As a young lawyer of the country party and a frequenter, it would appear, of the Green Ribbon Club,[3] he had some dealings with Richard Rumbold and other insurgent "republicans" in the spring of 1683.
[4] He was suspected of complicity in the Rye House plot, and on 23 June a reward of £100 was offered for his apprehension, together with Rumbold, John Rumsey, Richard Goodenough, and other plotters.
[1] Three witnesses were found to give evidence against him, but he escaped to Holland, where he spent two years in an atmosphere of whig intrigue, and, according to his own account, acted as an emissary between the Duke of Monmouth and Archibald Campbell, 9th Earl of Argyll.
[3] Three days later he marched with Forde Grey, earl of Tankerville, in the direction of Bridport, at the head of about three hundred infantry, and took part in an indecisive and shambling encounter with the Dorset militia.
[7] In January 1687 King James, anxious to win the good opinion of the dissenters, sent Wade to Bristol with the order of the council for the "remodelling" of the corporation, and he presented his special commission under the privy seal to the mayor on 4 February.