Commons 1660-1690

Hertfordshire had been a strongly parliamentarian county during the war, and the few royalist families, like the Fanshawes, were in rapid decay. The electorate showed a considerable degree of sophistication, and there was no predominant aristocratic or gentry interest. Even the heir to Hatfield could not secure election without heavy expenditure. Dissent was strong in Hertfordshire, and the Quakers particularly were an electoral force to be reckoned with. A letter from a royalist agent of 6 Apr.

Weobley, an insignificant market town, was re-enfranchised in 1628 at the instance of James Tomkyns, whose son Thomas sat for the borough from August 1660 to his death. The manor was held by the dowager Duchess of Somerset till 1674, when it was acquired by Thomas Thynne I, but neither seems to have exerted much political influence, presumably because the sheriff of Herefordshire conducted the elections.

In 1668, 224 houses paid hearth tax in Leominster, of which 35 were held by women; presumably the numbers on the scot and lot roll were similar. At the general election of 1660, John Birch, the intruded high steward, enjoyed the best interest, and defeated the efforts of Edward Massey to prevent his election. The other Member, Edward Pytts, was lord of the neighbouring manor of Ivington.

Hereford was an open borough with a wide franchise. Elections were notoriously expensive and sometimes riotous. Of the successful candidates, only Roger Bosworth, a physician, and Thomas Geers were permanently resident in the city; but all the others were Herefordshire gentlemen, though William Gregory, like Geers, was primarily a lawyer. For the Convention, the city returned two moderates, of royalist sympathies, Bosworth and Herbert Westfaling. On the death of the former, the ultra-royalist Sir Henry Lingen was elected.

Even as early as the general election of 1660, the traditional interests in Herefordshire had regained control, though candidatures were to some extent deterred by the ban on Cavaliers and their sons.

Lord Cutts, a subsequent governor of the Isle of Wight, wrote of Yarmouth:

The corporation consists of a mayor and 12 aldermen, who have a power to add as many freemen to the corporation as they please (who have all of them voices in the election of Members of Parliament), insomuch that the mayor and any five of the aldermen can turn the elections as they think fit.

The roll of freemen at Winchester was controlled by the corporation, who nominated a small number of non-residents, although, in the absence of close contests, they seldom exercised their franchise. In this Anglican stronghold there was no discrimination against Roman Catholics, who were always represented on the corporation after the Restoration. All the candidates may be considered gentry, except the townsman Thomas Muspratt in 1660 and the court lawyer Charles Hanses in 1685.

The purchase by the Wallops in 1636 of Hurstbourne Priors, which became their principal residence, did not give them immediate control of the neighbouring borough of Whitchurch, but by 1660 it had become established. They used their interest tactfully, never claiming more than one seat for the family, and allowing the other to be occupied by a neighbouring gentleman of similar religious and political outlook.

Stockbridge was a borough by prescription. Its only officials were a bailiff (elected annually in the court leet of the crown manor), a constable, and a serjeant-at-mace. Perhaps as the consequence of a particularly sensational incident in 1614, it enjoyed a reputation for electoral malpractice, and only narrowly escaped setting a precedent for disfranchisement.

The corporation of Southampton consisted of the mayor, two bailiffs, and an indefinite number of ‘select burgesses’or freemen. There were also the aldermen, supposed to be six but in practice variable in number, the recorder, the town clerk, and the sheriff, who had acted as returning officer in parliamentary elections since Southampton had been granted county status in 1447. All the candidates in the period were court supporters, and only three contests are known; but the form of the indenture varied.