Richmond

Economic and social profile

Situated 44 miles north-west of York, on the north bank of the river Swale, Richmond, which was home to many ‘persons of independent property’, lay at the centre of an agricultural district and was described in 1849 as ‘a comparatively stagnant market town’.Lewis, Topographical dictionary of England, iii. 638; Daily News, 5 Mar. 1849. Its weekly market was one of the north of England’s major corn markets, but Richmond possessed little in the way of manufacturing, its former trade in knitted stockings and woollen caps having ‘nearly ceased’ by the 1840s.Fieldhouse & Jennings, History of Richmond and Swaledale, 457; Lewis, Topographical dictionary of England, iii. 638. Other small-scale local industries included paper-making, tanning and iron-working, and there was a trade in lead from Swaledale’s mines.Fieldhouse & Jennings, History of Richmond and Swaledale, 454-5. The Swale was not navigable, but communications were improved in 1846 by the arrival of a branch line from the Great North of England railway.Lewis, Topographical dictionary of England, iii. 638; Fieldhouse & Jennings, History of Richmond and Swaledale, 460. Richmond was a polling place for the North Riding, and hosted the local quarter sessions and assizes.Parliamentary gazetteer of England and Wales (1844), iv. 29. In addition to provision for Anglican worship, in 1844 the town had chapels for Baptists, Wesleyan Methodists and Catholics.Lewis, Topographical dictionary of England, iii. 638.

Electoral history

Since the 1760s Richmond’s parliamentary representation had been controlled by the Dundas family, of nearby Aske Hall, who owned the majority of the burgage properties conferring the franchise. Loyal Whigs, they backed reform, despite the fact that the Grey ministry’s first reform bill listed Richmond on schedule B, reducing it to one seat. Presenting a petition from Richmond in support of reform, John Charles Dundas had argued that its residents were happy to lose one seat in order to see reform carried, 14 Mar. 1831. However, when Northallerton was removed from schedule B in the amended bill, Richmond’s residents lobbied for a similar reprieve, 17 June 1831, arguing that a very small enlargement of Richmond’s boundaries would bring its population up to the qualifying limit of 4,000. Moreover, Richmond represented the interests of a sizeable area of the North Riding, and had significance as the historic capital of Richmondshire, a judicial centre and the seat of an archdeaconry. In the revised reform bill of December 1831, while Northallerton was demoted to schedule B, Richmond retained two seats, and its boundaries were extended to include the neighbouring parish of Easby.HP Commons, 1820-32, iii. 281-2.

The introduction of the £10 household franchise had little impact on the size of Richmond’s electorate, and in 1851 it was among England’s ten smallest boroughs.PP 1852 (8), xlii. 314. In 1865-6 20.2% of Richmond’s electors were working-class: PP 1866 (170), lvii. 50. Nor did it shake off the control of Lord Dundas, who received the earldom of Zetland in 1838, and was succeeded by his son Thomas in 1839. Gash lists Richmond among the proprietary boroughs remaining after 1832, and The Times in 1837 described it as ‘a rotten and hollow tooth of this infirm nobleman’.N. Gash, Politics in the age of Peel (1953), 439; The Times, 28 July 1837. Contests were a rarity, and family members monopolised the representation until 1841. When no relative wished to sit, the earl bestowed his patronage upon ‘rising members of the party’, notably Sir Roundell Palmer, for whom Richmond provided a safe berth on his appointment as solicitor-general in 1861.The Times, 7 May 1873. While middle-class Liberals took an increasing interest in proceedings, the choice of parliamentary candidates ultimately rested with Zetland, and the influence of the Richmond Reform Association was confined to municipal politics.Fieldhouse & Jennings, History of Richmond and Swaledale, 423; L.P. Wenham (ed.), Richmond Municipal Reform Association Minute Books 1841-1859 (1978), passim. However, in contrast with the venality or ‘sad subserviency’ of electors in many small boroughs, the Daily News in 1849 suggested that Zetland’s electoral dominance was more benign, stemming from ‘hereditary affection, personal regard, and general accordance of political opinion’, Richmond being an ‘essentially liberal town’.Daily News, 5 Mar. 1849.

