Sir James Laroche

Son of John Laroche (1700-1752, MP for Bodmin 1727-1752), and himself MP for Bodmin 1768-1780. 'A Bristol merchant', according to the History of Parliament but in fact a major slave-trader, following his uncle James Laroche, from whom Sir James Laroche inherited. He mortgaged one of two Antiguan estates [and the 184 enslaved people upon them] of his first wife Elizabeth Rachel Ann Archbould (nee Yeamans, q.v. under Dame Elizabeth Rachel Ann Laroche, who died c. 1781) in 1774 for £7000 to Justinian Casamajor, and was bankrupt in 1777. The Laroche estate itself appears to have remained in the family and was sold by his sister Susannah, his widow (also Dame Elizabeth Laroche, who must have been a second wife) and other family members in 1816. The will of Sir James Laroche of Pyle Glamorganshire made in 1803 and proved 01/01/1805 shows a son James as well as a widow.

The Public Ledger wrote of him in 1779: ‘Was a Bristol merchant, and for doing some Government business there, was rewarded three years ago with a baronetage. He is lately become a bankrupt ... and is now literally a beggar for the crumbs which fall from the minister’s table.’ (Cited in History of Parliament entry.)

Mary M. Drummond, 'Laroche, James (1734-1804)', History of Parliament online, accessed 23/03/2105; he appears distinctively in the Transatlantic Slave-Trade Database as James Laroche jr. and then Sir James Laroche, but is probably also the James Laroche for some of the later voyages. His uncle was especially active in the 1730s and 1740s; Vere Langford Oliver, History of Antigua Vol. II pp. 161-163; PROB 11/1422/7.