John Alford was an English politician who sat in the House of Commons

House of Commons of England

The House of Commons of England was the lower house of the Parliament of England from its development in the 14th century to the union of England and Scotland in 1707, when it was replaced by the House of Commons of Great Britain...

  in two periods between 1626 and 1648. He supported the Parliamentarian side in the English Civil War

English Civil War

The English Civil War was a series of armed conflicts and political machinations between Parliamentarians and Royalists...

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Alford was the son of John Alford of Offington

Offington

Offington is a neighbourhood of the Borough of Worthing in West Sussex, England. It lies on the A2031 road 1.6 miles northwest of the town centre....

 and his wife Judith Downing, daughter of Sir Edward Downing.

In 1626 Alford was elected Member of Parliament

Member of Parliament

A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...

 for New Shoreham

New Shoreham (UK Parliament constituency)

New Shoreham, sometimes simply called Shoreham, was a parliamentary borough centred on the town of Shoreham-by-Sea in what is now West Sussex...

 and in 1628 was elected MP for Arundel

Arundel (UK Parliament constituency)

Arundel was twice a parliamentary constituency in the Kingdom of England, the Kingdom of Great Britain, and the United Kingdom. The first incarnation strictly comprised the town centre of Arundel and was a borough constituency first enfranchised in 1332 and disfranchised in 1868 under the Reform...

 until 1629 when King Charles decided to rule without parliament for eleven years. In April 1640, he was re-elected MP for New Shoreham in the Short Parliament

Short Parliament

The Short Parliament was a Parliament of England that sat from 13 April to 5 May 1640 during the reign of King Charles I of England, so called because it lasted only three weeks....

 and again in November 1640 for the Long Parliament

Long Parliament

The Long Parliament was made on 3 November 1640, following the Bishops' Wars. It received its name from the fact that through an Act of Parliament, it could only be dissolved with the agreement of the members, and those members did not agree to its dissolution until after the English Civil War and...

 and held the seat until 1648 when he was excluded in Pride's Purge

Pride's Purge

Pride’s Purge is an event in December 1648, during the Second English Civil War, when troops under the command of Colonel Thomas Pride forcibly removed from the Long Parliament all those who were not supporters of the Grandees in the New Model Army and the Independents...

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Alford died in 1649 and was buried at Broadwater.

Alford married Frances Bishopp, daughter of Sir Thomas Bishopp, 1st Baronet, of Parham, Sussex, M.P., and had two daughters.