Philip Carteret Webb

[2] Webb has remembered also as an agent of the crown in the North Briton scandal (1763), assisting Robert Wood to seize the papers of radical journalist John Wilkes, whose inflammatory writings had offended the king.

He practised at first in Old Jewry, then moved to Budge Row, and afterwards settled in Great Queen Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields.

The first of these elections elicited in 1754 the ballad, attributed to Dr William King, of St Mary Hall, Oxford, of ‘The Cow of Haslemere,’ which had eight calves, for each of which a vote in Webb's interest was claimed.

[3] In December 1756, Webb was made joint-solicitor to the treasury, and held that post until June 1765; he was consequently a leading official in the proceedings against John Wilkes, and for his acts was dubbed by Horace Walpole ‘a most villainous tool and agent in any iniquity,’ ‘that dirty wretch,’ and ‘a sorry knave.’ In the action brought against Wood, Lord Egremont's secretary, for seizing Wilkes's papers, Webb, as a witness, swore that while in the house he had no key in his hand.

[3] Webb was the leader in seizing, among the papers of Wilkes, the poem of the Essay on Woman; and when the legality of general warrants was impugned, he printed privately and anonymously a volume of Copies taken from the Records of the Court of King's Bench, the Office-books of the Secretaries of State, of Warrants issued by Secretaries of State, 1763.

His most valuable coins and medals were acquired by Matthew Duane; the remainder and his ancient marble busts and bronzes were sold in 1771.

[3] A letter from Emanuel Mendes da Costa to Webb is in John Nichols's Illustrations of Literature (iv.

She died at Bath on 12 March 1756, aged 45, leaving one son, also called Philip Carteret Webb (d. 10 October 1793).

[3] In August 1758 Webb married Rhoda, daughter of John or James Cotes of Dodington in Cheshire, and by her had no issue.