PRYCE (PRICE), Matthew (c.1639-1700), of Park, Llanwnog, Mont.

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1660-1690, ed. B.D. Henning, 1983
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Constituency

Dates

Family and Education

b. c.1639, 1st s. of John Pryce of Park by Mary, da. of William Reed of Castle Broomhill, Glos. educ. Univ. Coll. Oxf. 1657; L. Inn 1658, called 1665. m. Hester, da. of John Thelwall of Bathafarn Park, Llanbedr, Denb., s.p. suc. fa. c.1668.1

Offices Held

J.p Mont. 1668-1680, Feb. 1688-?d., commr. for assessment 1673-80, 1689-90, dep. lt. 1674-?80, capt. of militia horse by 1697-?d.2

Biography

Pryce came from a cadet branch of a Montgomeryshire family established by the 14th century, which had first represented the county in 1563. His father served on a number of local parliamentary commissions during the Civil War and Interregnum, but continued in office after the Restoration. Pryce was elected to the Exclusion Parliaments on the Herbert interest. At the first election of 1679 he was involved in a double return which revolved round the rights of the out-boroughs. He was allowed to take his seat, and marked ‘base’ on Shaftesbury’s list. His only committee was for a private bill, and he was absent from the division on exclusion. Re-elected in the autumn after a contest with Sir John Trevor, he may have gone over to the Opposition, for he was removed from the commission of the peace. In the second Exclusion Parliament he was appointed only to the committee on the bill to abolish the court of the marches. He again defeated Trevor in 1681, but took no known part in the Oxford Parliament. In 1685, at the request of Lord Herbert of Chirbury (Hon. Henry Herbert), he gave up his seat to a more prominent Whig politician, William Williams. Like Williams, he seems to have become a Whig collaborator, and was restored to the bench in 1688. But he never sat in Parliament again. He died on 23 Jan. 1700, aged 60, and was buried at Llanwnog, ‘a zealous and steady defender’ of the Church, according to his epitaph, and the last of the family to enter Parliament.3

Ref Volumes: 1660-1690

Authors: Leonard Naylor / Geoffrey Jaggar

Notes

  • 1. Mont. Colls. xxxi. 67; xxxvii. 155-6.
  • 2. Add. 23088, f. 50; Eg. 1626, f. 58.
  • 3. Mont. Colls. xv. 184; A.H. Dodd, Studies in Stuart Wales, 128, 164, 168; PRO 30/53/8 f. 10.