Cornwall

Bossiney, on the north coast of Cornwall, was a tiny settlement established as a parliamentary borough by the duchy of Cornwall in the mid-sixteenth century. The borough was not incorporated until 1685, and in the interim it was controlled by the court leet, with a ‘mayor’ presiding. Maclean, Trigg Minor, iii. 185, 205-9, The franchise was never entirely settled, and the electorate was variously made up of those who owned property in the parish (the ‘burgesses’), those paying scot and lot, or the inhabitants of the parish of Tintagel in general.

The tiny town of Mitchell had been enfranchised at the behest of the lord of the manor, John Arundell† of Lanherne, in 1547, and in the seventeenth century it remained one of the smallest and most easily influenced boroughs in Cornwall. The Arundells of Lanherne, as recusants, were unable to use the benefits of lordship effectively, and the parliamentary patronage of the borough was controlled instead by their cousins, the Arundells of Trerice, whose seat was close to the town.

Bodmin (a name derived from the Cornish for ‘dwelling under the hills’) originated as an Anglo-Saxon town serving the monastery founded by St Petrock, and had become a borough by the end of the twelfth century. In the middle ages its wealth was based on its dual role as monastic centre and entrepot of the tin trade, and it retained its importance in the county administration – hosting the quarter sessions and trained band musters, as well as an important weekly market – into the early seventeenth century. Maclean, Trigg Minor, i.

Originally a Saxon manor owned by the bishops of Sherborne, Launceston (or Dunheved) developed as the most important town in Cornwall during the middle ages, and its many privileges reflected the status of its castle as the headquarters of the duchy of Cornwall and a vital strategic stronghold, guarding the crossing of the Tamar from Devon.

Callington, seven miles north of Saltash, was one of the smallest and least impressive of the Cornish boroughs. In 1639 the corporation begged for exemption from Ship Money on the grounds of poverty; in 1641 only 91 men from the parish signed the Protestation; and in the 1660s there were only around 70 households, with none of the houses boasting more than four hearths. CSP Dom. 1639, p. 62; Cornw. Protestation Returns, 214; Cornw.

The borough of Saltash, on the west bank of the River Tamar and the edge of Plymouth Sound, was a town of some commercial and strategic importance, established by the duchy of Cornwall within the manor of Trematon in the thirteenth century. Parochial Hist. Cornw. iv. 170-6. According to the antiquarian Richard Carew, writing at the turn of the seventeenth century, Saltash ‘compriseth between 80 and 100 households’ – a number that had apparently declined by the time of the Hearth Tax survey of the 1660s, which listed only 66 households. Cornw.

East Looe was the larger and more important of the two boroughs at the mouth of the River Looe on the south coast of Cornwall. According to early seventeenth century accounts, East Looe was more prosperous than neighbouring West Looe, and ‘their profit chiefly accrueth from their weekly markets, and industrious fishing, with boats of a middle size able to brook, but not cross the seas’, with the most lucrative trade being in ‘this silly small fish’, the pilchard. Carew, Survey, 128; Corporation Chronicles… of East and West Looe ed. A.L.

Camelford, situated where the main road crossed the River Camel in north Cornwall, had been part of the duchy of Cornwall since the fourteenth century.

The borough of Liskeard, on the road from Plymouth to Lostwithiel, had been granted a charter as early as 1240, and was incorporated into the duchy of Cornwall on its creation in 1337. A new charter, granted in 1587, established a corporation of nine capital burgesses, with a mayor, recorder and steward, and the mayor and recorder were given the right to act as justices of the peace for the town. J. Allen, Hist. of Borough of Liskeard (rev. edn.

Penryn was a little port town at the head of Falmouth Harbour, with an anchorage protected by the twin castles of St Mawes and Pendennis. At the beginning of the seventeenth century it was less prosperous than its inland neighbour, Truro, and Richard Carew† described it as ‘rather passable than notable for wealth, buildings and inhabitants’. Carew, Survey, f. 150v. In later decades Penryn also came under pressure from the newly established port at Smithwick (or Falmouth), developed by the Killigrew family. CSP Dom. 1660-1, p.