MARK OF JOHN SCOFIELD, LONDON, 1781

WILLIAM DRAKE M.P.
Born into an ancient Buckinghamshire family, whose seat was the neoclassical Shardeloes, near Amersham, which his father, also called William and similarly an M.P. had rebuilt to the designs of the great classical architect Robert Adam (1728-1792). His son William, who commissioned the present lot, sat as M.P. from 1768 until his death in 1795. The Public Ledger described him in 1779 as ‘a very independent, conscientious man, votes on each side, but most usually in the minority’. Later in his career he spoke more frequently in parliament, often on the subject of taxation and it was said 'in all matters of public expenditure his maxim was waste not, want not’. On his death in 1795 the Gentleman’s Magazine, London, 1795, p. 445 wrote that he left a great fortune, ‘partly acquired by marriage, and partly by some collateral branches. Had he lived to inherit that of his father, he would have been one of the richest men in the country.’ He had two daughters, who married two brothers, both the sons of Frederick Irby, 2nd Baron Boston. Rachel Ives Drake (d.1830), married the eldest brother, George Irby, 3rd Baron Boston (1777-1856). Emily Ives Drake (d.1806) married Rear-Admiral Hon. Frederick Paul Irby (1779-1844).