John Sargent (1749 – 9 September 1831) was a British

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members of ...

and administrator. He was born a younger son of John Sargent, MP of Halstead Place, Kent and educated at

Eton College Eton College () is a public school in Eton, Berkshire, England. It was founded in 1440 by Henry VI under the name ''Kynge's College of Our Ladye of Eton besyde Windesore'',Nevill, p. 3 ff. intended as a sister institution to King's College, C ...

(1760–67) and St. John’s College, Cambridge (1767) before studying law at

Lincoln's Inn The Honourable Society of Lincoln's Inn is one of the four Inns of Court in London to which barristers of England and Wales belong and where they are called to the Bar. (The other three are Middle Temple, Inner Temple and Gray's Inn.) Lincoln ...

from 1770. He held a wide variety of offices: Director of the

Bank of England The Bank of England is the central bank of the United Kingdom and the model on which most modern central banks have been based. Established in 1694 to act as the English Government's banker, and still one of the bankers for the Government of ...

(1778–79),

Gentleman of the Privy Chamber A privy chamber was the private apartment of a royal residence in England. The Gentlemen of the Privy Chamber were noble-born servants to the Crown who would wait and attend on the King in private, as well as during various court activities, f ...

(1784), member of the Board of Agriculture (1803),

Clerk of the Ordnance {{Infobox official post , post = Office of the Clerk of the Ordnance , body = , nativename = , insignia = File:Badge of the Royal Army Ordnance Corps on a RML 10 inch 18 ton gun in Gibraltar.jpg , insigniasize ...

(1793–1802), joint

Secretary to the Treasury In the United Kingdom, there are several Secretaries to the Treasury, who are Treasury ministers nominally acting as secretaries to HM Treasury. The origins of the office are unclear, although it probably originated during Lord Burghley's tenure ...

(1802–1804) and a Commissioner of Audit (1806–21). He also served as Member of Parliament for Seaford from 1790 to 1793, for

Queenborough Queenborough is a town on the Isle of Sheppey in the Swale borough of Kent in South East England. Queenborough is south of Sheerness. It grew as a port near the Thames Estuary at the westward entrance to the Swale where it joins the R ...

from 1794 to 1802 and for

Bodmin Bodmin () is a town and civil parish in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It is situated south-west of Bodmin Moor. The extent of the civil parish corresponds fairly closely to that of the town so is mostly urban in character. It is bordere ...

from 1802 to 1806. On 21 December 1778, at Woolavington, Sussex, he married Charlotte, the daughter and heiress of Richard Bettesworth of Petworth, Sussex, with whom he had six sons and four daughters, including John Sargent, the clergyman and biographer. His second son, George Hanway Sargent was shot and killed in November 1807, aged 25, in the pursuit of the highwayman, Jim Allen.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sargent, John 1749 births 1831 deaths People educated at Eton College Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge Gentlemen of the Privy Chamber Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for English constituencies British MPs 1790–1796 British MPs 1796–1800 Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for English constituencies UK MPs 1801–1802 UK MPs 1802–1806 Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for constituencies in Cornwall