Thomas Powys

Sir Thomas Powys (1649 – 4 April 1719), of Henley, near Ludlow, Shropshire and Lilford cum Wigsthorpe, Northamptonshire, was an English lawyer, judge and Tory politician, who sat in the English and British House of Commons between 1701 and 1713. He was Attorney General to King James II and was chief prosecutor at the trial of the Seven Bishops in June 1688. He served as Justice of the King's Bench from 1713 to 1714, but was dismissed. Early years Powys was the second son of Thomas Powys of Henley Hall in Shropshire and his first wife, Anne Littleton, daughter of Sir Adam Littleton, 1st Baronet. His father was serjeant-at-law and a Bencher of Lincoln's Inn. He was the younger brother of Sir Littleton Powys (1647–1732). Powys was educated at Shrewsbury School, and matriculated at Queen's College, Oxford on 20 May 1664, aged 15. He was admitted at Lincoln's Inn on 19 February 1696 and was called to the bar in 1673. Career Powys was attorney-general for Denbighshire and Montgomeryshire from 1680 to 1686 and was knighted on 23 April 1686. He became solicitor-general in 1686, when Heneage Finch was dismissed. Having acquiesced in the appointment of Roman Catholics to office, and argued in favour of the king's dispensing power, he was promoted to attorney-general in December 1687, the same year that he became treasurer of Lincoln's Inn.