Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Mounsteven, John
MOUNSTEVEN, JOHN (1644–1706), politician, baptised at St. Mabyn, Cornwall, in 1644, was son of John Mounstephen or Mounsteven (d. 1672), who married at St. Mabyn in 1640 Elizabeth Tamlyn (d. 1664). He matriculated from Christ Church, Oxford, as pauper puer on 7 Dec. 1666, and graduated B.A. in 1671. After this he repaired to London and became secretary to the Earl of Sunderland, who, on receiving the appointment of secretary of state to James II, made him the under-secretary. When Sunderland lost his office he discarded his secretary, an event to which Prior refers in his 'Epistle to Fleetwood Shepherd,' 1689, in the words,
Nor leave me now at. six and seven
As Sunderland has left Mun Stephen.
In 1685 he purchased the estate of Lancarfe in Bodmin, Cornwall. He was one of the free burgesses of Bodmin in the charter of 27 March 1685; represented the Cornish burgh of Bossiney from 1685 to 1688, and that of West Looe from 1695 to 1701, 1705 to 1706. Afterwards he fell into a despondent state and cut his throat on 19 Dec. 1706, dying intestate and without issue. His name frequently occurs in the diary of Henry Sidney, afterwards Earl of Romney, and he was a friend of Thomas Cartwright, bishop of Chester (Diary, Camden Soc., 1843, pp. 62-74). There are letters by him in Blencowe's ' Diary, &c., of Henry Sidney,' i. 97-101, 252-5, 282-3, ii. 22-3, and in the British Museum Addit. MS. 28876.
[Maclean's Trigg Minor, i. 216, 262, 300; Foster's Alumni Oxon.; Luttrell's Brief. Hist. Relation, vi. 119; Courtney's Parl. Repr. of Cornwall, pp. 136-330.]