VAUGHAN, RICE (d. 1672 or a little earlier), lawyer and author;
second son (and, from 1654, heir) of Henry Vaughan, Gelli-goch, Machynlleth, and his wife Mary, daughter of Maurice Wynn, Glyn, near Harlech. He went to Shrewsbury school in July 1615, was admitted to Gray's Inn, 13 Aug. 1638, and was called to the Bar on 20 June 1648. In the meantime he had been assisting the Parliament side, e.g. in June 1644 he was appointed a member of the committee for Cardiganshire, Pembrokeshire, and Carmarthenshire. Having failed to get himself elected Member of Parliament for Merioneth, 1654, he petitioned the Council of State, alleging irregularities on the part of the sheriff (Maurice Lewis); the member elected was John Vaughan, Cefnbodig (see summary account in W. R. Williams, Hist. of the Great Sessions in Wales, based on Cal. S.P. Dom., 1654.) The previous year (18 Aug. 1653) Vaughan had been appointed prothonotary for the counties of Denbigh and Montgomery in the court of Great Sessions in place of John Edisbury; for details, see W. R. Williams, op. cit., and Cal. S.P. Dom., 1653-4. He served the commissioners for sequestrations (from March 1649) and did some business on behalf of the Council of State in 1656. He appears to have been a prisoner in the Tower of London for some time from May 1665 and probably remained there for about two years.
Vaughan was the author of (at least) three works: (a) A Plea for the Common Laws of England (London, 1651), a pamphlet dedicated to the House of Commons, replying to a book by Hugh Peters called A Good Work for a Good Magistrate; (b) Practica Walliae: or the Proceedings in the Great Sessions of Wales: containing the Method and Practice of an Attorney there, from an Original to its Execution. Whereunto is added, The Old Statute of Wales at large; And an Abridgement of all the Statutes uniting Wales to England; with Tables of the Fees, and the Matters therein contained (London, 1672); and (c) A Discourse of Coin and Coinage (London, 1675). As ‘T.M.’, the editor of (b), refers to Rice Vaughan as the ‘late Author’ of ‘this Tract,’ it is evident that Vaughan d. in 1672 or a little earlier.
Bibliography:
- To the references already given add D.N.B.;
- Foster, Register of Admissions to Gray's Inn;
- W. R. Williams, Parl. Hist.;
- R. Williams, Mont. Worthies;
- Blackwell.
Author:
Sir William Llewelyn Davies, M.A., LL.D., F.S.A. (1887-1952), Aberystwyth
