Richard Onslow (Solicitor General)

For other people named Richard Onslow, see Richard Onslow (disambiguation).

Possibly fictitious portrait of Richard Onslow

Monument of Richard Onslow in old St. Chad's Church, 1796

Richard Onslow (1528–2 April 1571) was a 16th-century English lawyer and politician who served as Solicitor General from 1566 to 1569 and Speaker of the House of Commons. (He was one of two Richard Onslows and three Onslows to be elected Speaker.) He was born in Shrewsbury, a younger son of Roger Onslow and his first wife Margaret Poyner.^[1]

Onslow entered the Inner Temple in 1545, from which he was briefly expelled in 1556 with several other members for involvement in an affray but was readmitted after an apology and a spell in the Fleet Prison and was a Bencher (giving power to call graduates to the bar) in 1559, and Governor from 1564 to 1566. He was Recorder of London in 1563.^[1] From 1557 to 1558 and 1562 to his death in 1571 he was Member of Parliament for Steyning, a tiny borough in Sussex.^[2] In 1559 he was elected MP for Aldborough, north Yorkshire.^[3] His religious sympathies were with the Puritan party, and the Spanish ambassador described him as a "furious heretic".

In 1566 he was appointed Solicitor General, and was summoned to attend the House of Lords by a writ of assistance. However, later the same year the Speaker of the Commons died, and the Privy Council chose Onslow to succeed him. At this period the appointment was effectively a Crown nomination, though theoretically the House of Commons had a free choice; Onslow was the royal candidate but was opposed, the only occasion on which this happened during the Elizabethan period. As is the convention, Onslow spoke in opposition to his own appointment, and argued that the independence of the Speakership was incompatible with the Solicitor General's oath to the Queen; this gave his critics good excuse to oppose, but he was nevertheless eventually approved by 82 votes to 70, and became Speaker on 2 October 1566. He was Speaker until its dissolution in January 1567.

Onslow may have been the author of Arguments Related to the Sea Landes and Salt Shores.

He married Catherine Harding, by whom he had two sons and five daughters, including Edward, ancestor of the Earls of Onslow, and Cicely, who married Sir Humphrey Winch.

Onslow died from 'pestilential fever' at Harnage near Shrewsbury, after visiting a relative in the town, in April 1571 and was buried in the then St Chad's Church in Shrewsbury where a tomb monument was erected, that was restored in 1742 by his descendant, Arthur Onslow, himself a past Speaker. After the fall of the church in 1788 the monument was moved to the Abbey Church in Shrewsbury, where it remains.^[1]

References

1 2 3 History of Parliament member article by P.W. Hasler.
↑ "Steyning. History of Parliament". Retrieved 2011-09-27.
↑ "Aldborough. History of Parliament". Retrieved 2011-09-27.

Concise Dictionary of National Biography
J E Neale, The Elizabethan House of Commons (London: Jonathan Cape, 1949)
J E Neale, Elizabeth I and her Parliaments, 1559–1581 (London: Jonathan Cape, 1953)

External links

Onslow, Richard (1527/8–1571), History of Parliament Retrieved 24 March 2013.

Legal offices
Preceded by William Rosewell	Solicitor General for England and Wales 1566–1569	Succeeded by Sir Thomas Bromley
Parliament of England
Preceded by Thomas Williams	Speaker of the House of Commons 1566–1571	Succeeded by Sir Christopher Wray

Speakers of the House of Commons

House of Commons
of England

14th century	Hungerford De la Mare Pickering Guildesborough Waldegrave Pickering Bussy Cheney Doreward Savage Redford

15th century	Esturmy Tiptoft Chaucer Stourton Hungerford Chaucer Redman Beauchamp Flower Hunt Chaucer Baynard Russell Walton Vernon Tyrell Alington Bowes Burley Tresham Say Popham Oldhall Thorpe Charlton Wenlock Tresham Green Strangeways Wood Catesby Lovell Mordaunt Fitzwilliam Empson Drury Englefield

16th century	Dudley Sheffield Nevill More Audley Wingfield Rich Hare Moyle Baker Dyer Pollard Broke Higham Cordell Gargrave Williams Onslow Wray Bell Popham Puckering Snagge Coke Yelverton

17th century	Croke Phelips Crewe Richardson Crewe Finch Finch Glanville Lenthall Pelham Rous (Barebones Parliament) Widdrington (2nd Protectorate Parliament) Chute (3rd Protectorate Parliament) Long (3rd Protectorate Parliament) Bampfield (3rd Protectorate Parliament) Grimston Turnour Charlton Seymour Sawyer Gregory Williams Trevor Powle Foley Littleton

18th century	Harley Smith

House of Commons
of Great Britain

18th century	Smith R. Onslow Bromley Hanmer Compton A. Onslow Cust Norton Cornwall Grenville Addington

House of Commons
of the United Kingdom

19th century	Addington Mitford Abbot Manners-Sutton Abercromby Shaw-Lefevre Denison Brand Peel Gully

20th century	Lowther Whitley FitzRoy Brown Morrison Hylton-Foster King Lloyd Thomas Weatherill Boothroyd

21st century	Martin Bercow

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