Sir Edward Crofton, 2nd Baronet (died 1729)
Sir Edward Crofton, 2nd Baronet (c.1662 – 24 November 1729) was an Irish landowner and politician, who sat in the Irish House of Commons for more than thirty years, and served briefly as a member of the Privy Council of Ireland. Family. He was born at Mote Park, County Roscommon, the only surviving son of Sir Edward Crofton, 1st Baronet, and his second wife Susanna Clifford, daughter of Thomas Clifford of Devon. The Crofton family had come to Ireland from England in the sixteenth century and acquired substantial estates in Roscommon. The elder Sir  Edward was noted for his loyalty to the Stuart dynasty during the English Civil War, and at the Restoration of Charles II he was rewarded by being created a baronet, the first of the Crofton Baronets. Less is known for certain of Susanna's background, but there is a tradition in the Crofton family that she belonged to a junior branch of the family of Baron Clifford of Chudleigh. Two years after his father's death in 1675 his mother remarried Garrett Dillon, a prominent Roman Catholic barrister who during the reign of the Catholic King James II of England  rose to a position of political influence, and was appointed Recorder of Dublin. Garrett and his stepson seem to have been estranged by the time of the Glorious Revolution of 1688, which found them on opposite sides, and Susanna's death sometime before 1689 broke the family tie between them. After the Glorious Revolution. When James II landed in Ireland, in order to recover the three kingdoms, Edward's stepfather Garrett Dillon remained loyal to his cause and sat in the so-called Patriot Parliament of 1689. Edward, who was described as a young man of "sturdy and resolute character