Thomas Bladen was a colonial governor in North America and politician who sat in the British House of Commons between 1727 and 1741. He served as the 19th Proprietary Governor of Maryland from 1742 to 1747.

Ashburton was a borough constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament at Westminster, for the Parliaments of 1295 and 1407, and regularly from 1640 until it was abolished for the 1868 general election. It was one of three Devon borough constituencies newly enfranchised in the Long Parliament. It returned two Members of Parliament until the 1832 general election when the number was reduced to one MP.