Richard Ford (East Grinstead MP)

{{Short description|English politician}}

{{other people | Richard Ford }}

{{Use dmy dates|date=January 2017}}

{{Use British English|date=January 2017}}

Sir Richard Ford (1758 – 3 May 1806){{Rayment-hc|e|1|date=March 2012}} was an English politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1789 to 1791.

Ford was elected as a Member of Parliament (MP) for the borough of East Grinstead in Sussex at an unopposed by-election{{cite book

|last=Stooks Smith

|first=Henry

|editor=Craig, F. W. S.

|editor-link=F. W. S. Craig

|title=The Parliaments of England

|orig-date=1844–1850

|edition=2nd

|year=1973

|publisher=Parliamentary Research Services

|location=Chichester

|isbn=0-900178-13-2

|page=[https://archive.org/details/parliamentsofeng0000smit/page/551 551]

}} in February 1789. He held that seat until the general election in 1790, when he was returned unopposed for the borough of Appleby in Westmorland.{{London Gazette

|issue= 13220

|date=20 July 1790

|page=457

}}Stooks Smith, page 560

He served less than a year as an MP for Appleby,{{Rayment-hc|a|2|date=March 2012}} until he resigned from the Commons in early 1791 by accepting the post of Steward of East Hendred.{{London Gazette

|issue= 13310

|date=21 May 1791

|page=299

}} (The by-election for his successor was held in May 1791).

After serving the Undersecretary of State in the home office, Richard Ford was for many years chief police magistrate of London, for which services he was knighted. Ford lived some years with actress Dorothea Jordan, who had three children by him, one of whom died. She left him when his promises of marriage were not fulfilled, because it went against the wishes of Ford's father.The Volume of the Walpole Society, volume 60, "The Ford Collection", p. 380. Ford later married Benjamin Booth's daughter and a heiress. His eldest son from this marriage was also named Richard Ford known for his travel writings about Spain and art collection.Richard Ford DNB