Bletchingley

From 1643 to 1677 the 2nd Earl of Peterborough was lord of the manor of Bletchingley, but he appears to have exerted little or no influence on the elections. All the Members represented local territorial interests, and three of them were past or present inhabitants of the parish. At the general election of 1660 the two representatives of the borough in the Long Parliament, Sir John Evelyn of Godstone and Edward Bysshe of Burstow, were opposed by John Goodwin, a resident, and Edmund Hoskins of Oxted, who had sat for Bletchingley in 1659. Evelyn and Goodwin, the two strongest commonwealthmen, were successful. Neither stood for re-election in 1661, when the courtier Sir William Hawarde was elected; but Thomas Howard, a younger son of the Earl of Berkshire, failed to assert an aristocratic interest in the borough against Bysshe.

In 1677 the manor was sold to Sir Robert Clayton under a private Act which was steered through committee by Thomas Neale. Clayton sat for London in the Exclusion Parliaments, but he nominated his partner John Morris for Bletchingley at both elections of 1679. The three other candidates may also be reckoned supporters of the country party at this juncture. Evelyn’s son George was returned with Edward Harvey of Coombe, defeating Morris and Sir Marmaduke Gresham of Titsey. Although Harvey had been successful he was the only candidate of the four not to contest the autumn election. This time Morris was returned with Evelyn; but in 1681 he made way for his nephew Sir William Goulston, possibly for reasons of health, as the election seems to have been uncontested. In 1685 even Clayton’s interest could not carry the borough, the inconspicuous Gresham defeating him by a narrow margin. The other Whig candidate, Evelyn, received only two votes, and the Tory Ambrose Browne was returned at the top of the poll. In 1688 the King’s electoral agents reported that Bletchingley was under Clayton’s influence, and no court candidates were nominated. Clayton regained his London seat in 1689, and probably supported Thomas Howard of Ashtead, a moderate Whig, at Bletchingley. The other Member returned at the general election, John Glyd, owned property in the parish, though he lived in chambers at Gray’s Inn. The Glyd property was sold on his death later in the year to his fellow-bencher, John Amherst, whose son Jeffrey succeeded to the seat for the brief remainder of the Convention.1VCH Surr. iv. 257; Surr. RO, Clayton mss 60/9/1-6; CJ, ix 423; Evelyn Diary, iv. 110-11; Duckett, Penal Laws (1882), 250.