| Constituency | Dates |
|---|---|
| East Retford | 1659, 1661 – June 1670 |
Family and Career Data
commr. militia, Notts. 12 Mar. 1660.
FRS, 28 Mar. 1667.
When Clifton came of age in the late 1640s, Sir Gervase Clifton made him his heir in preference to his wastrel eldest son; and for the next decade or so Clifton probably devoted himself to clearing the family estate of the debts and damages incurred as a result of his father’s allegiance to the king during the civil war.1C6/134/107; SP23/75, p. 244. Not until 1659 and his return for East Retford to Richard Cromwell’s* Parliament did he make his entrance upon the political stage. He was elected on his own and his father’s interest as the town’s leading local landowners. He was named to only one committee in this Parliament – concerning the estate of John Paulet, 5th marquess of Winchester (11 April 1659) – and made no recorded contribution to debate.2CJ vii. 634b. Shortly after Charles II landed in Dover late in May 1660, Clifton joined his father and other Nottinghamshire grandees in a congratulatory address to the king ‘for your so happy regaining at once both the affections and obedience of your people’.3SP29/1/42, f. 82.
In the elections to the Cavalier Parliament, Clifton was returned for East Retford again, on this occasion with his father. Unlike his father, however, he was not listed by Philip 4th Baron Wharton as a likely supporter of a Presbyterian church settlement. Indeed, he favoured legislation for suppressing nonconformist conventicles, and he was included in 1669 on a list of court supporters at Westminster.4HP Commons 1660-1690; A. Browning, Thomas Osborne, Earl of Danby (1913), iii. 39.
Clifford died in the summer of 1670 and was buried in the family vault in Clifton church on 22 June.5Notts. RO, PR/NW; Raine, Hist. of Blyth, 139-40. In his will, he bequeathed portions of £4,000 to each of his two younger daughters, although his trustees had to obtain a private Act to sell some of the family’s lands in order to raise these sums.6Notts. RO, PR/NW; Nottingham Univ. Lib. CL D 1504; HP Commons 1660-1690. None of Clifton’s immediate descendents sat in Parliament.