At the 1832 general election the incumbents, who were respectively the brother and younger son of Lord Dundas, received a requisition from Richmond’s electors asking them to offer again. Sir Robert Lawrence Dundas had sat since 1828, and his nephew, John Charles Dundas, since 1830. The requisition praised their support for the reform bill, together with ‘the liberal and constitutional opinions which you have invariably supported; your advocacy of Civil and Religious Liberty; your exertions to enforce a strict economy in public affairs; your votes for the suppression of grievances, and the correction of abuses’. While exulting in their ‘newly acquired Rights as free Electors, of a free and open Borough’, the voters paid tribute to Lord Dundas’s ‘generous and patriotic conduct… in surrendering to the public good, that control and influence in the Borough which usage had invested with all the sacred marks of private property’. John Dundas gave a token nod to the nominally more independent electorate when he promised that it would be ‘an additional incitement’ to exert himself in his duties as MP.York Herald, 4 Aug. 1832. However, in practice, the Reform Act’s impact on local politics was negligible, and the Dundas nominees were re-elected unopposed.

Sir Robert Dundas stood down at the 1835 general election, citing ‘circumstances of a private nature’ that prevented him attending to his parliamentary duties.York Herald, 20 Dec. 1834. John Dundas decided to offer at York, where his older brother Thomas Dundas, heir to the barony, had been returned for a vacancy in 1833. This left the Richmond seat free for Thomas. The reasons for their effective exchange of constituencies are unclear, but it seems likely that John Dundas’s more advanced views – he advocated shorter parliaments and the ballot, which Thomas strongly opposed – were felt to be better suited to York’s broader electorate.York Herald, 20 Dec. 1834, 27 Dec. 1834. The second seat went to Lord Dundas’s nephew, Alexander Speirs, who came from a Scottish mercantile background, and once again the Dundas interest went unchallenged. At the nomination, to which the candidates were escorted by voters bearing orange flags and banners, Speirs was commended to the voters as ‘a thorough, unflinching Reformer in every department of the State’, and declared his opposition to Peel’s ministry. Thomas Dundas, whose ‘hereditary connection’ with the borough was noted, praised the achievements of Whig ministers, especially in reducing expenditure, and condemned the ‘sophistry’ of Peel’s Tamworth manifesto. Following their return, they were ‘chaired round the spacious market-place, the ladies from the windows waving their handkerchiefs, and the assembling multitude cheering them’.York Herald, 17 Jan. 1835.

At the 1837 election the Carlton Club reportedly offered £1,000 to promote the return of a Conservative candidate, but ‘their confidential agent prudently dissuaded them from an attempt which must have been certainly unsuccessful’, and Thomas Dundas and Speirs were spared a contest.Leeds Mercury, 29 July 1837. Later that year, however, Miles Thomas Stapleton, of Carleton Hall, the Catholic son of a Richmond banker, came forward as a future candidate.Daily News, 5 Mar. 1849. The York Chronicle reported that Richmond’s ‘really independent inhabitants’ wished to ‘effect the political emancipation of the borough’ from ‘those titled borough-mongers, the Dundas family, who, in proportion to the loudness of their professions in favour of freedom and purity of election, have ever shown themselves to be overbearing and intolerant towards those who are unhappily placed in their merciless clutches’.Hull Packet, 25 Aug. 1837. The illness of Lord Dundas (upon whose death Thomas Dundas would vacate his seat) prompted Stapleton to canvass voters in September 1837, when a detractor claimed that his views were ‘disguised... by generalization, and mystified by so opaque a clothing of unintelligible metaphor’. Stapleton decried the Whig ministry as weak and vacillating, and declared his opposition to the church rates and Irish tithe bills, although he would support Irish municipal reform.York Herald, 23 Sept. 1837. His candidature was said by a later account to stem from the emergence of two distinct parties in the borough following municipal reform in 1835.Daily News, 5 Mar. 1849. Although Lord Dundas remained aloof from municipal politics, the Reformers, aided by the newly founded Richmond Municipal Reform Association, had nonetheless triumphed at the first elections to the new council, to which no member of the old corporation secured election.L.P. Wenham (ed.), Richmond Municipal Reform Association Minute Books 1841-1859 (1978), 7-8, 58-9.

