[1] After trading for years with Cardiff in coasters, Richard Cory settled in the town about 1831, opening a ship-chandler's store, to which he soon added a shipbroking business.

[3] When in 1836 teetotalism was first advocated in Cardiff, Cory's father is reputed to have been the first to sign the pledge, and he soon became the recognized leader of the movement in the town, his co-workers being nicknamed ‘Coryites’.

Besides many other generous contributions to the Salvation Army, he gave it Maendy Hall at Ton Pentre, with thirty acres of land, as a home of rest.

In Cardiff he gave the police institute at a cost of £3,000 (besides contributing annually to its maintenance), the original YMCA building, £6,500 to the University College, and gifts to Aberdare Hall (women students' hostel), £2,000 to the Seamen's Hospital, and large sums to the infirmary.

He was a member of the Cardiff school board for twenty-three years, and gave annually a large number of prizes for proficiency in Bible knowledge.

[3] Cory was one of the original members of Glamorgan County Council when it was established in 1889 and served as a councillor for the Barry ward, and as an alderman, until he was narrowly defeated at the 1898 election.

She died in August 1909, leaving by him one daughter and three sons, of whom the second, Clifford Cory, of Llantarnam, Monmouthshire, became Liberal Member of Parliament for the St. Ives division of Cornwall in 1906, and was made a baronet in 1907.