Robert Were Fox the Elder

Robert Were Fox (5 July 1754 – 1818) was a Quaker businessman who lived in Falmouth.

Life and work

Fox was born in Fowey, Cornwall, in the United Kingdom, and married Elizabeth Tregelles (1768–1849) in 1788. The couple had six sons, including Charles Fox of Trebah, Robert Were Fox FRS[1] of Penjerrick Garden and Alfred Fox of Glendurgan. They also had two daughters: Mariana Fox (1807–1863), who married Francis Tuckett of Frenchay and became the mother of the mountaineer Francis Fox Tuckett,[2][3] and Charlotte, born in 1799, who married Samuel Fox of Tottenham.[4]

The Fox family were Quakers, descended from George Fox of Fowey and his wife, Anna Debell. Robert Were Fox was the son of George Croker Fox and his wife, Mary Were.[5] It was George Croker Fox founded a Falmouth ship-brokering business that continued into the 21st century.

Under Robert Were Fox's management, the family's business interests expanded into copper mining, tin smelting, and foundry work, in partnership with the Williams family. In 1794, R. W. Fox was appointed Consul (Diplomatic Representative) by the United States of America for the port of Falmouth.

In 1811, Fox was one of four delegates sent to negotiate with the Post Office headquarters in Lombard Street, London, for the return of the Packet Service station to Falmouth from Plymouth.[6]

Notes and references

1. Philip Payton, ‘Fox, Robert Were (1754–1818)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Sept 2004; online edn, Jan 2008 accessed 13 Jan 2009
2. "Mariana Tuckett nee Fox". Winterbourne Family History Online. Frenchay Village Museum. Retrieved 13 January 2009.
3. "Francis Fox Tuckett". Winterbourne Family History Online. Frenchay Village Museum. Retrieved 13 January 2009.
4. Annual Monitor 1879 p.68-78, available online at The Internet Archive.
5. Pages 26/27 of Barclay Fox's Journal
6. Norway, Arthur H (1895). The Post-Office Packet service: between the years 1793 and 1815, compiled from records, chiefly official. London: Macmillan. pp. 197–221.

Further reading

• Oxford Dictionary of National Biography article by Philip Payton Fox, Robert Were (1754–1818)
• ODNB article by Denise Crook, Fox, Robert Were (1789–1877) accessed 3 Aug 2006
• ODNB article by G. C. Boase, Fox, Charles (1797–1878), revised by Justin Brooke, accessed 6 Aug 2006]
• Fox, Robert Barclay (1979). Raymond Brett (ed.). Barclay Fox's journal. London: Bell and Hyman. ISBN 0-7135-1865-0. and U.S. edition, Fox, Robert Barclay (1979). Raymond Brett (ed.). Barclay Fox's journal. Totowa, N.J.: Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 0-8476-6187-3. Barclay Fox was R. W. Fox the Elder's grandson. Pages cited above are from the Introductory essay by R. L. Brett