NEWNHAM, Nathaniel (c.1699-1778), of Basinghall St., London and Newtimber Place, Suss.

A merchant of ‘great authority in the court of directors of the India Company’, Newnham, after purchasing Newtimber in Sussex in 1741, was brought into Parliament by Newcastle as a Dissenter, whose return might help to secure the nonconformist vote at Lewes. In Parliament he acted as a dependant of Newcastle’s, but made ‘no progress’ with the Duke, as ‘his modesty ... made him afraid of being troublesome in too frequent waiting on him’. In 1754 Newcastle turned him out to make way for Pitt at Aldborough, observing, when Newnham’s brother-in-law, Sir Dudley Ryder, interceded for him, that he was ‘of no consequence in himself’, Eventually he was brought in by the Government free of charge for Bramber, ‘within seven miles of his house’, which did not please him, as proximity to one’s constituents was well-known to lead to endless trouble and expense.1Dudley Ryder Diary, 1, 9 Nov. 1753, 23 Mar. 1754, Harrowby mss.

He died 17 Sept. 1778.