Sussex

The chief interests in Horsham at George I’s accession were those of Charles Eversfield, a Tory, and of the Ingrams, Viscounts Irwin, Whigs. As neither owned a majority of burgages each relied on the independent burgage holders for votes. In 1715 there was a contest at which two Eversfield candidates were returned but the seats were awarded to the Ingrams on a petition alleging partiality by the returning officers, as well as malpractices by the sitting Members’ agent, who was committed to the custody of the serjeant at arms.CJ, xviii.

The predominant interest at East Grinstead was in the Duke of Dorset, the lord of the manor, who owned most of the burgages there.W. H. Hills, Hist. East Grinstead, 43-44, 50. Except in 1727, when he nominated both Members, he shared the representation successively with the Tory Conyers and the Whig Webster families, both of whom also owned property in the town. The only threat of opposition occurred at a by-election in 1750, when Lord Hardwicke, whose son was being put up by the Duke of Dorset, learned that

An independent borough, with a minor government interest from the customs officers at the port, Chichester returned two Whig townsmen at a contested election in 1715. About 1720 the 1st Duke of Richmond bought Goodwood, three miles away. In 1722 his heir, who succeeded to the dukedom in 1723, was returned unopposed, after which it became the custom to pay the Goodwood family the compliment of permitting them to recommend one Member, on condition that the inhabitants of Chichester should be left to choose the other.

At George I’s accession 18 of the 36 Bramber burgages belonged to Sir Richard Gough, a Whig; 13 were owned by Lord Windsor, a Tory; 5 were independent. In 1715 Gough and a Windsor candidate, Style, were returned, but Style was unseated in favour of Minshull, the Gough candidate, who petitioned successfully on the ground of partiality by the returning officer.CJ, xviii. 24. At both the next general elections Gough’s candidates were successful, in 1722 after a contest and in 1727 unopposed.

Till 1747, the chief interest at Arundel was in the Lumleys, earls of Scarborough, who had inherited the estates of the earls of Arundel in the sixteenth century and sat for one of the Arundel seats in every Parliament from 1708 to 1747. The mayor, as returning officer, and the corporation were an important factor, while the government had a certain influence from the customs service at the port. The Duke of Norfolk was lord of the manor and owner of Arundel Castle, but as a Roman Catholic seldom intervened in elections.

Steyning was entirely dominated in this period by two local landowning families, the Faggs of Wiston and the Gorings of Highden. Henry Goring I, whose royalist sympathies had never brought him within the scope of the Long Parliament’s ordinance, came from a cadet branch of a well-established family. He was returned in 1660 with John Fagg, a Rumper who had become a Presbyterian Royalist. Although Fagg had acquired the Wiston estate only during the Interregnum and his title was not beyond question, he was successful for Steyning at every general election during this period.

New Shoreham, a borough by prescription, had developed no municipal organization, and the constable acted as returning officer. Although he was elected in the manorial court, there is no evidence in this period that the Howards exercised any parliamentary interest here as lords of the manor. More important were two local gentry families, the Gorings of Highden and the Faggs of Wiston. No warships were built at Shoreham between 1654 and 1690, but the Admiralty maintained an interest through shipments of timber through the port.

Midhurst was a borough by prescription in which the Viscounts Montagu of Cowdray, as lords of the borough, exercised a considerable interest. Their steward nominated the ‘homage’ or jury at the annual meeting of the capital court baron, and the homage in turn elected the bailiffs, the senior of whom acted as returning officer. As the Cowdray family was recusant its interest had to be discreetly exercised, and from Elizabethan times it was the Lewknors of West Dean who most frequently represented the borough.

Lewes was an ancient borough by prescription. The returning officers were the two constables, appointed annually by a group of prominent inhabitants called ‘the Twelve’, after 1666 ‘the Jury’, but elections to Parliament were evidently arranged by the local landowners, and only one contest is recorded during the period. In 1660 John Stapley of Patcham, a royalist conspirator, was returned with Nizel Rivers, a member of a puritan family, whose brother James Rivers of Combe had represented the borough in the Short and Long Parliaments.

As lords of the manor the Howards of Arundel Castle enjoyed a strong potential interest in Horsham. In their court the returning officers, the two bailiffs, were chosen, and the tenants admitted to the burgages from which they derived their franchise. The number of burgages fluctuated, but tended to increase slightly through splitting. Except in the by-election of 1669, there is no indication of patronage in this period, and in this political vacuum a number of minor gentry families resident in the town or the neighbourhood found seats.