The anticipated vacancy finally occurred in February 1839 following the death of the earl of Zetland (as Lord Dundas had become in 1838), when Thomas Dundas succeeded as second earl and Richmond’s electoral patron. Sir Robert Dundas came out of retirement to offer on the family interest, and secured the backing of the Reform Association.York Herald, 2 Mar. 1839. He was opposed by Stapleton, who was considered to be ‘a partial Reformer’, rather than a ‘very decided Tory’, and to profess ‘rather liberal’ views on some questions.York Herald, 9 Mar. 1839. The key policy differences between them were Stapleton’s opposition to church appropriation and his ‘able and eloquent’ advocacy of the corn laws, which reportedly won him support from farmers and landowners, but also ‘mechanics’, whom he persuaded that ‘full employment at home and good wages’ were better than ‘cheap corn’.The Standard, 5 Mar. 1839; The Era, 10 Mar. 1839. Unlike many Tories, he supported a national system of education, ‘without distinction of sect or party’, but despite his Catholicism he professed support for the Church and for church rates.York Herald, 9 Mar. 1839.

Richmond’s first contested election in more than a century put ‘the whole town... on the stir’, but was conducted with ‘good humour’, in Stapleton’s view.The Standard, 15 Mar. 1839. He won the show of hands by a margin of at least two to one,The Standard, 13 Mar. 1839. which the York Herald blamed on underhand Tory tactics, including ‘revelling and intoxication’.York Herald, 16 Mar. 1839. However, the situation was reversed at the poll, where Stapleton mustered less than half Sir Robert Dundas’s total. Declaring that he had offered ‘for the purpose of opening the borough, and giving you an opportunity of asserting your independence’, Stapleton bemoaned the fact that many of those who had signed his requisition had not polled for him.Stapleton entered the Lords upon succeeding to the abeyant barony of Beaumont in 1840: http://www.cracroftspeerage.co.uk/online/content/Beaumont1308.htm Zetland’s response to this challenge to his political control was to evict Henry Wood, the shopkeeper who had proposed Stapleton.Fieldhouse & Jennings, History of Richmond and Swaledale, 423.

In June 1840 it was rumoured that Speirs would step down at the next dissolution to offer for his native Renfrewshire, with John Dundas replacing him at Richmond, and that Sir Robert Dundas would also retire.The Times, 17 June 1840. However, ‘severe illness’ compelled Speirs to take the Chiltern Hundreds in February 1841.Morning Chronicle, 12 Feb. 1841. At a committee meeting of the Reform Association, it was resolved that his successor must be prepared to support the present ministry, and ‘progressive reform in every department of church and state; all practicable plans for improving the condition of the people of Ireland... and all endeavours to establish a liberal system of general education’, together with economy, retrenchment and ‘the preservation of an honourable peace abroad’. Before canvassing, any candidate should expound his political principles at a public meeting of electors.Ibid. In practice, however, the Reform Association’s involvement in the contest amounted to little more than rubber-stamping Zetland’s chosen candidate, the Hon. George Wentworth Fitzwilliam, a younger son of the 3rd Earl Fitzwilliam, whose mother was a Dundas. Introduced by John Dundas, who was greeted ‘with three times three cheers for the ballot’, Fitzwilliam addressed a public meeting, when he declared his support for ministers, and for free trade, ‘civil freedom and religious toleration’, and a system of national education ‘without regard to creed or sect’. He wished to see ‘Justice for Ireland’, and would support Morpeth’s Irish registration bill rather than Stanley’s.Leeds Mercury, 20 Feb. 1841; York Herald, 20 Feb. 1841. A resolution in his support proposed by Christopher Croft, a leading light of the Reform Association, was carried almost unanimously.Leeds Mercury, 20 Feb. 1841.

