HARRIS, John II (c.1596-1648), of Lanrest, Liskeard, Cornw. and Radford, Plymstock, Devon.

The Harrises of Lanrest had been resident in the parish of Liskeard since the early sixteenth century. John Harris II’s father had served as MP for the borough of Liskeard during the reign of James I.20HP Commons 1604-1629. The father died in June 1623 and his heir, Christopher, died only a few months later, leaving John Harris to inherit the Lanrest estate; and in 1625, on the death of his uncle, Sir Christopher Harris, he also inherited three manors in Devon and the seat at Radford near Plymouth, which had been in the family since the reign of Henry V.21Vivian, Vis. Cornw. 209; Vivian, Vis. Devon, 447-8. Thus, in the space of two years John Harris had moved from being a younger son, with modest prospects and a meagre inheritance consisting of a few scattered properties in Cornwall, to being a significant landowner in eastern Cornwall and western Devon, and the head of the senior branch of the family. Harris’s windfall was, however, blemished. The substantial debts incurred by his father, and the unresolved problem of providing for his brother’s widow, left his finances in a precarious condition until the end of the 1620s. It was only then that Harris became politically active, serving as MP for Liskeard in 1628 and as provost-marshal of Cornwall in 1629. He was active in both capacities, and courted controversy by working to disrupt the militia musters in October 1629 - although it is uncertain how far he made common cause with the leading opponents of the crown in Cornwall, like William Coryton*.22HP Commons 1604-1629. In the later 1630s Harris received further administrative jobs in the south west. He was appointed as piracy commissioner in both Devon and Cornwall, and as vice-admiral of Devon from 1638; in the same period he was elected as recorder of Liskeard, despite his apparent lack of formal legal training.23C181/5, ff. 83v, 84v, 132v; HCA30/620, no. 45; HCA14/49, nos. 178, 307; Cornw. RO, B/LIS/288.

Harris was returned for Liskeard in the elections for the Short Parliament of April 1640, but there is no indication that he was active in the Commons. He was re-elected in November, and may have been the John Harris who took the Protestation on 3 May 1641.24CJ ii. 133a. On 1 March 1642 he was given leave to go into the country, although he was in London in May, when he wrote to his brother-in-law, Jonathan Rashleigh*, about the sale of some property.25CJ ii. 462a; Cornw. RO, RS/1/1059. Harris’s comments on this occasion suggest that he had no great enthusiasm for the king or Parliament, merely recording that the king ‘protests [that] unless he have present satisfaction against Sir John Hotham* that he will seek his vindication both by his subjects, friends and allies, or by any other means’ and reporting the latest success against the Catholic rebels in Ireland. Unlike Rashleigh, who had already thrown in his lot with Charles I, Harris was inactive, and he explained to his brother-in-law that he had been ‘again surprised with my old grief [gout?] so as I cannot yet ride any journey’ (perhaps hinting that he intended to join the king at York) and added, pointedly, that ‘you may have leisure enough, too, before you ride to Parliament’.26Cornw. RO, RS/1/1059. In August 1642 Harris was appointed to the royalist commission of array for Devon, but he was presumably still at Westminster – and still on reasonably good terms with Parliament – on 19 September, when he was again granted leave to go into the country.27Northants RO, FH133, unfol.; CJ ii. 773a.

Despite his misgivings, Harris did eventually join the royalists in the south west, being appointed as a justice of the peace for Devon in February 1643, although he confided to Rashleigh in March of the same year that he regretted that ‘the continuance of these troubles hinders the intercourse of our society, specially that I cannot give my sister a visit in the time of her sickness’.28Docquets of Letters Patent ed. Black, 11; Cornw. RO, RS/1/36. In January 1644 Harris attended the Oxford Parliament, provoking its Westminster counterpart to include him in those ‘forthwith to be discharged and disabled from sitting … for deserting the service of the House, and being in the king’s quarters, and adhering to that party’.29CJ iii. 374a; Rushworth, Hist. Collns. v. 573. In July 1644 Parliament assessed Harris for a fine of £1,000.30CCAM 435. He continued to support the king actively in the autumn of 1644, when Sir Francis Bassett reported that the news of the capture of Saltash by the Plymouth garrison had been relayed by Sir Richard Grenville* and Harris.31Cornw. RO, B35/235. In 1645 Harris was appointed as commissioner for assessments in the duchy of Cornwall, and in the summer of that year he was one of those who persuaded the borough of Liskeard to grant a free gift of five years’ rent to the king.32Coate, Cornw. 182.

Harris died in the spring of 1648. In his will, written on 24 March, he left money to the poor of the parishes of Liskeard, Menheniot and Plymstock, and a few other minor bequests, but the bulk of his estate had already been secured for his son, also John†, in trust.33PROB11/210/29. This allowed the son to argue that the Devon lands, in particular, should not be sequestered. His case was accepted by the county commissioners in May 1648, and although the Committee for Advance of Money* and the Committee for Compounding* took a little more persuading, the sequestration of the family estates was lifted in 1654.34CCAM 718-9; CCC 2893-4. John Harris junior served as MP for Liskeard from 1661 until his death in 1677.35HP Commons 1660-1690.