Whitchurch was described by the antiquarian Thomas Baskerville in the later seventeenth century as a ‘poor thoroughfare town’ in a region devoted mainly to sheep grazing and the clothing industry. HMC Portland, ii. 286. The borough was owned by the dean and chapter of Winchester, but governed by a court leet presided over by an annually elected mayor and bailiff. VCH Hants, iv. 299-304. Members were first returned to Parliament in 1584, and the franchise rested in the freemen.
Situated on the edge of the South Downs, Petersfield was a prosperous market town and centre for the local clothing and leather tanning industries. VCH Hants, iii. 111-16. A borough by prescription, its government was vested in a mayor, constable, bailiff and two aldermen and tithingmen, and it regularly sent Members to Parliament from 1547. The franchise was confined to the burgage-holders, with the mayor acting as returning officer. R.S. Atcheson, Rep. of Case of Petersfield, 10-11. A handsome town mace survives, dated 1596. E.M.
Situated in north Wiltshire, near the border with Gloucestershire, and lying strategically on both the Thames and Ermine Street – the principal road connecting Gloucester and Cirencester with Winchester – Cricklade was originally developed as a Saxon royal borough. It received its first charter in the twelfth century and was represented in Parliament from 1275. However, it was never incorporated and it continued to be governed by the annual manorial court leet. T.R. Thomson, ‘Early Hist. and Topography’, Materials for a Hist. of Cricklade ed. T.R. Thomson, 63-80; T.R.
Portsmouth’s strategic position and fine natural harbour made it an ideal naval base, although the presence of the garrison and its governor were occasionally a source of friction with the townsmen. Camden noted that ‘in war-time it is much frequented, at other times scarce at all, the inhabitants being more attentive to war and navigation than to trade’. Portsmouth Pprs. xv. 6; W. Camden, Britannia (1772), i.
Established in the eleventh century when the bridge at Aldborough was re-sited upstream, Boroughbridge returned two Members to Parliament in 1300, and was re-enfranchised in 1553. The town was part of the duchy of Lancaster honour of Knaresborough, which was granted to Anne of Denmark and later Prince Charles, though the government interest was usually exercised by the Council in the North.Sir T. Lawson-Tancred, Recs. Yorks. Manor 3-14, 141, 174-5; A.D.K. Hawkyard, ‘Enfranchisement of constituencies, 1508-1558’, PH, x.
Named after the Norman keep built on the site of one of the forts of Hadrian’s Wall, Newcastle-upon-Tyne was the chief bulwark of north-eastern England’s defences against the Scots until 1482. It was also the region’s most important port town, dealing in wool and hides, and increasingly in coal, abundant reserves of which lay close to the surface on both banks of the Tyne; in 1560 perhaps 40 per cent of national production came from coal pits near the Tyne and Wear rivers, a proportion which increased substantially over the next century.
Southampton, once a major trading port, received its first charter in the reign of Henry II, and sent Members to the Model Parliament in 1295.J.S. Davies, Hist. Soton, 152, 199. Incorporated in 1445, the town’s government was vested in a mayor, sheriff, recorder, two bailiffs, a steward, two constables, and a fluctuating number of aldermen, or ex-mayors. Assembly Bks. 1602-8 ed. J.W. Horrocks (Soton Rec. Soc. xix), pp.
Ilchester was the county town of Somerset, having not only the county gaol but also hosting regular meetings of the shire and circuit courts.VCH Som. iii. 185. However, it failed to develop an economic base to match its administrative importance: under Henry VIII, John Leland observed that the town ‘hath been a very large thing’, but ‘at this time it is in wonderful decay, as a thing in a manner razed with men of war’. Ibid. 185-7; J. Leland, Itinerary ed. L. Toulmin-Smith, i.
Bristol, as the Privy Council reminded it in 1620, when demanding a contribution of £2,500 towards the cost of a naval expedition, was ‘a port that ever hath been reputed to be the second of the kingdom’. APC, 1619-21, p. 121. With a population about one-twentieth of that of the capital, it came, indeed, a poor second; but it was foremost among the outports in its resentment of London’s trading monopolies, ‘as if God had no sons to whom he gave the benefit of the earth but in London’.
Reigate first returned Members to the Model Parliament of 1295,OR. but received no charter until 1863. Consequently it remained under the jurisdiction of the lord of the manor and all public officers were chosen by the court leet, including the bailiff, who acted as returning officer. It was nonetheless a reasonably prosperous market town, particularly noted for the manufacture of oatmeal. The franchise was vested in the freeholders, returns usually being made in the name of the ‘burgesses’, although in 1620 the term ‘inhabitants’ of the borough was used.
