John Rolle, 1st Baron Rolle

Who was John Rolle, 1st Baron Rolle?

John Rolle, 1st Baron Rolle was a British peer who served as a Member of Parliament in general support of William Pitt the Younger and was later an active member of the House of Lords. His violent attacks on Edmund Burke and Charles James Fox in the early 1780s led to his being the target for satirical attack in the Rolliad. He was colonel of the South Devon Militia and was instrumental in forming the Royal 1st Devon Yeomanry and the North Devon Yeomanry.

He was the largest landowner in Devon, with about 55,000 acres centred around his seats of Stevenstone in the north and Bicton in the south-east, and thus was highly influential in that county. He promoted and financed several large engineering projects, including the Rolle Canal in North Devon, Rolle Quay in Pottington, Barnstaple, and two road bridges over the River Torridge near Torrington, at Town Mills and Weare Giffard and the sea-wall at Exmouth. He was an active donor to charitable works in Devon, being patron of his family's almshouses at Livery Dole, Exeter, Otterton, Great Torrington and St Giles in the Wood and of two schools in Otterton.