Sir Dudley Ryder, (4 November 1691 – 25 May 1756) was an English lawyer, writer and politician who sat in the

British House of Commons The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the upper house, the House of Lords, it meets in the Palace of Westminster in London, England. The House of Commons is an elected body consisting of 650 memb ...

from 1733 until 1754 when he was appointed

Chief Justice of the King's Bench The Lord or Lady Chief Justice of England and Wales is the head of the judiciary of England and Wales and the president of the courts of England and Wales. Until 2005 the lord chief justice was the second-most senior judge of the English a ...

Early life

Ryder was the second son of Richard Ryder, a draper of Hackney, Middlesex, and his second wife Elizabeth Marshall, daughter of William Marshall of Lincoln's Inn. He studied at a dissenting academy in Hackney and the

University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh (, ; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a Public university, public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Founded by the City of Edinburgh Council, town council under th ...

, Scotland and

Leiden University Leiden University (abbreviated as ''LEI''; ) is a Public university, public research university in Leiden, Netherlands. Established in 1575 by William the Silent, William, Prince of Orange as a Protestantism, Protestant institution, it holds the d ...

in The Netherlands. He went to the

Middle Temple The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, commonly known simply as Middle Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court entitled to Call to the bar, call their members to the English Bar as barristers, the others being the Inner Temple (with whi ...

in 1713 (where he kept a diary from 1715 to 1716, in which he minutely recorded “whatever occurs to me in the day worth observing”). In 1719, he was called to the Bar. He married Anne Newnham, daughter of Nathaniel Newnham of Streatham, Surrey in November 1733.

Career

Ryder was returned as Member of Parliament for St Germans at a by election on 1 March 1733. He was also made

Solicitor General A solicitor general is a government official who serves as the chief representative of the government in courtroom proceedings. In systems based on the English common law that have an attorney general or equivalent position, the solicitor general ...

by Sir

Robert Walpole Robert Walpole, 1st Earl of Orford (; 26 August 1676 – 18 March 1745), known between 1725 and 1742 as Sir Robert Walpole, was a British Whigs (British political party), Whig statesman who is generally regarded as the ''de facto'' first Prim ...

in 1733. At the

1734 British general election The 1734 British general election returned members to serve in the House of Commons of Great Britain, House of Commons of the 8th Parliament of Great Britain to be summoned, after the merger of the Parliament of England and the Parliament of Scot ...

, he switched to Tiverton where he was returned unopposed as MP. He was appointed as

Attorney General In most common law jurisdictions, the attorney general (: attorneys general) or attorney-general (AG or Atty.-Gen) is the main legal advisor to the government. In some jurisdictions, attorneys general also have executive responsibility for law enf ...

in 1737. At the creation of the

Foundling Hospital The Foundling Hospital (formally the Hospital for the Maintenance and Education of Exposed and Deserted Young Children) was a children's home in London, England, founded in 1739 by the philanthropy, philanthropic Captain (nautical), sea captain ...

in London in 1739 he was one of the founding governors. In 1740, he was

knight A knight is a person granted an honorary title of a knighthood by a head of state (including the pope) or representative for service to the monarch, the church, or the country, especially in a military capacity. The concept of a knighthood ...

ed. He topped the poll in a contest at the

1741 British general election The 1741 British general election returned members to serve in the House of Commons of the 9th Parliament of Great Britain to be summoned, after the merger of the Parliament of England and the Parliament of Scotland in 1707. The election saw suppo ...

and was returned unopposed again in 1747. On 2 May 1754 he was made a Privy Councillor and Chief Justice of the King's Bench, a post he held until his death. He did not stand for parliament at the 1754 general election. The King refused his application for a peerage until he had served in office for two years. A patent creating him a peer was signed by the King on 24 May 1756, but Ryder died the following day and was in no position to kiss hands to take it up.

Horace Walpole Horatio Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford (; 24 September 1717 – 2 March 1797), better known as Horace Walpole, was an English Whig politician, writer, historian and antiquarian. He had Strawberry Hill House built in Twickenham, southwest London ...

thought Ryder "a man of singular goodness and integrity; of the highest reputation in his profession, of the lowest in the House, where he wearied the audience by the multiplicity of his arguments; resembling the physician who ordered a medicine to be composed of all the simples in a meadow, as there must be some of them at least that would be proper".Horace Walpole, ''Memoirs of King George II: Volume I'' (Yale, 1985), p. 83. Ryder died leaving one son

Nathaniel Nathaniel is an English variant of the biblical Hebrew name A name is a term used for identification by an external observer. They can identify a class or category of things, or a single thing, either uniquely, or within a given context. ...

who became the first Baron Harrowby.

References

* William Matthews (ed.), ''The Diary of Dudley Ryder 1715-1716'' (London, 1939).
Brenner, Maurice, ‘Discourse and Reality: the many worlds of Dudley Ryder, 1715-1716’ (Ipswich, 2012)

Notes

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ryder, Dudley 1691 births 1756 deaths Attorneys general for England and Wales British MPs 1727–1734 British MPs 1734–1741 British MPs 1741–1747 British MPs 1747–1754 Knights Bachelor Lord chief justices of England and Wales Members of the Middle Temple Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for Tiverton Members of the Privy Council of Great Britain Solicitors general for England and Wales Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for St Germans

Dudley Dudley ( , ) is a market town in the West Midlands, England, southeast of Wolverhampton and northwest of Birmingham. Historically part of Worcestershire, the town is the administrative centre of the Metropolitan Borough of Dudley. In the ...

18th-century English diarists Alumni of the University of Edinburgh