The Tory-controlled corporation was the most powerful influence in the city of Oxford. All the Members returned were Tories. Thomas Rowney and his son, Thomas, who were members of the corporation, had the chief interest, representing the town for 64 years between them. In 1743 the younger Rowney succeeded Montagu Bertie, 2nd Earl of Abingdon, as high steward of the borough.
The only contest occurred in 1722, when, a Tory reports,
Owing to the proximity of Blenheim, New Woodstock fell under the influence of the dukes of Marlborough, who became its hereditary high stewards, claiming the right of appointing the recorder of the borough.A. Ballard, Woodstock Chrons. 109, 126.
The chief interests in Banbury at George I’s accession were in two neighbouring Tory families, the Norths of Wroxton, three miles from the borough, and the Copes of Hanwell, two miles away. There was a strong non-juring party in the corporation who in 1715 returned Sir Jonathan Cope, an extreme Tory, unopposed. But in July 1718 a new charter was issued, under which another corporation was appointed.A. Beesley, Hist.
Oxfordshire was a Tory stronghold, always returning Tories unopposed. The only hint of opposition occurred at a by-election in 1717, when Dr. Stratford of Christ Church reported to his former pupil, Lord Harley:
Sir John D’Oyly is put up by the Whigs for the county and Sir Robert Bankes Jenkinson by our friends. I fancy Sir John D’Oyly will make nothing of it; it is hoped he will see it so plainly himself that he will desist.
A few days later he wrote
The chief interests in Nottingham were, on the Whig side, those of the Duke of Newcastle, who succeeded the Duke of Kingston as recorder of the borough in 1726, of the corporation, a close body, and of the Dissenters; on the Tory side, those of Lord Middleton, whose estate of Wollaton was close to the town, and of a number of neighbouring country gentlemen.
In 1715 the Whigs at Newark were headed by the Duke of Newcastle, the lord of the manor of Newark; the Tories by Robert Sutton, the last Lord Lexington, who owned the neighbouring estate of Kelham, and Sir Thomas Willoughby, 1st Lord Middleton, who had recently purchased the local property of Sir Matthew Jenison, formerly M.P. for the borough. On Lord Lexington’s death in 1723 his interest passed to his son-in-law, the 3rd Duke of Rutland, whose wife inherited Kelham. After 1736 the vicar of Newark, Dr.
The chief interests at Retford in 1715 were those of the Duke of Newcastle, whose estates surrounded the borough, and of four country gentlemen: two Whigs, Thomas White and John Thornhagh; and two Tories, William Levinz and John Digby. ‘I found Levinz and Jack Digby in possession of it’, Newcastle wrote over half a century later. ‘I soon got in Jack White’s father and have, by degrees, totally got the better of Levinz and Digby’.Newcastle to Rockingham, 17 Nov. 1767, Add. 32987, f. 14. With Newcastle’s support White and his son, John, held one seat continuously from 1715 to 1768.
The head of the Whig interest in Nottinghamshire was the lord lieutenant, Thomas Pelham Holles, Duke of Newcastle, who had inherited the estates there of his uncle, John Holles, Duke of Newcastle. In his old age he recalled how
A large independent trading town, Newcastle always returned members of local merchant families, such as the Blacketts, who held one seat in every Parliament from 1673 to 1777, except in 1705-10, when the head of the family was a minor. From 1715 until 1747 every election was contested, Tories winning both seats, except in 1722, when William Carr, a Whig, was returned with Sir William Blackett. Defeated in 1727 by Blackett and another Tory, Nicholas Fenwick, Carr petitioned on the ground of the partiality of the returning officer. His petition was heard at the bar of the House on 26 Mar.
The patrons of Morpeth were the earls of Carlisle who, as lords of the manor, could restrict the admission of new freemen, reward their supporters by leasing farms to them on favourable terms, and punish recalcitrants by denying them access for their cattle to Cottingwood common, a tract of common land. From 1715 the 3rd Earl was always able to nominate one Member, his son, Lord Morpeth, ‘without expense’. When Morpeth as 4th Earl intimated that he expected the same treatment for Robert Ord, his agent replied: