ABSTRACT
William Dyott was an army officer and country gentleman, residing in Freeford Hall, near Lichfield, Staffordshire, from 1826. He was appointed aide-de-camp to King George III in 1801. As a country landowner, Dyott was involved with agriculture and politics. Dyott was also an active Justice of the Peace and deputy lieutenant of the county. Dyott’s diaries are an excellent source of information about the varied business of an active county magistrate, though it has to be dug out of a large number of dispersed entries. Dyott’s activities provide some indication of the role and significance of the county magistracy. They were the first, and on many occasions, the last line of defence against the social and political turbulence that affected the industrial regions of England in the first half of the nineteenth century.
