James Bertie

James Bertie (13 March 1674 – 18 October 1735) was a British Tory politician of the late 17th and early 18th centuries.

He was born in 1673, the second son of James Bertie, 5th Baron Norreys, later created Earl of Abingdon.

On 5 January 1692, he married Hon. Elizabeth Willoughby, the daughter of George Willoughby, 7th Baron Willoughby of Parham. They had ten sons and four daughters; five of the sons and three of the daughters predeceased him. They included:

Elizabeth had been left an extensive legacy by her great-uncle John Cary (d. 1686), including the manor of Stanwell, on the condition that she would marry Lord Guilford within three years of his death; the inheritance otherwise to go to Anthony Cary, 5th Viscount of Falkland (d. 1694), John's first cousin twice removed, and his heirs and afterwards to Edward Cary (d. 1692), John's first cousin, and his heirs. Her trustees came to an agreement with Falkland and Edward Cary to allow her to enjoy the estate for life, notwithstanding her failure to marry Lord Guilford, and she afterwards married Bertie. However, the agreement ended upon the deaths of Edward Cary and Falkland, and when Edward's son Lucius succeeded Anthony in the peerage, his guardian sued Elizabeth to claim the estate. The Court of Chancery found in favour of Lord Falkland in 1698, and Bertie appealed the decree to the House of Lords. He was successful in obtaining a life interest for Elizabeth in the Stanwell estate, with reversion to Lord Falkland, but a paper circulated by his brother Robert on his behalf abused Lord Chancellor Somers in such terms as to create a scandal, for which Lord Abingdon was compelled to apologise in the Lords.

From 1715 on, Bertie opposed the Whig Government in all votes of record. Although the Stanwell estate passed to Lord Falkland upon his wife's death that year, Bertie's personal electoral influence in Middlesex remained strong. In the 1722 election, he was returned both in Middlesex, where he headed the poll, and at Westbury, where his brother Lord Abingdon was lord of the manor. He and Francis Annesley, also standing on the Bertie interest, were returned in place of the sitting members, Lord Carbery and Charles Allanson; while Carbery and Allanson had a better claim to the seat, their election petition was disqualified on technical grounds. Bertie chose to sit for Middlesex, and Carbery was returned for Westbury at the ensuing by-election. On 2 December 1724, Bertie seconded a motion by John Barnard for a committee to inquire into the crimes committed in Wapping, where debtors fleeing bailiffs had gathered and terrorised the neighbourhood after the abolition of their former sanctuaries. He served on the committee of inquiry, which reported out the bill that became the Shelterers in Wapping, Stepney, etc. Act 1724. He again headed the poll in Middlesex at the 1727 election, but did not stand for that borough in the 1734 election. He appears to have been the James Bertie who was defeated at Westbury in that election; he petitioned against the election result, but this was disallowed when he failed to produce the requisite property qualification. He died on 18 October 1735. Some time after his first wife's death, he married Elizabeth, the daughter of Rev. George Calvert, rector of Stanwell, but they had no children.

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