In a quiet contest, Fitzwilliam’s proposer cited his connections with the ‘noble and illustrious’ houses of Fitzwilliam and Dundas, ‘for whom we all have the highest respect’, while his seconder declared that although he and others might differ in opinions from Fitzwilliam, they were united in his support.York Herald, 20 Feb. 1841. Following his unopposed return, Fitzwilliam was carried on the shoulders of four men in a chair decorated with orange silk and ribbons.Ibid. John Dundas, who accompanied him to the hustings, attacked the ‘factious and unprincipled opposition of the Tories’ to the Whig government’s reforming efforts, and urged the country to support the government’s Irish registration bill and reject Stanley’s ‘insidious proposition’. However, he refused to discuss his views on the ballot, which Fitzwilliam opposed.Ibid.; Morning Chronicle, 12 Feb. 1841.

As anticipated, Sir Robert Dundas retired at the general election in 1841, and John Dundas, whose backing for a low fixed duty on corn had made him unpopular with his supporters at York, offered in his stead.The Standard, 1 Feb. 1839. John Dundas had announced in June 1840 that he would not offer again at York: The Standard, 29 June 1840. The second seat was also vacant, as Fitzwilliam transferred to Peterborough, where his family had influence. Rumours that it might provide a safe berth for Sir George Strickland or Lord John Russell were unfounded.Lancaster Gazette, 19 June 1841; The Standard, 23 June 1841. In the event the Dundases settled upon the Hon. William Nicholas Ridley Colborne, only son of the Whig Baron Colborne, who had abandoned his candidature for Knaresborough after an unpropitious canvass. However, John Dundas informed three of the borough’s leading Liberals that if they preferred another candidate, Ridley Colborne would withdraw.The Times, 25 June 1841. Led by Christopher Croft, they thus approached Marmaduke Wyvill, of Constable Burton, Whig MP for York, 1820-30, whose forebears had sat for Richmond. He demurred, but proposed his son (also Marmaduke), although when it transpired that this invitation was not made with Zetland’s consent, he advised his son to decline, and urged Croft to support Ridley Colborne. In return, Zetland made a ‘half promise’ that Wyvill junior would be considered for Richmond in future. Local Liberals also mooted other candidates, but no opposition to the Dundas nominees was forthcoming, despite Croft’s protests that the representation should not be ‘a matter of private arrangement between two or three persons without the knowledge and consent of the electors’.Fieldhouse & Jennings, History of Richmond and Swaledale, 423-5.

Prior to the election John Dundas and Ridley Colborne addressed a public meeting, at which the latter described himself as ‘a sincere Reformer... anxious to remove those burdens which now press so heavily upon the industrious classes’, and professed his support for the government’s proposed measures on corn, sugar and timber, and his opposition to the ballot. John Dundas, in contrast, strongly endorsed the ballot, and although he backed ministers on the corn and timber duties, he objected to alterations in the sugar duties, fearing that this would encourage slave-grown sugar. He also urged the necessity of mitigating the severity of the poor law, and giving greater power to local guardians.York Herald, 3 July 1841. Following this abortive attempt to challenge his influence, Zetland ‘remained at loggerheads with the Richmond Liberals for some years’, and responded testily to Croft’s complaints that he had not voted at the 1845 municipal elections, asking why the Reform party should expect his support when one of its candidates had supported Stapleton in 1839. He also attacked the use of party labels for municipal purposes, arguing that two of the so-called ‘Tory’ candidates had been prominent Whig supporters in parliamentary elections.York Herald, 4 Jan. 1845; Lord Zetland to C. Croft, 18 Nov. 1845, in Wenham, Richmond Municipal Reform Association Minute Books, 56.

