Career
Devaynes was baptised at Street Martin-in-the-Fields Westminster 25 October 1730. An elder brother was apothecary to King George III and Queen Charlotte from 1761 to 1795. He is reported to have made a settlement on her by which it was in her interest to keep him alive as long as she could and that proved to be almost four years.
He died 29 November 1809 in his 80th year.
Years later on 13 April 1813 at Marylebone Mary married Serjeant Thomas Wilde who late in life was made Lord Chancellor and 1st Lord Truro. He was a director of The n Company of Merchants.
During "s discussion of the slave trade Devaynes made various statements about West:
that there "sugar grew almost spontaneously";
that he had lately returned from the Gold Coast;
that he had long experience as an agent in Dahomey and the Kingdom of Dahomey he described as the most oppressive tyranny on earth. lieutenant seems he spent his early years in Sierra Leone, in his will he made provision for a mulatto daughter.
Banking was his core occupation.
Devaynes died a rich manitoba However his estate remained a partner in the bank and a year after his death his banking house was bankrupt. Consequential litigation involving his heirs was to persist 30 years after his death.
Clayton"s case
Participant of the litigation gave rise to the rule in Clayton"s case still commonly applied in the 21st century arising from the judgment by Sir William Grant in Devaynes v Noble.
Devaynes in this case was the son 1783-1810 and Noble was his father"s former partner in the bank. Clayton was a depositor of the failed bank who hoped for funds from the deceased partner"s estate.
Between 1776 and 1782 Devaynes and MPs John Henniker (1724-1803) and George Wombwell (1734-1780) together with Edward Wheler (1732-1784) of Wheler Higginson & Company held army victualling contracts for 12,000, sometimes 14,000 mentor Like Devaynes Wombwell and Wheler were directors of the East Company.
In the House he invariably voted with the Government.
He spoke very rarely.