Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 37.djvu/285

 20l. and imprisoned for eight days. His health was now failing, and orders were given that no new dean of St. Patrick's was to be appointed in case of Meredith's death until his fine was paid in full. He died in Dublin on 3 Aug. 1597, and was buried on 7 Aug. by the side of his brother John in St. Patrick's Cathedral, at a spot reserved for members of his family. His heirs erected a handsome monument to his memory, which was defaced in 1688, when James II's troops converted the cathedral into a stable; but a monument of black marble, with an inscription to his memory, has since been erected. By his will, dated 28 July, Meredith left considerable sums to the corporation of Dublin and to his children on condition of their preserving their chastity until marriage.

Meredith married Sarah Batho or Bathow, and had issue by her. His eldest son, Robert, was knighted by Strafford on 6 Sept. 1635, and became privy councillor and chancellor of the Irish exchequer. He and Sir Thomas Rotherham were the only privy councillors who met on 21 Oct. 1641 in obedience to the summons of Lord-justice Parsons upon the first intimation of the rebellion. In 1647 he was appointed with others to take over the government of Ireland, in place of, first duke of Ormonde [q. v.] Meredith's second son, Thomas, was also knighted, and settled at Dollardstown, co. Meath. His widow remarried, first viscount Loftus of Ely [q. v.]

Another (1559–1621), dean of Wells, born in 1559, was admitted scholar of Winchester School in 1573, of New College, Oxford, in 1576, and fellow of New College in 1578, probably graduating B.C.L. on 1 July 1584, and B.D. on 17 Nov. 1606. He became rector of St. Peter and St. Paul, Bath, and of Portishead, Somerset, king's chaplain and dean of Wells in 1607. On 11 and 25 Feb. 1606–7 he preached before the king at Whitehall, and subsequently published the two sermons in a single volume (London, 4to, 1606, by G. Eld for S. Waterson). He died on 15 Aug. 1621, and was buried in Wells Cathedral (cf., Progresses of King James; , Winchester Scholars; , Alumni Oxon. 1500–1714; , Fasti, i. 317; , Church Hist. ii. 367). 

MEREDITH, WILLIAM (d. 1790), politician, third and last baronet of Henbury, Cheshire, was son of Amos Meredith (1688–1745) of Chester city, by Anne St. John, his second wife. He matriculated at Christ Church, Oxford, on 24 March 1742–3, when aged 18, and was created D.C.L. on 14 April 1749. In 1752 the title and family estates descended to him by the death of his grandfather, Sir William Meredith, the second baronet. He sat in parliament for Wigan from 1754 to 1761, and for Liverpool from 1761 to 1780, when he withdrew from public life, though at the election in 1784 a small number of votes was cast for him. When young he inclined to Jacobitism, but soon became an active whig, and was numbered among the followers of Lord Rockingham. He took a leading part in the proceedings connected with Wilkes, and his speeches are included in the published volumes of Sir Henry Cavendish's shorthand notes of the debates. When the Rockingham ministry was formed, Meredith became a lord of the admiralty (August 1765), and he remained in office for a short time after its fall; but at the close of November 1766 he resigned his post. In the following March he zealously struggled to effect an alliance of the followers of Rockingham with those of George Grenville, and for some years was one of the most active leaders of the opposition. Horace Walpole describes him as ‘inflexibly serious and of no clear head; yet practice formed him to a manner of speaking that had weight. He was, I believe, an honest man, though not without personal views.’ In 1771 he brought in a bill for repealing a clause in the Nullum Tempus Act, by which rights and titles acquired under grants or letters patent from the crown can be prosecuted with effect within a certain time, and it was carried against the government for some stages, but was ultimately rejected. He was even less successful in his attempt in February 1773 to abolish the subscription to the Thirty-nine Articles which was imposed on members of the universities. Much to his credit he interfered in March 1771, at considerable risk to his own person, to protect Lord North from the violence of the mob, and that minister acknowledged the courtesy by bestowing a benefice on his brother, the Rev. Theophilus Meredith. A little later his position in the house was that of leader of ‘a very small squadron’ of personal followers, and he was supposed ‘by the Rockingham party to lean to the court.’ On the dismissal of Charles James Fox, in February 1774, his name was mentioned for the vacant lordship of the treasury, and in the next