Clare Sewell Read

Clare Sewell Read (6 November 1826 – 21 August 1905) was a British agriculturist and Conservative politician.

Early life He was born in 1826 in Ketteringham, Norfolk, and was the eldest son of George Read of Barton Bendish Hall, and his wife Sarah Anne, daughter of Clare Sewell. The family had been farming land in Norfolk for three centuries, and following private education in King's Lynn Read spent five years learning practical agriculture on his father's farm at Plumstead. Subsequently, he managed large farms in Pembrokeshire and Oxfordshire, before returning to Plumstead in 1854.

Following the loss of his seat, he refused candidacies at North Lincolnshire and Cambridgeshire. In 1884 the sitting member for West Norfolk resigned, and Read was elected unopposed to fill the vacancy at the ensuing by-election. He was persuaded to stand at Norwich when a further election was called in 1886. He did not take the seat, and did not make any more attempts to enter parliament. In 1896 Read retired from farming, and in the following year the landlords and tenant farmers of Norfolk formally presented Read with his portrait at a ceremony at the Norwich Shire Hall to mark their "deep sense... of the value of the services that he had rendered to agriculture".

On retirement, Read moved to London, taking up residence at 91 Kensington Gardens Square.

Clare Sewell Read died at his London home in August 1905. He was buried in Barton Bendish, Norfolk.