ed. Mayo, 114, 377; CCAM 74. Lea’s service brought him to the notice of the government after the execution of the king, and he became involved in county commissions: from April 1649 he was a regular appointee as assessment commissioner for Dorset, and in March 1650 he was granted a commission as captain in the local militia raised in preparation for the regular army’s expedition against the Scots.21A. and O.; CSP Dom. 1650, p. 505. Lea soon proved himself worthy of the regime’s trust: as commissioner against scandalous ministers in the mid-1650s he gained a reputation for harshness against episcopalian ministers; in response to the Penruddock rising he was made a militia commissioner in March 1655; and by December of the same year he had become a commissioner for securing the peace of the commonwealth, working with the local major-general, John Disbrowe*.22Bayley, Dorset, 457; SP25/76A, f. 14; TSP iv. 305. During the mid-1650s Lea was named to other commissions with James Dewy I*, James Baker*, Edward Butler* and Edward Cheeke* - all Disbrowe’s agents in Dorset; and his election as MP for Bridport in 1659, in tandem with Cheeke, seems to have reflected his importance in the county, as well as his local prominence in the borough.23Dorset RO, DC/LR/D2/1, unfol.; TSP iv. 305. Lea attended Westminster, and contributed to the debate concerning transacting with the Other House on 8 April 1659. His objections, based on whether ‘the orders of the House’ had been observed, may betray his continuing sympathy with Disbrowe and the military faction which opposed the bicameral constitution.24Burton’s Diary, iv. 372. Lea’s appointment as militia commissioner in July 1659 suggests that he was still considered trustworthy by the army after the fall of the protectorate.25A. and O.
Government favour also brought more tangible benefits to Lea during the 1650s. The problem of paying soldiers’ arrears encouraged the committees at Westminster to allocate sequestration revenues to former soldiers, and Lea made the most of this situation to accrue substantial estates in Dorset and beyond. In March 1649, he and his fellow officers from the reduced regiments of Ceely and Sydenham, were allowed to keep half the proceeds of any concealed estate they discovered.26CCAM 74. For the next few years Lea was zealous in his discovery of land and debts which should have been forfeited to the government, and in 1652 he attracted questions from the Committee for Advance of Money, which had become concerned that not all officers were benefiting equally from Lea’s endeavours.27CCAM 994, 1076. From 1653 Lea bought up delinquent estates from the treason trustees, acquiring property in Dorset and Somerset.28CCC 3131, 3213. Lea’s will, written in July 1659, shows that he had acquired further lands by that time. The principal estates were bequeathed to John Lea the younger, with overseers being drawn from the borough of Bridport, including the former deputy recorder, John Hoskyns, and the puritan rector of the town, John Eaton.29PROB11/307/10. Lea had died before the purge of the corporation in 1662, but it is likely that his family were unable to retain possession of their acquisitions, and soon returned to historical obscurity.