Appendix XIII: Government opponents in 1555

Government opponents in 1555

Guildford mus. Loseley 1331/2

A list of some 106 opponents of a bill survives among the papers of William More II of Loseley in Surrey, More himself being one of those named. According to a note at the end of the list ‘All these in Queen Mary’s time were in the Parliament first holden against the general repeal of all treasons etc. whereby the Statute of the Supremacy was repealed’. This note is almost certainly in a lighter ink and a different hand from the list itself: neither the note nor the list is in the hand of More. An addition made at some time after the original compilation of the list would account for the inaccuracies over the Parliament and the measure concerned. Less than half of the men listed were Members of Mary’s first Parliament, but the names on the list correlate with those of the Members of the Queen’s fourth Parliament, for which nearly all the returns survive. Some of the names are not known from the returns or from any other source: thus the list is in itself evidence of Membership for the Parliament of 1555. During this Parliament two bills introduced by the government caused controversy: the bill for first fruits and tenths passed the Commons only after a division of 193 to 126 votes on 3 Dec. but that to penalize exiles was rejected on a division forced by (Sir) Anthony Kingston and others three days later. Although it is tempting to identify the list of opponents with the Members who aligned themselves with Kingston on the 6th rather than with the ‘noes’ of the 3rd, the evidence is too slim, and also too confused, to warrant certainty in the matter.