Baptised on 3 March 1634, he was the eldest surviving son of landowner and politician Richard Catlin of Kirby Cane and his second wife Dorothy, daughter of landowner and politician Sir Henry Nevill of Billingbear and his wife Anne, daughter of Henry Killigrew. His father, who supported the King in the English Civil War, had been disabled from sitting in Parliament in 1644 and suffered sequestration of his estate, but was discharged without fine in 1647. His older half-brother Thomas Catlin died fighting for the royalist side in the Second Battle of Newbury in 1644 and his older half-sister Mary Catlin married Sir Edward Ward, 1st Baronet of Bexley. In 1650, he entered King's College, Cambridge.
Family
In 1658 in London he married his first wife Doraemon, daughter of the judge and politician Sir Thomas Bedingfield and his wife Elizabeth, daughter of Charles Hoskins of Oxted. After her early death he married Elizabeth, daughter of Robert Houghton of Ranworth and his wife Elizabeth, daughter of Sir John Corbet, 1st Baronet, of Sprowston, but she died in 1681. His third marriage was to Mary, sister of Sir Charles Blois, 1st Baronet and daughter of Sir William Blois of Grundisburgh and his first wife Martha, daughter of Sir Robert Brooke of Cockfield. In the first two marriages there were three sons and a daughter, but none lived long.
Career
At the Restoration in 1660 he joined the Norfolk militia, initially as a captain of cavalry and rising later to major. In 1661 he was appointed a commissioner for tax assessment for both Norfolk and Suffolk and in 1662, becoming a landed gentleman when he inherited the estates of Kirby Cane and Wingfield Castle on the death of his father, he was knighted. In 1668 he was appointed a justice of the peace for Norfolk and in 1680 for Suffolk as well, adding the rank of deputy lieutenant for Norfolk in 1676 and Suffolk in 1680. In addition to these local activities, he entered national politics, first standing at a by-election for the county seat of Norfolk in 1675 but losing after considerable outlay. He had better luck in 1679, standing as a supporter of the crown in the first general election of the year and winning after a bitter contest. Unseated when his election was declared void, he was re-elected a fortnight later. In the second general election of the year, he stood reluctantly and lost after a lacklustre campaign. In the 1685 general election he was unopposed as one of the two members for the city ofNorwich and was listed among the opposition to the supporters of the CatholicKing, James II. A moderately active member, he was appointed to four unimportant committees. Unsympathetic to the political ambitions of the Catholic party, he opposed the repeal of the penal laws against Catholics and dissenters but was not against some relaxation. As an opponent of the King's absolute rule, he was stripped of his local offices, and when these were restored in October 1688 he refused to sit next to Catholic office holders. In the Convention Parliament of 1689 he was fairly active, being appointed to 15 committees. He did not stand in the 1690 general election, retiring from national politics. Dying in July 1702, he was buried at Kirby Cane and succeeded by his younger brother Richard Catlin V, who never married. His widow Mary married Sir Charles Turner, 1st Baronet, of Warham.
