Brecon

There were no contributory boroughs in Breconshire, and the freemen of Brecon, a prosperous market and industrial town ‘well-furnished with conventicles’, enjoyed the sole right of election. The dominant interest was enjoyed by Brecon Priory, which passed from the Price to the Jeffreys family. As prominent Cavaliers, neither Sir Herbert Price nor John Jeffreys is likely to have stood in 1660, and the seat was taken by a country gentleman, Sir Henry Williams, the son of a more cautious Royalist. In 1661 Price stood for both county and borough. In the latter he was opposed by the son of the bishop of St. David’s who as ex officio dean of Brecon resided in the town. Price was allowed to sit on the merits of the return, and no further proceedings followed. When Price died he was succeeded without a contest by Thomas Mansel, the son of one of the Commonwealth propagation committeemen, who had married a Breconshire heiress, and immediately joined the Opposition. Despite his dubious pedigree, Mansel enjoyed the support of the loyal William Morgan at the general election. But John Jeffreys, who had intended to stand for the county, stood down in favour of the court candidate Edward Progers and transferred to the borough. The result was a double return, but Jeffreys’s indenture was signed by the bailiff, and he was allowed to sit. He abstained or paired on the exclusion bill division, and was probably unopposed at the next two elections.1CJ, ix. 116; Jones, Brec. iv. 195; L. Inn Reg. i. 258; CSP Dom. 1667-8, p. 428, 1672, p. 271; 1677-8, p. 656.

The corporation of Brecon and ‘above 400 inhabitants’ presented a loyal address in June 1681, approving the dissolution of the last Parliament, and another address from the corporation and freemen expressed their abhorrence of the Rye House Plot in 1683. They surrendered their charter to the Duke of Beaufort (Henry Somerset) on 2 Feb. 1685, but it had not been replaced when the election for James II’s Parliament was held three months later. Beaufort’s son was returned, and when he chose to sit for another constituency Jeffreys took the seat, probably without a contest. The new charter named Beaufort as recorder, Edward Jones as mayor, and appointed Beaufort’s son and Jeffreys to the corporation. The latter was ordered to stand again as court candidate in 1688. But in the Convention Brecon was represented by a Whig, Thomas Morgan, the head of the Monmouthshire family, who had inherited the Dderw estate.2London Gazette, 27 June 1681, 13 Aug. 1683; Beaufort mss. 500.8.1.; HMC Ormonde, n.s. vii. 340; CSP Dom. 1686-7, p. 42; 1687-9, p. 276.