Ridley Colborne’s sudden death in March 1846 prompted a by-election. Henry Rich, Liberal MP for Knaresborough, 1837-41, came forward on the Zetland interest, and went unchallenged. He noted that he was ‘a friend of the late member, and one who entertains similar political opinions’, and expressed his support for ‘steady, firm, and progressive reform’.Morning Post, 2 Apr. 1846. The customary procession to the hustings with banners and music was dispensed with out of respect to Ridley Colborne, to whom fulsome tributes were paid. Rich devoted much of his speech following his return to persuading the agricultural interest that corn law repeal would not have the adverse effects it feared, and also voiced his opposition to ‘the brute force of coercion bills when unaccompanied by measures of conciliation, toleration, and charity’ in Ireland.York Herald, 11 Apr. 1846. His appointment as a lord of the treasury in the new Russell ministry necessitated a by-election that July, when he was again unopposed. Following his return he noted his support in the House for corn law repeal and his opposition to the Irish coercion bill, but acknowledged the late Conservative ministry’s ‘wise, temperate and Christian conduct with regard to our foreign affairs’.York Herald, 18 July 1846.

John Dundas retired at the 1847 election, citing his inability ‘to give that constant attendance in parliament which he considers the duty of a representative’.York Gazette, cited in The Standard, 26 July 1847. However, it appears that the real reason was ‘certain family differences’, as his political views, particularly his support for the ballot and parliamentary reform, did not chime with those of his brother the earl.Fieldhouse & Jennings, History of Richmond and Swaledale, 425. Zetland therefore honoured his promise to Wyvill junior, who offered as Rich’s colleague, citing ‘the great principles of liberty which his family have for centuries supported with unflinching hand, in times of difficulty and persecution’.York Herald, 31 July 1847. The two men were returned unopposed, with Croft acting as Wyvill’s proposer.Ibid. They were re-elected without a contest in 1852, when both emphasised their support for free trade. Wyvill argued that while he was ‘deeply interested in the state of the tenant farmers’, the remedy for their problems lay in agricultural improvement rather than protection. He voiced support for moderate franchise extension, and defended his vote for the militia bill. Rich cited the achievements of Russell’s ministry and advocated ‘the removal of all monopoly and exclusiveness’. Having voted the opposite way from Wyvill on the militia bill, he explained that he preferred ‘a regular and disciplined force’. Given Zetland’s opposition to the ballot, it was noteworthy that Rich’s seconder urged that this question and others ‘of less immediate importance’ should be avoided.York Herald, 10 July 1852; Daily News, 7 July 1852.

While the ballot had been played down at the previous contest, Rich and Wyvill both voiced their opposition to it when seeking re-election in 1857.York Herald, 28 Mar. 1857. For Wyvill, this represented a change of heart, as he had divided for the ballot in the 1849 and 1850 sessions, and his reversal may well have reflected Zetland’s distaste for this policy.Fieldhouse & Jennings, History of Richmond and Swaledale, 425. Rich’s assertion at an electors’ meeting that voting ‘open to the eye of day’ was preferable to secrecy prompted much dissatisfaction, and ‘some insinuations were thrown out about “the House of Aske” and “the closeness of the borough”’.York Herald, 28 Mar. 1857. Both took a moderate stance on franchise extension – Wyvill asserted that it should go hand-in-hand with education, while Rich advocated an educational qualification and extension of the county franchise – and endorsed free trade and abolition of church rates.Hull Packet, 27 Mar. 1857; York Herald, 28 Mar. 1857. Where they differed, however, was in their attitude towards the Canton question. Absent abroad when Cobden’s censure motion had come before the House, Wyvill had paired for it, and told electors that neither Bowring nor Palmerston had had any alternative.Morning Post, 14 Mar. 1857; The Times, 24 Mar. 1857. Rich, in contrast, had conscientiously abstained, believing that Bowring had acted unjustly and in defiance of his instructions, ‘but he did not vote against the Cabinet because that wrong was not of their doing’. However, like Wyvill, he promised general support for Palmerston’s ministry.The Times, 24 Mar. 1857; York Herald, 28 Mar. 1857. During a brief tumult at the electors’ meeting, which some had attended ‘for the “fun,” rather than for any political interest’, one apparently inebriated man ‘made some fine merriment’ by proposing Sir William Lawson (of Brough Hall, the president of the Reform AssociationWenham, Richmond Municipal Reform Association Minute Books, 23.) as a candidate, but there was no real challenge to the re-election of Zetland’s nominees.York Herald, 28 Mar. 1857. They were also untroubled by a contest at the 1859 general election, despite another difference of opinion between them: Rich condemned the Derby ministry’s reform bill, while Wyvill had been among the minority of Liberals to vote for it.York Herald, 30 Apr. 1859.

