Family and Education

b. c.1636, 1st s. of William Patten of Preston by 2nd w. Mary, da. of James Archer of Preston. educ. G. Inn 1671, called 1678. m. aft. 1665, Mary, da. and coh. of John Doughty of Thornley Hall, Chipping, Lancs., 1da. suc. fa. 1660.1

Offices Held

Freeman, Preston 1662; commr. for assessment, Lancs. 1673-4, 1689-90, dep. lt. 1689-d., j.p. 1689-91, 1697-d.2

Biography

Patten came from a merchant family established in Warrington by the 16th century. His father, a younger son, settled in Preston, where he served as mayor under the Protectorate. Patten inherited a ‘sumptuous house’ in the town, entered his pedigree at the heralds’ visitation of 1665, and somewhat late in life qualified as a barrister, possibly after his marriage had involved him in the responsibilities of a landed proprietor. At the general election of 1689 he was returned for the borough on the Gerard interest and with the support of the dissenters. An inactive Member of the Convention, he was appointed to seven committees, none of which was of much political significance. He was among those to whom the bill for reviving proceedings at law was committed (23 Feb.), but in April he was given leave of absence, which he occupied in seizing Papists’ horses. In the second session he was named to the committees to hear an informers’ petition and to consider the bill of attainder; but he was not listed as a supporter of the disabling clause in the bill to restore corporations. As a protégé of Lord Brandon (Hon. Charles Gerard) he was obnoxious to the Earl of Derby’s faction, and he lost his seat at the general election to the Tory Lord Willoughby (Robert Bertie II). Nevertheless Brandon pressed his claim to the county magistracy, where he was active in assisting dissenters and suppressing Papists. He was buried at Preston in 1697. His daughter brought the estate to her husband, Sir Thomas Stanley, 4th Bt.^†, who was returned for Preston in 1695. He was the last of this branch of the family, but the Warrington Pattens rose steadily in the social scale, producing an MP for Newton in 1797.3

Ref Volumes: 1660-1690

Author: Irene Cassidy

Notes

• 1. Vis. Lancs. (Chetham Soc. lxxxviii), 229-30.
• 2. Preston Court Leet Recs. ed. Hewitson, 54; Lancs. RO, QSC 106.
• 3. Gregson, Lancs. Fragments , 185; VCH Lancs. iii. 279; vii. 34; HMC Kenyon , 246, 249-50; Cal. Treas. Bks. ix. 231; CSP Dom. 1689-90, p. 567; 1690-1, p. 502.