William Currie, (26 February 1756 – 3 June 1829), was an English land owner,

distiller Distillation, or classical distillation, is the process of separating the components or substances from a liquid mixture by using selective boiling and condensation, usually inside an apparatus known as a still. Dry distillation is the heating ...

, banker and

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 ...

for Gatton and

Winchelsea Winchelsea () is a small town in the non-metropolitan county of East Sussex, within the historic county of Sussex, England, located between the High Weald and the Romney Marsh, approximately south west of Rye and north east of Hastings. Th ...

. On his father's death in 1781, he inherited his father's 75% interest in the distilling partnership his father had started with Nathaniel Byles. He also became a partner in the family banking firm, replacing his father, but seems to have taken no active part, leaving the responsibilities to his brother Isaac. In 1792, Currie was elected as a member of the

American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

. He is chiefly remembered for the restoration of the village of

East Horsley East Horsley is a village and civil parish in Surrey, England, 21 miles southwest of London, on the A246 between Leatherhead and Guildford. Horsley and Effingham Junction railway stations are on the New Guildford line to London Waterloo. ...

and its manor house, East Horsley Towers.

Family

He was the eldest son of William Currie (1721–1781) and Magdalen Lefevre (a great aunt of

Charles Shaw-Lefevre, 1st Viscount Eversley Charles Shaw-Lefevre, 1st Viscount Eversley, GCB, PC (22 February 1794 – 28 December 1888), was a British Whig politician. He served as Speaker of the House of Commons from 1839 to 1857. He is the second-longest serving Speaker of the House ...

), and was baptised at the Church of St. Dunstan's in

Stepney Stepney is a district in the East End of London in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. The district is no longer officially defined, and is usually used to refer to a relatively small area. However, for much of its history the place name appl ...

on 4 March 1756. Currie married Percy Gore on 23 June 1794, the daughter of a banking partner, by whom he had a daughter, Percy Gore Currie, and two sons, William and

Henry Henry may refer to: People *Henry (given name) * Henry (surname) * Henry Lau, Canadian singer and musician who performs under the mononym Henry Royalty * Portuguese royalty ** King-Cardinal Henry, King of Portugal ** Henry, Count of Portugal, ...

. Percy Gore Currie married the Right Reverend Horatio Powys, son of Thomas Powys, 2nd Baron Lilford. The eldest son, William, was a great connoisseur and collector of works of art, and had excellent taste. He left his major collection of gems, camei, intagli, Etruscan scarabei and Etruscan gold ornaments to the

Uffizi The Uffizi Gallery (; it, Galleria degli Uffizi, italic=no, ) is a prominent art museum located adjacent to the Piazza della Signoria in the Historic Centre of Florence in the region of Tuscany, Italy. One of the most important Italian museums ...

Gallery in Florence. The second son,

, went on to be MP for

Guildford Guildford () is a town in west Surrey, around southwest of central London. As of the 2011 census, the town has a population of about 77,000 and is the seat of the wider Borough of Guildford, which had around inhabitants in . The name "Guildf ...

between 1847 and 1852. Three of his nephews were

Sir Frederick Currie, 1st Baronet Sir Frederick Currie, 1st Baronet (3 February 1799 – 11 September 1875) was a British diplomat, who had a distinguished career in the British East India Company and the Indian Civil Service. His posts included Foreign Secretary to the Governmen ...

, Vice Admiral

Mark John Currie Captain Mark John Currie RN (later Vice-Admiral) played a significant role in the exploration of Australia and the foundation of the Swan River Colony, later named Western Australia. He explored areas in New South Wales, after which he returned ...

and

Raikes Currie Raikes Currie (15 April 1801 – 16 October 1881) was Member of Parliament (MP) for Northampton from 1837 to 1857. He was a partner of the bank Curries & Co, along with his father, Isaac Currie, in Cornhill, City of London, and had several in ...

, Member of Parliament for

Northampton Northampton () is a market town and civil parish in the East Midlands of England, on the River Nene, north-west of London and south-east of Birmingham. The county town of Northamptonshire, Northampton is one of the largest towns in England; ...

East Horsley

Currie bought a substantial property,

Horsley Towers Horsley Towers, East Horsley, Surrey, England is a country house dating from the 19th century. The house was designed by Charles Barry for the banker William Currie. The East Horsley estate was later sold to William King-Noel, 1st Earl of Lovelac ...

