Although the Commons decided in 1744 (significantly, on an amendment to their original motion) that the franchise in Denbigh Boroughs was confined to resident freemen, and this after hearing evidence of elections under William III and Anne, it is highly unlikely that the qualification was ever imposed before that date.
The Myddeltons of Chirk Castle had held the upper hand in Denbighshire county elections since the Restoration; after 1684, when the estates of their only serious rivals, the Salusbury family of Lleweni, passed, through a failure in the male line, to the Cottons of Combermere, Cheshire, they were utterly dominant. Sir Richard Myddelton, 3rd Bt., a High Tory, was returned without opposition at every election from 1685 until his death in 1716.
‘An ancient, but not a decayed town . . . well built and populous’, Carmarthen borough no less than the rest of the county was in thrall for most of this period to the Vaughans of Golden Grove, and was represented in every Parliament by the head of a cadet branch of the family, Richard Vaughan I of Cwrt Derllys, who was also recorder of the corporation. Vaughan’s connexion with the borough went back to 1683, when he was first elected to the recordership as a Tory and in all probability a client of the 1st Duke of Beaufort (Henry Somerset†).
The overpowering interest of the Vaughans of Golden Grove, headed by the Earl of Carbery [I] (John Vaughan†), custos of Carmarthenshire from the Revolution onwards, made the county (one of the more populous in Wales) a citadel of Whiggism until the Sacheverellite fever of 1710. The ability of the Whig Sir Rice Rudd, 2nd Bt., to retain the shire seat unopposed until he died, derived, we may assume, from support Carbery must have accorded him, since Rudd was himself nearly bankrupt and his Carmarthenshire estates were weighed under with debt.
Of the Cardiganshire boroughs, the county town itself was easily the most important: the elections were always held there, with the mayor acting as returning officer. Governed by its common council, a self-perpetuating oligarchy responsible for the admission of freemen, Cardigan corporation was controlled by the owner of the priory estate. At the beginning of the period this was the outgoing Whig Member Hector Phillips, who returned himself again in the 1690 election.
The Vaughans of Trawscoed (also known as Crosswood) and the Pryses of Gogerddan, Whig and Tory respectively in this period, were traditional rivals in Cardiganshire politics, and in the 1690 general election the master of Gogerddan, Sir Carbery Pryse, 4th Bt., defeated the master of Trawscoed, John Vaughan, through the connivance, or so Vaughan alleged, of the county sheriff. Such considerations may explain the complaint made to the House on 1 Apr. 1690 that the Cardiganshire return had not yet been made to the Crown Office.
The borough seat at Caernarvonshire, like that for the county, was under the undisputed control of the leading Tory interests for most of this period. Sir Robert Owen, the outgoing Member in 1690, was safely re-elected twice, dying shortly before the dissolution of the 1695 Parliament. His successor, Sir John Wynn, 5th Bt., was similarly untroubled by a contest, and graduated to the county representation in 1705, whereupon he was replaced by one of the Bulkeleys of Baron Hill, Anglesey, emerging now as the dominant force on the Tory side.
Until the last Parliament of Queen Anne, elections in Caernarvonshire were controlled by a nexus of powerful Tory families, among whom the Bulkeleys of Baron Hill, Anglesey, were increasingly prominent. Sir William Williams, 6th Bt., of Vaynol, was re-elected in 1690, probably with Bulkeley support, and after his death in 1697 (which incidentally marked the eclipse of the Vaynol interest), Hon. Thomas Bulkeley, a senior representative of the Baron Hill family and the owner himself of a large Caernarvonshire estate, succeeded without opposition.
The corporation of Brecon was controlled by a close oligarchy of 15 common councilmen, who annually elected from their number a bailiff and two aldermen as magistrates, and who were solely responsible for the admission of freemen. There were no out-boroughs, though claims were later advanced for the rights of inhabitants of such places as Hay, Llanywern, Llywel, Talgarth and Trecastle. The franchise was settled in the freemen at large, but not without the possibility of dispute.
In the later 17th century three families dominated Breconshire politics: Jeffreys of Brecon Priory, Jones of Buckland, and Morgan of Tredegar. The first two were Tory in sympathy; the last, Whig. Of these the Morgans had their principal base in Monmouthshire, while the Jeffreys showed more concern for the borough of Brecon than the county. Edward Jones was therefore returned unopposed in 1689.
