Clare Sewell Read

[1][2] He was born in 1826 in Ketteringham, Norfolk, and was the eldest son of George Read of Barton Bendish Hall, and his wife Sarah Anne, daughter of Clare Sewell.

[1][3] In 1874 he was appointed to a junior ministerial post in the Second Disraeli ministry as Parliamentary Secretary to the Local Government Board.

In 1884 the sitting member for West Norfolk resigned, and Read was elected unopposed to fill the vacancy at the ensuing by-election.

In 1848, 1854 and 1856 he was awarded prizes by the Royal Agricultural Society for reports on farming in South Wales, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire.

Along with Albert Pell, Read was made an assistant commissioner, and the two men visited the United States and Canada to inquire into the production and export of wheat.

[2] Although no longer in parliament, Read continued to represent the interests of farmers through the societies of which he was a leading member.

In 1892 he was called as an expert witness before a Board of Trade investigation into corn sales, and in 1894 appeared before the Royal Commission on Agriculture.