MORE, Poynings (1606-1649), of Loseley, Surr.

More’s great-great-grandfather, an exchequer official of Derbyshire origin, acquired Loseley, two miles from Guildford, in the latter part of the reign of Henry VIII and first sat in Parliament for Surrey in 1539.20VCH Surr. iii. 7; HP Commons 1509-1558, ‘Christopher More’. Thereafter, the family enjoyed a pre-eminent position both in the county and at court and appeared regularly in the Commons under More’s great-grandfather, Sir William More†, and grandfather, Sir George More†.21HP Commons 1558-1603. His father, Sir Robert More†, a gentleman pensioner, represented the county or the borough of Guildford six times, while More himself, following a perhaps perfunctory formal education and still short of his eighteenth birthday, was elected in 1624 for his grandfather’s borough of Haslemere and went on to sit in the other three 1620s Parliaments.22HP Commons 1604-1629; Trinity Coll. Oxf. Bursary Archives 11/C/1, ff. 213, 297.

Sir Robert predeceased Sir George, leaving his heir still a few months under age and his court pension in arrears. More’s mother, who obtained his wardship, and grandfather made several attempts to repair declining family fortunes by finding him a well-dowered wife, but their efforts were not helped by Poynings’s dissolute habits.23Surr. Hist. Centre, LM/350/11/1-2; LM/COR/4/80; HMC 7th Rep. 676-8. In 1630 he and his cousin, Francis Carew II†, fled to France to escape their creditors, and in September 1632 More applied for another pass to go abroad, although the death of his grandfather shortly afterwards may have prevented him from utilising it.24Add. MS 29599, ff. 36, 38; HMC 7th Rep. 677; Oglander Memoirs, 142.

More married early in 1637.25Surr. Hist. Centre, LM/350/55; LM/COR/5/6–7; 6729/3/152. Whether through financial embarrassment or political principle, he did not contribute to the second bishops’ war.26Rushworth, Hist. Collns, iii. 914. By December 1639 he had sold some property and, perhaps as a measure of retrenchment, was living near Chichester, Sussex, although he planned to celebrate Christmas in some style.27Surr. Hist. Centre, LM/COR/5/13. It is possible, therefore, that he was effectively an outsider at the spring elections of 1640. He was recorded in some sources as having been returned again for Haslemere, possibly because of confusion with other Mores or Moores in the House, but was in fact defeated by Sir William Ellyot*, a hard-working magistrate with whom he and his grandfather had had a long-running feud, ‘outed’, More complained, ‘by an indirect course’.28Rushworth, Hist. Collns, viii. 734-6; BL, Loseley MSS, microfilm M437, f. 124; Surr. Hist. Centre, LM/COR/4/82; LM/COR/5/11.

In the autumn More again stood for Haslemere and this time was sent up on a double return. Although he did not appear in the Journal until 3 May 1641, when he took the Protestation, his return does not appear to have been questioned by the Commons.29CJ ii. 133a. However, he was not named to a single committee and made no recorded speech. He evidently retained some interest in current affairs, since the patent of baronetage he obtained on 18 May 1642 cited his having paid for the upkeep of 30 foot soldiers in Ireland, but perhaps caution and financial difficulty combined to distract him.30Surr. Hist. Centre, LM/350/60.

It is not known how he responded to an invitation issued on 12 June by the lord lieutenant of Surrey, Charles Howard, 2nd earl of Nottingham, for a conference of deputy lieutenants at Leatherhead.31HMC 7th Rep. 677. By 26 September he had decided to contribute two horses to the cause of Parliament, and three weeks later was duly made a deputy by Parliament’s lord lieutenant, Algernon Percy†, 4th earl of Northumberland.32CJ ii. 783b; HMC 7th Rep. 677. Although named to further local office, he seems to have spent most of the remaining six and a half years of his life in London, albeit more to escape billeting on his estate and hounding by his creditors than to contribute to proceedings at Westminster.33A. and O. On 4 February 1643 he was noted among those MPs who ‘walks in the streets every day’ without putting in an appearance in the chamber and was summoned on pain of a fine of £100.34Add. 18777, f. 142a Three months later the penalty was doubled, while on 28 September he was among those threatened with sequestration of his estates; he was also charged with providing two horses for the defence of Surrey (18 Sept.).35CJ iii. 77b, 256b; Surr. Arch. Colls. lxi. 58. Having missed the deadline to present himself in the Commons (10 Oct.), on 25 November he was assessed at a twentieth part of their value.36CJ iii. 319b. Somehow, from his lodgings at the sign of the Black Boy in the Strand, where his agent in Surrey plied him with gloomy tales of taxation, unpaid rents and destructive troop movements, he managed to make his peace.37HMC 7th Rep. 678; Surr. Hist. Centre, LM/COR/5/34–81. Granted 14 days’ respite on 22 January 1644 under threat of disablement from sitting in the House, on 7 February he was admitted with fellow Surrey MP Edward Bysshe II* to take the Covenant.38CJ iii. 374b, 391b.

Further unwelcome attention came when on 1 June 1646, doubtless in the course of negotiations for the surrender of Oxford, the Commons received information that More had once sent money to the king’s headquarters in the city.39CJ iv. 559b. Referred to the Committee for Examinations, the case re-emerged in the Lords on 26 November, when peers heard allegations that Sir George Crymes of Pelham, Surrey, had conveyed £100 to Oxford from More in London.40LJ viii. 578b. The matter surfaced in the Commons on 2 December, but then disappeared under other business.41CJ iv. 735b.

More appears to have stayed on in London through much of 1647 and 1648, but he was absent without excuse upon a call of the House on 24 April 1648.42CJ v. 543b; Surr Hist. Centre, LM/COR/5/92-102. Surprisingly soon after the collapse of the rising of Henry Rich†, 1st earl of Holland, More’s agent told him that ‘you may safely be in the country’ (15 July), but it seems as though lack of money and the demands of tenants and parishioners kept him away.43Surr Hist. Centre, LM/COR/5/29, 98, 100-2. More was named among those secluded at Pride’s Purge, which may have provided the impetus finally to leave the capital. He did not sit again. On 20 March 1649 a letter to him at Loseley requested payment for lodging with John Barston in Covent Garden.44A List of the Imprisoned and Secluded Members (1648, 669.f.13.62); Surr Hist. Centre, LM/COR/5/28. He died on 11 April and was buried in the family chapel at St Nicholas, Guildford.45CB Administration of his estate, with debts of several thousands of pounds, was granted 12 days later to his widow.46Surr Hist. Centre, LM/2011/69/1, LM/1087/1/9, LM/1121, LM/1598. His eldest surviving son, Sir William More†, was MP for Haslemere four times from 1675.47HP Commons 1660-1690.