SAYER, Exton (c.1691-1731), of Doctors’ Commons, London.

On Sayer’s marriage in 1724 he resigned his fellowship at Trinity Hall to become spiritual chancellor to his father-in-law, the Bishop of Durham, from whom he obtained valuable leases of ecclesiastical coal-bearing lands.E. Hughes, N. Country Life in 18th Cent. 308. A famous advocate in Doctors’ Commons, in 1725 he acted as counsel for Lord Chancellor Macclesfield, to whom he was a ‘particular friend’.Howell, State Trials, xvi. 886. Brought into Parliament as a ministerial nominee, he quickly became one of the leading government spokesmen. On 26 Feb. 1730 he led for the Government in resisting an opposition sponsored petition to end the monopoly of the East India Company, and in the great Dunkirk debate next day he was put up by Walpole to sidetrack Sir William Wyndham’s motion by rising before it could be seconded to move an alternative motion, which was adopted.HMC Egmont Diary, i. 66-67, 72-73; Knatchbull Diary. A promising political career was cut short by his death from a riding accident, 24 Sept. 1731.