William Nathaniel Massey (3 June 1809 – 25 October 1881) was a

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barrister, author and

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Member of Parliament.

Early life

Massey studied law, being admitted as a student at the

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in November 1826, and was called to the bar in January 1844. He married firstly in 1833, Frances Carleton, daughter of Rev John Orde. Massey practised on the Western Circuit and in 1852 was appointed

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and in 1855 of

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In politics

He first entered the

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in July 1852 as a Liberal

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for

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. In April 1857 he became MP for

Salford Salford () is a city and the largest settlement in the City of Salford metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. In 2011, Salford had a population of 103,886. It is also the second and only other city in the metropolitan county afte ...

. In August 1855 he was appointed

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during the first ministry of

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, and became a member of

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. He held the office until March 1858 when the

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s came to power, and

Lord Derby Edward George Geoffrey Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby, (29 March 1799 – 23 October 1869, known before 1834 as Edward Stanley, and from 1834 to 1851 as Lord Stanley) was a British statesman, three-time Prime Minister of the United Kingdom ...

formed his second government. He continued to represent Salford in the Commons until 1865, and was appointed Chairman of Committees of the Whole House. He purchased the old ruined estate at Old Basing House, Hampshire. In January 1865 Massey left parliament to become a member of the

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of the

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. He was nominated to the position of Minister for Finance in the British Raj, and was sworn onto the

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. He retired from the council in 1868. As a "City Liberal" club member, Massey contested the constituency of Liverpool on 17 November 1868. He was finally returned to parliament in November 1872 as MP for Tiverton, a seat he held until his death.

Later life

In 1869 Massey became chairman of the National Bank (later part of the

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), a post he held for the rest of his life. He was a member of the Athenaeum Club; and was chairman of St John's Hospital for Diseases of the Skin. He died at his London home, 96 Portland Place, in October 1881.

Works

Massey's major work was ''A History of England under George III'', which was published in four volumes between 1855 and 1863, by J. W. Parker & Son. It was unfinished, and drew on research of

Edward Hawke Locker Edward Hawke Locker (9 October 1777, in East Malling, Kent – 16 October 1849, in Iver, Buckinghamshire) was an English watercolourist (producing works now in the V&A and British Museum) and administrator of the Royal Naval Hospital, Greenwic ...

on George II. He also wrote: *''Common Sense versus Common Law.'' London, Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1850.

Family

His first wife was Frances Carleton Orde (3 November 1806 – 11 July 1872) daughter of John Orde and Frances Carleton, and their son was

Charles Carleton Massey Charles Carleton Massey (1838–1905), most well known as C. C. Massey, was a British barrister, Christian mystic and psychical researcher. Massey was born at Hackwood Park, Basingstoke. He was the first president of the British Theosophical S ...

(23 December 1838 –29 March 1905), the famous writer on spiritualism, psychic phenomena, mysticism and theosophy. In 1880, shortly before his last illness, Massey married Helen Henrietta, youngest daughter of the late Patrick Grant, Esq., Sheriff-Clerk of Inverness.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Massey, William Nathaniel 1809 births 1881 deaths Members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom Liberal Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies UK MPs 1852–1857 UK MPs 1857–1859 UK MPs 1859–1865 UK MPs 1868–1874 UK MPs 1874–1880 UK MPs 1880–1885 Members of the Council of India Members of the Inner Temple Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for Salford Members of Parliament for Newport (Isle of Wight)