The chief interests at Callington were those of the Rolles of Heanton Satchville, Devon, who held the manor and lordship under the duchy of Cornwall, and the Corytons, whose seat at Newton Ferrers was only two and a half miles away, and who owned land in the borough. Both families were Tories and it seems that they were able to return themselves or their nominees without any contests during the period.Ibid. 171–4; W. P. Courtney, Parlty Rep. Cornw. 267–8.
Thomas Tonkin* wrote that Bossiney, also known as Tintagel, ‘is a very small village, and contains scarcely 20 houses, and those not better than cottages’ which with the ‘equally mean’ hamlet of Trevenna made up the whole borough. Bossiney was a duchy manor leased by the townsmen and ‘whoever has free land in the borough and lives in the parish is a freeman’. The mayor was chosen at the court leet. The advowson was owned by the dean and chapter of Windsor, and the lessees of the ruined Tintagel Castle also had an interest.
The corporation, consisting of 12 aldermen (including the mayor) and 24 common councilmen, possessed a strong interest at Bodmin. Its income from tolls and corporate lands was said to be worth £200 p.a. However, the corporation had to share electoral power with the 2nd Earl of Radnor (Charles Bodvile Robartes†), whose seat at Lanhydrock lay in the adjacent parish to the south. The Glynns of Glynn in the neighbouring parish of Cardinham to the east also had an interest, as did the Hoblyns, who held the manor of Bodmin Francis.
Until 1780 Truro was controlled by Lord Falmouth, and generally returned members of his family. But shortly before the general election of that year, a majority of the corporation rebelled, complaining that Falmouth’s ‘avarice, increasing with age, hath grossly abused a confidence as complete, perhaps, as unguarded disinterested friendship ever placed in man’.St. James’s Chron. 17 Oct. 1780. Led by Falmouth’s former agent,Jonathan Elford to Lady Bute, 17 Feb.
In 1754 the patrons of Tregony were Lord Falmouth and William Trevanion of Carhayes. Falmouth himself wrote on 22 Mar. 1754 in a paper on Mitchell, where he was engaged in a contest with Lord Sandwich:Add. 35592, ff. 290-1.
Thomas Jones, Lord Edgcumbe’s agent, wrote about St. Mawes in June 1760:
Lord Falmouth and Mr. Nugent, but the latter is lord of the borough and makes the returning officer and thereby has the strongest and most secure interest.
And Nugent himself said in the House on 13 Apr. 1780, during the debate on disfranchising revenue officers:
The chief interest was in the family of Praed of Treventhoe, near St. Ives, who had sat for the borough in several Parliaments since the Restoration; the Duke of Bolton, who owned one of the manors of St. Ives; Lord Buckinghamshire; and John Stephens, of a local family concerned in the fisheries and mines, who had formerly managed the borough for Buckinghamshire. At the general election of 1754 Buckinghamshire and Praed each carried one candidate without opposition.Add. 32995, f. 182; 35604, f. 197.
All electoral surveys during this period assign the borough to Edward Eliot, in the briefest terms, without any qualification. Thus Newcastle, March 1754: ‘Mr. Eliot’s interest’; Thomas Jones, Lord Edgcumbe’s agent, June 1760: ‘Mr. Eliot’; Rockingham, summer 1765: ‘Edward Eliot, Esq., absolutely’; John Robinson, December 1783: ‘Under Mr. Eliot’s arrangement’.
In Newcastle’s paper of 18 Mar. 1754 Penryn was included among the Boscawen boroughs; while the list of 15 Mar. noted after the names of the two candidates, Richard Edgcumbe and George Boscawen: ‘Here is a little difference to be adjusted by the Duke of Newcastle between Lord Edgcumbe and Lord Falmouth.’Add. 32995, ff. 63, 98. Falmouth had written to Henry Pelham on 18 Dec. 1753:Newcastle (Clumber) mss.
Newport, a suburb of Launceston, was controlled by the Morices of Werrington, who as lords of the manor appointed the two returning officers, or vianders. Their hold was challenged in 1754 by the Duke of Bedford, owner of a number of burgages in the borough, who had quarrelled with Morice. Although Bedford did not think the prospect of success very great, he insisted on making ‘a diversion ... in resentment of Mr.