Shropshire

It was said of Bishop’s Castle that the inhabitants had no trade or business except that of elections, which they found very profitable.J. R. Burton, ’Two Elections for Bishop’s Castle in the 18th Cent.’, Salop Arch. Soc. Trans. (ser. 3), ix.

From 1688 and until 1727 there was no predominant interest at Ludlow, which normally chose its representatives from among the neighbouring landowners, notably the Herberts of Oakley, the Baldwyns of Stokesay, and the Walcots of Bitterley and Walcot. The Duke of Chandos also had an interest through his close connexion with Humphrey Walcot as well as from his purchase of the Bishop’s Castle estate. Chandos was mainly responsible for procuring the return in 1719 of Sir Robert Raymond,Chandos to John Baldwyn, 9 Nov., 21 Dec.

Shrewsbury elections were usually controlled by the Tories, who drew most of their strength from outside the town, from the suburbs and the extensive liberties of the borough, and from among the ‘out-burgesses’. A local Tory squire, John Kynaston of Hordley, had an especially strong interest. But there was also a considerable Tory element in the town itself, and Tory mobs went on the rampage in 1710 and 1714.

No more than a seventh of the Much Wenlock electorate resided in the town, according to one estimate, and the two most powerful interests by far belonged to neighbouring country gentlemen: Sir William Forester, the lord of the manor of Little Wenlock, and the Welds of Willey Park, who, by an arrangement between them, jointly controlled the representation throughout this period. Forester, a Court Whig, and George Weld I, a Tory, were returned unopposed in 1690 and at every election thereafter until Weld’s death in 1701, when he was succeeded as Member by his eldest son George Weld II.

James II’s reversal in 1688 of his earlier policy towards the boroughs gave rise to confusion in Ludlow, and by 1690 there were two rival bodies each claiming to be the legal corporation, one holding by the ancient charter which had been surrendered in 1684 and the other by a new charter granted by King James in the following year in order to establish a Tory-controlled corporation.