RUSSELL, Thomas (fl.1613-1623), of Truro, Cornw. and London

This Member has not been definitely identified. However, given the frequency with which Truro chose men with local connections to serve in Parliament during this period, he was probably the Thomas Russell who had three sons baptized at Truro church between 1613 and 1619. Described as a gentleman ‘of London’ in the former year, he leased several properties in and around the town, but the few surviving local records do not reveal when he first settled there, or whether he found a place on Truro’s corporation. Ibid. 165; C2/Jas.I/C8/63. Russell does not feature by name in the records of the 1614 Parliament, though as a port town burgess he was entitled to sit on legislative committees appointed to consider issues such as the preservation of fish-fry and the extortions of customs officials (21 and 25 May). Procs. 1614 (Commons), 309, 339. He was still living in 1623, by which time he had apparently left Truro. He may have been the Thomas Russell of Lambeth who died in 1635 leaving sons whose names and ages fit with the baptismal records of the Truro man’s children. C2/Jas.I/C8/63; PROB 11/169, f. 166r-v.