Sir William Curtis 1st bart.

MP for London for more than 30 years and a major City of London figure, despite the History of Parliament's characterisation of him as 'a portly and bottlenosed bon vivant and unconscious buffoon'. He was a trustee with John Sowerby, another City figure, under a deed of 21/07/1813 whereby they transferred on the instruction of Francis Willock a mortgage over Belleisle on St Vincent to Samuel Greatheed. His role in this transfer presumably flowed from his status as one of the assignees in bankruptcy (with John Sowerby) of Alexander Willock (q.v.) whose partnership with Francis Willock had failed in 1793.

1. Curtis & Co. were the owners of a slave voyage by The Nancy in 1773. In 1779 Timothy and William Curtis offered The Nancy, then in the Jamaica convoy, to the Admiralty, which had apparently expressed a wish to buy her.

https://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1790-1820/member/curtis-william-1752-1829; EAP 688 (St Vincent) Deed Book 1812, British Library, EAP688/1/1/22, https://eap.bl.uk/archive-file/EAP688-1-1-22 pp. 391 et seq.; Common Records 1794-1797, British Library, EAP794/1/1/25, https://eap.bl.uk/archive-file/EAP794-1-1-25 p. 217 shows him and Sowerby as surviving assignees of Alexander Willock.

1. The TASTDB gives 'Curtis' for this (and T. Douglass as the captain) while the 1776 Lloyd's register shows Curtis & Co. for The Nancy, captain T. Douglass, on the London-Jamaica route; ADM 106/1247/128.