MARSHALL, William (1796-1872), of Patterdale Hall, Westmorland

Described by a Chartist opponent as ‘one of the most useless members that sits in the House of Commons, capable of nothing but discussing wine and walnuts’, Marshall was the eldest son of John Marshall, founder of the family’s Leeds flax-spinning and linen business, and Whig MP for Yorkshire, 1826-1830.1Northern Star, 19 June 1841; HP Commons 1820-1832, vi. 356-60. Although Marshall had no direct involvement with the business, he reaped the rewards of its immense success.2HP Commons 1820-1832, vi. 360. In 1824 his father gave him the estate of Patterdale on the southern tip of Ullswater, and he later received £5,000 in cash, £20,000 in Louisiana stock and further property valued at £15,000.3W.G. Rimmer, Marshalls of Leeds: flax-spinners 1788-1886 (1960), 114. At the 1826 general election his father gave him the seat for Petersfield on the Jolliffe interest, which he had bought for himself the previous year, and in 1830 he was returned for the venal borough of Leominster before coming in for Beverley in 1831. In the pre-Reform Parliament he consistently voted for Catholic emancipation and gave solid support to Grey’s ministry on most major issues, but he rarely spoke and was far from a regular attender. He did not seek re-election in 1832.4HP Commons 1820-1832, vi. 360-1.

At the 1835 general election Marshall stood as a Liberal for Carlisle. In his address, described by his opponents as ‘violent’, he stated that ‘from rank Tories, no honest reformer can expect good’. Making his radical intentions clear, he called for triennial parliaments, the ballot and extension of the suffrage, and was returned unopposed.5Morning Post, 7 Jan. 1835; Parliamentary test book (1835), 104-5. Absent from the critical vote on the speakership, 19 Feb. 1835, he was in the opposition’s majority on the address, 26 Feb. 1835, and voted for Irish church appropriation, 2 Apr. 1835. Thereafter he consistently supported the Melbourne ministry’s legislative proposals for Ireland and was re-elected without a contest in 1837. His attendance, though, remained patchy and he is not known to have spoken in debate. He did, however, serve on select committees on the British Museum and the Roxburghshire election petition.6PP 1836 (440), x. 2; PP 1837-38 (152), xii. 229. Marshall is also known to have sat on select committees on the Lichfield election (PP 1842 (548), v. 19); law of Mortmain (PP 1851 (483), xvi. 1); and Waterford county election petition (PP 1852-53 (389), xix. 337).

Marshall endured a torrid nomination at the 1841 general election, though he survived to be returned in second place. Assailed by local Chartists for his denunciations of the Newport protesters and attacked by Conservative opponents for the supposed failures of the government, he rather tamely asserted that ‘it is not my fault if greater improvements have not taken place’.7Morning Chronicle, 2 July 1841. Thereafter he followed Lord John Russell into the division lobby on most major issues, including his motions not to reintroduce income tax, 13 Apr. 1842, and to consider the state of Ireland, 23 Feb. 1844. He reconfirmed his radical sympathies by voting for corn law repeal, 24 Feb. 1842, 15 May 1843, 26 June 1844, 15 May 1846. He was in the majority against the factory bill, 22 May 1846.

At the dissolution in 1847 Marshall retired from Carlisle and stood for East Cumberland with the backing of the retiring member William James. Explaining that he vacated his seat at Carlisle because he was called upon to do so by a ‘requisition signed by persons of all ranks, and especially by the friends and supporters’ of James, he called for a reduction of duties on tea and sugar, and was returned unopposed.8Standard, 7 Aug. 1848. The change of constituency, however, did little to alter his attendance habits, which remained poor. 9In the 1840 session Marshall attended 48 out of 219 divisions: Hampshire Telegraph, 20 Oct. 1849. He did, though, remain loyal to Russell’s ministry, backing the premier’s Jewish disabilities bill, 17 Dec. 1847, and voting against Cobden’s motion to reduce public expenditure, 26 Feb. 1849, Disraeli’s motion to relieve the distress of landowners, 13 Feb. 1851, and the repeal of the malt tax, 8 May 1851.

After being re-elected in second place at the 1852 general election, Marshall devoted his energies to promoting the Carlisle and Silloth bay dock and railway bill, which proposed to give Carlisle its own trading route by connecting the city by rail to a new floating dock on Silloth bay. A founding member of the Carlisle and Silloth railway company in 1852, he successfully shepherded the bill through Parliament two years later (17 Vic. 1. c. 119), despite facing opposition based on the engineering evidence against the scheme.10Minutes of proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers (1862), xxi. 324. The work was completed in 1859, when the new port was named Marshall Dock. Meanwhile, in a rare departure from his parliamentary muteness, he warned the House to ‘pause’ before they allowed another inquiry into Hutchinson’s claim bill. Referring to his service on the original 1831 committee, he recalled that ‘the accounts produced by the petitioner were on the face of them so monstrous that he wondered [how] any person could have brought them before that or any other tribunal’, 9 May 1853.11The case concerned the late Bury Hutchinson of the East India Company who was allegedly owed £48,000 by the late Rajah of Tavancore. See Hansard, 10 Apr. 1832, vol. 12, cc. 195-201.

An occasional attender in the 1850s, he voted against Disraeli’s budget, 16 Dec. 1852, and for Gladstone’s alternative proposals, 2 May 1853.12In the 1853 session Howard was present for 44 out of 257 divisions and in 1856 he was present for 24 out of 198: Daily News, 21 Sept. 1853; J.P. Gassiot, Third letter to J.A. Roebuck: with a full analysis of the divisions of the House of Commons during the last session of Parliament (1857), 4. Maintaining his reformist credentials, he voted for the ballot, 14 June 1853, and church rate abolition, 16 May 1855. He was in the minority against Roebuck’s motion for a select committee into the condition of the army at Sebastopol and the conduct of government departments, 29 Jan. 1855, which precipitated the collapse of Aberdeen’s coalition, and thereafter he gave his steadfast support to Palmerston. He voted against Disraeli’s motion criticising the war, 25 May 1855, and opposed Cobden’s censure motion on Canton, 3 Mar. 1857.

At the 1857 general election Marshall confirmed his unwavering support for Palmerston, declaring that it was a mistake to suppose that the premier was not a reformer. On the China question, he insisted that there were ‘great advantages both to that nation and this in the establishment of more extended friendly and commercial relations … which … would be secured by the present war’.13Daily News, 2 Apr. 1857. Re-elected without a contest, he was in the minority for Palmerston’s conspiracy to murder bill, 19 Feb. 1858, and opposed the short-lived Derby ministry’s reform bill, 31 Mar. 1859.

Returned unopposed at the 1859 and 1865 general elections, his votes for Edward Baines’ borough franchise bills, 10 Apr. 1861, 11 May 1864, reflected his commitment to franchise reform. He backed the Liberal ministry’s reform bill, 27 Apr. 1866, and was in the ministerial minority over the Adullamites’ motion of no confidence, 18 June 1866. He was largely absent from the key divisions on the Derby ministry’s representation of the people bill, though he voted with Gladstone in opposition to the minority clause, 8 Aug. 1867, and supported his resolutions on the Irish church, 3 Apr. 1868. Defeated in third place at the 1868 general election, Marshall retired from public life and died at Patterdale Hall in May 1872, leaving estates valued at under £160,000.14Leeds Mercury, 21 May 1872; England and Wales, National Probate Calendar, Index of wills and administration, 1861-1941, 1 July 1872. He was succeeded by his eldest son, John William Marshall.