Monmouthshire

<p>The franchise in Monmouth had been determined by a decision of the House in 1680, which admitted two out-boroughs, Newport and Usk, but excluded two others, Abergavenny and Chepstow. This was confirmed by the practice in the elections of 1689 and 1690. On the other hand the restriction of voting rights to resident freemen, which had been a subsidiary element in the Commons’ judgment, was almost certainly ignored throughout this period.

<p>Although Monmouth had a comparatively large electorate, it was a complete pocket borough of the Duke of Beaufort.</p>

<p>Monmouth Boroughs remained under the control of the dukes of Beaufort throughout the period.<fn>E. E. Havill, ‘Parl. Rep. Mon. 1536-1832’ (Univ. of Wales MA thesis, 1949); R. D. Rees, ‘Parl. Rep. S. Wales 1790-1830’ (Reading Univ. Ph.D. thesis, 1962), i. 259.</fn> They were in command of the close corporations of Monmouth and Usk.

<p>Monmouth was under the sway of the dukes of Beaufort, who had a strong interest in all its three constituent boroughs. In Monmouth the Duke controlled the council of 15 life-members; in Usk he was lord of the manor, appointing the burgesses through the recorder; in Newport, where he was lord of the borough, his steward nominated the mayor from two candidates chosen by the aldermen.

<p>Monmouth itself was regarded as dependent on the Raglan Castle interest, but the contributory boroughs were less subservient, though their rights were disputable. No return survives for 1660, when Sir Trevor Williams, subsequently a leading opponent of the Somersets, was elected. His interest was strongest in Usk, and in 1661 Sir George Probert was returned by the mayor, bailiffs and ‘burgesses’ of the county town alone.

<p>Monmouth was made the shire town of the new county which came into being in 1536 as a result of the Act of Union. The town was incorporated in 1549 and the government of the borough placed in the hands of a mayor and two bailiffs. It had long been a possession of the duchy of Lancaster.

<p>Situated at the junction of the rivers Wye and Monnow, the manor, town and borough of Monmouth belonged to the duchy of Lancaster. In 1536, when Monmouthshire was created by the Act of Union, the parts of the town on the English side of the two rivers were included within it. Monmouth became the shire town, although the county court was held alternately there and at Newport. Like many border towns Monmouth had suffered from the lawlessness which prevailed before the Union, and in 1544 it was included in the Act (35 Hen. VIII, c.4) for the re-edification of certain towns.

<p>Monmouth was established around a Norman castle situated at the confluence of the rivers Monnow and Wye. It thus occupied a significant strategic and cultural position on the boundary between Wales and England. In the thirteenth century the borough passed into the hands of the house of Lancaster, and thereafter it remained a duchy possession down to 1631. The town enjoyed good trading contacts by river and land, and possessed a market by the end of the eleventh century, but suffered severely in the Glynd?r rebellion and struggled to recover economically.<fn>K.

<p>The county town of Monmouth was situated on the Rivers Monnow and Wye between the ironworks of Wales and the coalfield of the Forest of Dean. It gave its name to, and was the polling town for, a contributory boroughs constituency of the Welsh type which, as the Commons had determined in 1680, included rapidly industrializing Newport and the small agricultural borough of Usk, 25 and 12 miles to its south-west, and excluded Abergavenny, Caerleon, Chepstow and Trellech.<fn> <em>HP Commons, 1690-1715</em>, ii. 407-9; <em>CJ</em>, ix.