Henry Rumsey Williams (Q71750)

Henry Rumsey Williams (1774-1841), solicitor, was born in Crickhowell, Brecknockshire. By 1793 he was a clerk to the recorder of the borough of Caernarfon, where he became a qualified attorney in 1795. He married Anne Bettiss in the late 1790s, and they had at least ten children. Williams became legal representative of landed families in Caernarfonshire, especially the Conservative landowners, including the Assheton Smiths of Faenol, the Newboroughs of Glynllifon and the Pennants of Penrhyn, as well as many gentry families in both Anglesey and Caernarfonshire, and also leading members of the burgeoning middle class in Caernarfon. He undertook electioneering for the Tory party in Caernarfon, particularly after the reformation of the Caernarfon corporation in 1835. By his death in 1841, Williams owned properties in Brecknockshire, Monmouthshire and Caernarfonshire. After his death, there followed a series of legal disputes concerning his estate, of which his son, Edward Rumsey Williams, was executor.