In July 1861 Rich resigned, stating that he had been considering retirement for some time due to ‘an affection of the eyes’. However, he also admitted that his decision was prompted by the opportunity to create a vacancy for the newly-appointed solicitor-general, Sir Roundell Palmer, who needed a seat, having stood down at Plymouth in 1857 because he disagreed with Palmerston on the Canton question.The Times, 5 July 1861. Edmund Antrobus, MP for Wilton, had reportedly been approached first, but had declined to make way for Palmer: Manchester Times, 13 July 1861. While Palmer praised Rich’s ‘spontaneous and disinterested’ act, press reports hinted that there must be some ‘quid pro quo for this extraordinary piece of self-abnegation’, and Rich was duly rewarded with a baronetcy two years later.The Times, 8 July 1861; The Standard, 5 July 1861. Zetland, meanwhile, had been made a Knight of the Order of the Thistle only two days before Rich took the Chiltern Hundreds, a coincidence that did not escape attention.London Gazette, 2 July 1861; The Standard, 11 July 1861; Manchester Times, 13 July 1861. In election proceedings ‘devoid of the least possible excitement’, Palmer, formerly a Peelite Conservative who contended that ‘true Conservatism was progress’, told his new constituents that his attachment to the great institutions of church and state was not ‘blind and unreasoning’Manchester Times, 13 July 1861., and that he would support well-considered measures of reform, wishing particularly to see ‘all law... undergo a careful, vigorous, and consistent revision’.Daily News, 10 July 1861. He emphasised his previous independent conduct in Parliament, and asserted that he had stayed out of the House since 1857 because he was not prepared to support Derby and Disraeli on the one hand, nor ‘consent to be bound by such pledges as many popular constituencies asked of their candidates’ on the other. He opposed the ballot and the unconditional abolition of church rates, but would enfranchise ‘the intelligent members of the working classes’. He endorsed Palmerston and Russell’s conduct of foreign policy, and Gladstone’s financial policy.The Times, 8 July 1861.

Palmer was re-elected without opposition upon his appointment as attorney-general in October 1863, when the York Herald praised his ‘good taste’ in coming to Richmond for the contest, which could have been managed in his absence.York Herald, 17 Oct. 1863. He devoted much of his speech at an electors’ meeting to the legal issues surrounding the American Civil War, notably recognition of the Confederate states and the fitting out of Confederate ships in British shipyards, and urged ‘the strictest neutrality’ on Britain’s part.Preston Guardian, 17 Oct. 1863; York Herald, 17 Oct. 1863. There was ‘only a small attendance’ for hustings proceedings which took less than half an hour, with Palmer renewing his praise for his ministerial colleagues.Leeds Mercury, 19 Oct. 1863.

