NORTON, Sir Richard (c.1582-1646), of Rotherfield Park, East Tisted, Hants.

Norton’s ancestors acquired East Tisted by marriage in the early fourteenth century. VCH Hants, iii. 31. He himself received a gentleman’s education at Oxford and the inns of court, completed by a tour to Italy in 1608 in the charge of a kinsman, Sir Stephen Lesieur. His father insisted upon the trip after Norton became involved in some romantic scandal and accepted a challenge to a duel; his temperament does not seem to have improved immediately, however, and while in Florence he managed to pick a quarrel with the marquess of Winchester’s eldest son. HMC Hatfield, xx. 110-11; SP98/2, f. 224v.

Norton entered into his inheritance in 1611, in which year he was also knighted. As sheriff of Hampshire in 1614, he conducted that year’s parliamentary election with obvious partiality towards his courtier-cousin, Sir William Uvedale*, and also towards Sir Richard Tichborne*, being allegedly prepared to risk the fine of £100 for making a false return. Procs. 1614 (Commons), 390, 397; STAC 8/293/11. He probably also nominated Tichborne’s brother Sir Walter* and Edward Savage I* for Petersfield, where he had inherited some property. C142/131/184. At the next general election Norton was returned with his brother-in-law Sir John Hippisley for Petersfield, but he played no known part in the 1621 Parliament’s proceedings. He did not sit again, but used his influence to secure Uvedale’s return for Petersfield in all the parliaments of Charles I’s reign.

During the 1620s and 1630s Norton proved a most conscientious local official, earning the praise of Hampshire’s lord lieutenant, Sir Edward Conway I*, for his ‘large and good heart that takes pleasure to exceed in kind and loving errands’, and his ‘very great care and good discretion’ in the business of the Forced Loan of 1626-7, to which he contributed £40 himself. Add. 21922, ff. 16, 99v, 119v. At the outbreak of the Civil War he sided with the king. HMC Portland, i. 51. He was taken prisoner in 1644 and fined £1,000, later reduced to £500, on lands worth £1,500 p.a. LJ, vii. 325; CCC, 848. He died in June 1646 and was buried at East Tisted; administration of his estates was granted in 1661 to his second son John, the third baronet, who represented Hampshire in the Cavalier Parliament, and thereafter sat for Petersfield until his death. PROB 6/37, f. 39.