Henry Purdon

Henry Purdon (c.1687-1737) was an Irish barrister, politician and Law Officer of the early eighteenth century. He sat in the Irish House of Commons and held the Crown office of Third Serjeant.

Purdon was born in County Cork, to a junior branch of a family, originally from Cumberland in England, which had acquired substantial lands in County Clare in the early seventeenth century; Henry's branch of the family settled at Ballyclogh in Cork. He was the son of Adam Purdon and his wife Mary Clayton, and grandson of Sir Nicholas Purdon (died 1678), who was MP for Baltimore in the time of Charles II, and his wife Alice Stephens. Bartholomew Purdon, who was High Sheriff of County Cork in 1708, and MP successively for several County Cork constituencies, was Henry's first cousin.

Henry entered the Middle Temple in 1707, was called to the Bar and became King's Counsel in 1716. He was MP for Charleville 1721-1727. In 1725 the House of Commons resolved that one Joseph Nagle should be committed to prison for breach of privilege, on account of his publication of a pamphlet entitled The Case of Joseph Nagle, which Purdon claimed was a malicious libel on him in his official capacity, and therefore an attack on the dignity of the House of Commons itself.

He was made Third Serjeant-at-law in 1730 and held that office until his death in December 1737. He is thought to have been the last Irish Serjeant to act as "messenger" to the House of Commons: that is he was sometimes called upon to advise the Commons on points of law, just as the High Court judges advised the Irish House of Lords.

He was made a burgess of the town of Kinsale in 1733, and was a Major in the Irish Yeomanry.

He married a daughter of Henry Bowerman or Boreman (died 1701), his predecessor as MP for Charleville, but had no children.

What seems to be our only glimpse of Purdon's personal character- his persecution of Joseph Nagle for an alleged libel- arguably shows him in a rather unsympathetic light, as arrogant and vindictive. On the other hand, his fellow MPs clearly regarded Nagle's conduct as an attack on the House of Commons as a whole, and thus deserving of punishment.

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