NORTON, Thomas (1684-1748), of Ixworth Abbey, nr. Bury St. Edmunds, Suff.

Norton was the grandson of Col. Richard Norton, M.P., an intimate friend of Oliver Cromwell’s, governor of Southampton and later of Portsmouth. Returned on his own interest with the support of the 1st Earl of Bristol, with whom he was connected by marriage, he was described by Walpole in 1733 as having ‘been ever a steady Whig, and never swerved from his principles, or given a vote against us’.Letter Bks. of John Hervey, 1st Earl of Bristol, iii. 103-4. Continuing to vote with the Government in every recorded division till he retired in 1747, he died 28 Apr. 1748.