Roger Newdigate
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Sir Roger Newdigate, 5th Baronet (30 May 1719 – 23 November 1806) was an English politician who sat in the House of Commons between 1742 and 1780. He was a collector of antiquities.<ref>Template:Cite EB1911</ref>
Early life
Newdigate was born in Arbury, Warwickshire, the son of Sir Richard Newdigate, 3rd Baronet (who died in 1727) and inherited the title 5th Baronet and the estates of Arbury and of Harefield in Middlesex on the early death of his brother in 1734. He was educated at Westminster School and University College, Oxford, where he matriculated in 1736, and graduated M.A. in 1738;<ref name=ALUM>Template:Alox2</ref> he contributed greatly to the university throughout the remainder of his life. He is best remembered as the founder of the Newdigate Prize on his death<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and as a collector of antiques, a number of which he donated to the university. The prize for poetry helped make the names of many illustrious writers.
Political career
From 1742 until 1747, he served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Middlesex, and in 1751, he began a 30-year tenure as an MP for Oxford University.<ref name = HOP>Template:Cite web</ref>
In 1759 he was commissioned as Major of the Warwickshire Militia and served with the regiment during its embodiment for home defence during the Seven Years' War, keeping a diary of his service.<ref> Anon, 'The Warwickshire Militia in 1759–60', Journal of the Society for Army Historical Research, Vol 11, No 42 (April 1932), pp. 83–9.</ref><ref>J.R. Western, The English Militia in the Eighteenth Century: The Story of a Political Issue 1660–1802, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1965, pp. 385, 387, 395, 397–9, 402, 453.</ref>
He lavished attention on the Elizabethan Arbury Hall which he rebuilt over a period of thirty years in splendid Gothic Renaissance style, engaging the services of the architect Henry Couchman.
Private life
He married, firstly Sophia Conyers in 1743, and secondly Hesther Margaret Munday in 1776. Both marriages were childless and on his death in 1806 the baronetcy became extinct. Arbury Hall and Harefield passed to Francis Parker (1774–1862) of Kirk Hallam, Derbyshire, a distant cousin of the 5th Baronet, who then adopted the additional name of Newdigate. Francis Parker moved into Arbury Hall and married Lady Barbara Maria Legge, daughter of George Legge, 3rd Earl of Dartmouth, in 1820.
Legacy
Sir Roger was immortalised in fiction in George Eliot's Scenes of Clerical Life, where he appears as Sir Christopher Cheverel in Mr Gilfil's Love Story.<ref>Cooke, George Willis. George Eliot: A Critical Study of her Life, Writings and Philosophy. Whitefish: Kessinger, 2004. [1]</ref>
References
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- 1719 births
- 1806 deaths
- British MPs 1741–1747
- British MPs 1747–1754
- British MPs 1754–1761
- British MPs 1761–1768
- British MPs 1768–1774
- British MPs 1774–1780
- Baronets in the Baronetage of England
- Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for English constituencies
- Alumni of University College, Oxford
- People educated at Westminster School, London
- Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for Oxford University
- Warwickshire Militia officers