At the 1865 general election Palmer’s address lauded the ‘constant and uninterrupted’ legal and social reforms and the ‘prudent and liberal’ financial policy undertaken by the Liberal ministry, as well as their preservation of peace.Sheffield Independent, 4 July 1865. Responding to criticism about the lack of parliamentary reform, he admitted that ‘finality probably was impossible’, and expressed his wish to see franchise reform based on a principle other than simply amending the rental value threshold.Leeds Mercury, 12 July 1865. With the family differences which had prompted John Dundas to step down in 1847 now ‘quite healed’, Zetland asked Wyvill to stand aside for his brother, which he obligingly did.Fieldhouse & Jennings, History of Richmond and Swaledale, 426. John Dundas professed his support for a liberal extension of the franchise, the ballot and abolition of church rates, and yet again, the Zetland interest went unchallenged.Leeds Mercury, 12 July 1865.

John Dundas’s death in February 1866 prompted Richmond’s first contested election for over a quarter of a century. Augustus Sussex Milbank, of Barningham Park, near Richmond, whose older brother Frederick was MP for the North Riding, issued an address on Whig lines, but withdrew in Wyvill’s favour.The Standard, 20 Feb. 1866; The Times, 23 Feb. 1866. It appears that Zetland considered offering the seat to a nephew, and backed Wyvill only once he ‘had modified his political views’, notably on parliamentary reform, regarding which Zetland remained lukewarm.Fieldhouse & Jennings, History of Richmond and Swaledale, 426. Wyvill wrote to Zetland after his return, asking how he should vote on reform, and subsequently took a moderate line, declining an invitation to attend a meeting of the National Reform Union in 1867 because he felt their programme went too far: Ibid., 427. Wyvill was opposed by William Henry Roberts, the recorder of Grantham, an ‘advanced Liberal’, whose campaign was assisted by the radical election agent James Acland.Daily News, 24 Feb. 1866; The Standard, 24 Feb. 1866. Roberts refrained from canvassing, instead addressing public meetings. He bemoaned Richmond’s ‘political servility’, and urged voters to assert their independence rather than remaining Zetland’s ‘electoral serfs’. He pledged support for a wide extension of the franchise, the ballot, free trade, abolition of the death penalty and of military flogging, disestablishment of the Irish church, a national poor rate and popular education.Daily News, 24 Feb. 1866; Fieldhouse & Jennings, History of Richmond and Swaledale, 426-7.

In contrast Wyvill’s hustings speech, in line with the feelings of his electoral patron, emphasised that ‘he had never advocated extreme views’. He would exercise his own judgement on reform, and while he wished to enfranchise ‘a considerable number of the most intelligent of the working classes’, the existing electorate must not be swamped. He claimed to have no strong personal views on the ballot, but would vote against it, because the majority of people ‘had a repugnance’ to it. He reaffirmed his support for the abolition of church rates, and favoured reform of the Irish church, but not disestablishment. Having repeated his radical programme, and urged Richmond’s voters to ‘awake out of their slumbers’, Roberts won the show of hands by a margin of six to one, assisted by members of the working classes, with whom he and Acland were ‘great favourites’.Leeds Mercury, 6 Mar. 1866. However, he mustered only 13 votes at the poll, which he blamed on ‘the influence which brooded over that borough. He had seen many a respectable and intelligent man coming up to the poll with a cowed demeanour. A ticket was put in his hand’. Nonetheless, Roberts promised to offer again once the reform bill had been carried.York Herald, 10 Mar. 1866.

The small electorate made Richmond vulnerable when reform was discussed, and it was mooted that it might be merged with Northallerton or Thirsk. In the event, however, the Second Reform Act left it as a separate constituency, but reduced it to one seat, with a small extension to its boundaries.Fieldhouse & Jennings, History of Richmond and Swaledale, 428. It remained firmly under the control of the Zetland interest thereafter. At the 1868 election the pliable Wyvill retired, leaving the seat to Palmer, who easily saw off a challenge from Roberts. Following Palmer’s elevation to the peerage in 1872, Richmond was held by members of the Dundas family until 1885, when it lost its separate representation. Thereafter it gave its name to one of the new North Riding county divisions.Ibid.