The 1st marquess of Cholmondeley had abandoned his attempt to sell the Houghton estate by 1820, and the representation of the pocket borough of Castle Rising, three miles from King’s Lynn, remained exclusive to his sons and Fulke Howard, younger son of the 1st Baron Templemore, who was by marriage the manorial lord and largest burgage holder. Wellington mss WP1/634/10; Hickling’s Almanac (1880), 67, 72; Norf.
Grantham, a town with a ‘very neat and clean appearance’, lay on the Great North road, within easy reach of London.White, Lincs. Dir. (1826), 127. Some of the county’s leading families, the Cholmeleys of Easton, Thorolds of Syston Park and Welbys of Denton, as well as the 1st Earl Brownlow of Belton (lord lieutenant of Lincolnshire) lived in its immediate vicinity and took an active interest in its affairs.
Wenlock, a collection of scattered settlements seven miles north-west of Bridgnorth and ten miles south-east of Shrewsbury, was an ancient liberty, manor and parliamentary borough formerly dominated by St. Milburga’s priory. It extended over 71 square miles and comprised 17 parishes: Badger, Barrow, Beckbury, Benthall, Broseley, Deuxhill, Ditton Prior, Hughley, Linley, Madeley, Monkhopton, Shipton, Stoke Saint Milliborough, Wenlock Little, Wenlock Much, Willey, and Eaton (with extra-parochial Posenhall).
Rutland, the smallest English county, was entirely agrarian. It contained the small market towns of Oakham, the venue for elections, and Uppingham.Pigot’s Commercial Dir. (1822-3), 350, 351. Since 1747 the Noels, earls of Gainsborough, of Exton Park, near Oakham had combined with the Cecils, earls of Exeter, of Burghley House, just over the Lincolnshire border, to exclude from a share in the representation the Finches, earls of Winchilsea. The county had last been contested in 1761.
Honiton, a market town situated beside the River Otter, in the east of the county on the Exeter to London road, consisted ‘principally of one street, nearly a mile in length, containing many good houses’, which had mostly been built since the fires of 1747 and 1765. It had ‘long been celebrated’ as a centre for the manufacture of fine lace, which was also carried on in the surrounding villages, but though still quite prosperous and benefiting from royal patronage the industry had passed its peak and faced competition from the rise of factory-based production elsewhere.
Norfolk was an agriculturally diverse county remarkable for its large and independent yeoman squirearchy. Its principal ports were King’s Lynn and Great Yarmouth and elections and county meetings were held in the city of Norwich.White, Norf. Dir.
Longford produced mainly oats, potatoes and butter and had ‘scarcely any manufactures’. There were ‘few resident noblemen or gentry of large estates’ and ‘few parts of Ireland in which persons of limited income’ could ‘live cheaper or better’. The principal market towns were Ballymahon, Colehill and Edgeworthstown, and the disfranchised boroughs of Granard, Lanesborough, St. Johnstown and Longford, the venue for county elections.S. Lewis, Top. Dict. of Ireland (1837), ii.
The borough of Tralee, which extended into the neighbouring parish of Ratass, was a busy though backward market town and seaport, whose fortunes were limited by its shallow harbour. Oldfield, Rep. Hist. (1816), vi.
Dysart, on the northern shore of the Firth of Forth, ten miles north of Leith and 16 miles south-south-east of Cupar, was dominated by Dysart House, the subsidiary seat of James St. Clair Erskine†, 2nd earl of Rosslyn, of Ravenscraig Castle, the owner of most of the properties and valuable coal seams nearby. The harbour and wet dock serving its coal and coarse linen trades, however, belonged to the town council, a self-elected body of 24, all resident in 1822, when 21 had property in the burgh.Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland (1895), ii. 455-6; PP (1823), xv. 703; J.
Milborne Port, a ‘very irregularly built’ town with the appearance ‘more of a village’, which had been ‘anciently ... of importance’, was situated on a branch of the River Yeo close to the Dorset border. Agriculture was crucial to the town’s economy, employing 283 families in 1821, but 159 worked in trade and manufacturing and 26 in other occupations. In the eighteenth century it had been a centre for the production of linen, sailcloth and the coarser types of woollens, but these industries were in serious decline by the 1820s and the market house had long been closed up.
