Edward Protheroe

Edward Protheroe (1774–1856) was an English merchant, ironmaster and coal-owner in the Forest of Dean, and plantation owner in Jamaica.

He was educated at Harrow School, and was admitted a fellow commoner of Magdalene College, Cambridge in 1792.

[4][5] Philip I had entered the West Indian sugar trade as apprentice to Mark Davis I, and became his partner c.1768.

Among the candidates, in the two-member constituency, were Sir Samuel Romilly, looking to escape Wareham, where John Calcraft acted as a borough-monger, and Henry Hunt.

[14] Romilly had the support of the Bristol Independent Club, chaired by Robert Claxton; and Hunt the backing of William Cobbett.

[15] In the House of Commons he gave qualified support to William Wilberforce's abolitionist programme.

[1] Standing again at the 1818 general election, Protheroe found he was under pressure: Hugh Duncan Baillie, son of Evan Baillie, was a candidate, and he came under attack from the reformers Edward Kentish and Thomas Stocking for failing to live up in parliament to Whig principles.

[22] Concurrently, he was developing coal mines in the Neath Valley, at Pwllfaron near Glynneath, Derlwyn Mawr, and Blaengwrach-Cwmgwrach.