ALLESTRY, Roger (c.1620-65), of Derby.

Allestry came from a merchant and professional family long established in the North Midlands, although the heralds denied their claim to gentility at the visitation of 1611. The descent from the family of ironmongers which provided three Members for Nottingham between 1393 and 1467 has not been established, but Allestry’s grandfather sat for Derby in five Tudor Parliaments, and his half-brother William (d.1655), represented the borough in both the Short and the Long Parliament until disabled for non-attendance. A cousin, Richard Allestree, served as chaplain to Charles II in exile, and was active in royalist conspiracy. But Allestry himself was sufficiently uncommitted politically to be nominated to all the local commissions from his brother’s death to the Restoration. Presumably an attorney, he became town clerk in January 1660, and was elected to the Convention three months later. Although totally inactive as committeeman and speaker, he presumably voted with the Court, though his clerkship of the peace for the county may have been more of a reward for his cousin’s services than his own. Re-elected without a contest in 1661, he was only a little more active in the opening sessions of the Cavalier Parliament, in which he was appointed to three committees, none of which were of political importance. Together with his colleague, John Dalton, he was blamed for the continuance of several prominent Presbyterians on the commission of the peace. He died on 1 Feb. 1665, and was buried at All Saints, Derby.3The Gen. 164; Keeler, Long Parl. 84-85; Derby Pub. Lib. Allestry notes; Reliquary, n.s. vi. 112.