Davis (Davies), John (d. 1667), politician and merchant, was the eldest son of Ezekiel Davis of Carrickfergus, Co. Antrim, whose family had come from Gustana, north Wales, in the early sixteenth century. Deeply involved in the commercial and public life of the town, he appeared on the roll of aldermen in 1630. He was appointed sheriff in 1633, and held the mayoralty in 1640, 1641, and 1656. When he was elected MP for Carrickfergus in 1640 his fellow townspeople questioned his honesty and suitability, and similar reservations continued to be expressed throughout his career. He was appointed commissary for Ulster in February 1642 and by 1 December of that year had supplied the New English with foodstuffs worth over £9,000. Although his political sympathies appear to have been Royalist, he shared the common New English view that victory in Ireland was the first priority and formed a close alliance with the influential Antrim planter Sir John Clotworthy (qv) and his associates in the ‘presbyterian party’ at Westminster. When an assessment ordinance providing for the collection of £80,00 to prosecute the war in Ireland was passed by the English parliament in October 1644, the supply contracts for all theatres of war were awarded to Davis. Thereafter Davis dominated the business of provisioning the Irish war, took charge of the collection of the assessments throughout England and Wales, and controlled the complex credit arrangements involved. He was closely concerned with the preparations for Viscount Lisle's (Philip Sidney (qv)) expedition to Ireland as parliament's lord lieutenant in 1647, for which Davis acted as commissary. When the political balance changed and eleven presbyterian leaders were charged with various offences by the army in July 1647, in a bid to have them removed from parliament, the accusations against Clotworthy were extended to include charges of fraud alleged to have been committed in collusion with Davis. These charges were dropped in the following year but Davis did not recover his position. At Westminster in January 1651 his connection with Clotworthy led to an altercation with Lord Folliott and others in which he was stabbed and narrowly escaped death.
Davis was resident in Carrickfergus during the 1650s and was elected to the Protectorate parliament for Belfast and Carrickfergus in 1656. At the request of John Thurloe, who believed he was ‘a most pestilent fellow’ and a supporter of the king, Henry Cromwell (qv) forbade him to attend. Subsequently Dr Henry Jones (qv), erstwhile bishop of Clogher, reported an informant's allegation that Davis was ‘verie intimate with the Irish, and with the ould adverse party, telling them all newes’ (Clarke, Prelude, 172). Despite these suspicions Davis was added to the list of commissioners for raising the assessment money in Antrim in March 1659. In the autumn of that year he became mayor of Carrickfergus and in December played the leading civilian part in the successful coup against the town's governor, Lt-col. Brian Smith, who was seized by his own soldiers. In the elections to the General Convention early in 1660, he returned his eldest son Hercules as member for the town. He later waited on Charles II at Breda.
Davis was returned to the Irish parliament for Co. Antrim in 1661. He was absent from Ireland in March 1664, and the assertion by George Rawdon (qv) that a new MP was required to replace Davis in October 1665 suggests that this absence may have been prolonged. He died in 1667. He had three sons, Hercules, Henry, and John, all of whom held commissions in the army. His heir, Hercules (d. 1708), married the fourth daughter of Charles Moore (qv), 2nd viscount Drogheda. He continued the family tradition of public service, representing Carrickfergus in the 1660 convention, and sitting as MP for the town (1661–6), for Roscommon borough (1692–3), and once more for Carrickfergus (1695–9).