, at

, in 1784 although it was not until 1820 that he commissioned Sir

Charles Barry Sir Charles Barry (23 May 1795 – 12 May 1860) was a British architect, best known for his role in the rebuilding of the Palace of Westminster (also known as the Houses of Parliament) in London during the mid-19th century, but also responsi ...

to build a second manor house in the Elizabethan style on the site.The Gentleman's Magazine
Volume 99, 1829
/ref> In 1792, an

Inclosure Act The Inclosure Acts, which use an archaic spelling of the word now usually spelt "enclosure", cover enclosure of open fields and common land in England and Wales, creating legal property rights to land previously held in common. Between 1604 and 1 ...

enabled him to enclose most of Horsley Common at the northern end of the parish and the common fields and waste at the southern part. He created an open park, grubbing up hedges, but leaving trees standing and planting others. He restored the church of St Martin, established a school and improved or rebuilt most of the houses in the village.Victoria County History, A History of the County of Surrey, Volume 3, by H.E. Malden, page 349
British History Online
/ref> "He fortunately had opportunities of purchasing nearly all the other land in the parish; and happily for himself, his family, and all the inhabitants of the parish, he had the means with which to make those purchases. We say happily for the inhabitants of the parish, for a more benevolent man, and family, never blessed a village or neighbourhood." Subsequent owners of the East Horsley estate were the 1st Earl of Lovelace, whose wife was

Ada Lovelace Augusta Ada King, Countess of Lovelace (''née'' Byron; 10 December 1815 – 27 November 1852) was an English mathematician and writer, chiefly known for her work on Charles Babbage's proposed mechanical general-purpose computer, the A ...

, the computer pioneer and

Lord Byron George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824), known simply as Lord Byron, was an English romantic poet and Peerage of the United Kingdom, peer. He was one of the leading figures of the Romantic movement, and h ...

's daughter, and Sir

Thomas Sopwith Sir Thomas Octave Murdoch Sopwith, CBE, Hon FRAeS (18 January 1888 – 27 January 1989) was an English aviation pioneer, businessman and yachtsman. Early life Sopwith was born in Kensington, London, on 18 January 1888. He was the eig ...

, the founder of the

Sopwith Aviation Company The Sopwith Aviation Company was a British aircraft company that designed and manufactured aeroplanes mainly for the British Royal Naval Air Service, the Royal Flying Corps and later the Royal Air Force during the First World War, most famously ...

, which featured predominantly in the First World War. After that war, the estate was broken up and sold in lots.

Member of Parliament

Currie was returned in 1790 as Member of Parliament for Gatton. He continued there until the 1796 election, when he was returned for

until 1802. Gatton and Winchelsea were

rotten boroughs A rotten or pocket borough, also known as a nomination borough or proprietorial borough, was a parliamentary borough or constituency in England, Great Britain, or the United Kingdom before the Reform Act 1832, which had a very small electora ...

and Gatton was an extreme example. It returned two MPs to the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. ...

, but only two constituents were entitled to vote, one of whom was William's brother, Mark Currie, the owner of Upper Gatton Park. Winchelsea also returned two MPs to

Westminster Westminster is an area of Central London, part of the wider City of Westminster. The area, which extends from the River Thames to Oxford Street, has many visitor attractions and historic landmarks, including the Palace of Westminster, Bu ...

, but had seven voters. In Parliament, Currie made no known speech. He was in favour of the unsuccessful attempt to repeal the Test Act in Scotland in 1791The Historical Journal,
The Scottish Campaign against the Test Act, 1790-1791, by G M Ditchfield
/ref> and voted with the opposition in the Oczakov debates of 12 April 1791 and 12 March 1792, but appears to have become a supporter of the administration afterwards. He voted for Pitt's assessed taxes on 4 January 1798, but made no further mark in the House,The House of Commons, 1790-1820, Vol 1, by R G Thorne,
page 544
/ref> although on 9 December 1801 he was appointed to the Committee on East India judicature.

References

External links

Portrait of William Currie (1756-1829)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Currie, William 1756 births 1829 deaths Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for English constituencies Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for English constituencies British MPs 1790–1796 British MPs 1796–1800 UK MPs 1801–1802