TREHERNE, Morgan (1803-1867), of Gate House, Sussex

‘A real good old Tory of the old school’, Treherne was a ‘fine old English gentleman’.1Coventry Herald, 27 Mar., 2 Apr. 1857, qu. by P. Searby, ‘Weavers and freemen in Coventry, 1820-1861: social and political traditionalism in an early Victorian town’, Univ. of Warwick, Ph. D. thesis (1972), 382. He was finally returned for Coventry in 1863 at the seventh attempt, which was possibly a record in the annals of Victorian elections. In Parliament he repeatedly attacked the 1860 Anglo-French commercial treaty for causing great distress among the Coventry ribbon weavers, but this had little impact given the intellectual dominance of free trade orthodoxy at this time. His eldest daughter described him as ‘a splendid orator, with [an] inexhaustible voice and lungs’.2G. Weldon, My orphanage and Gounod in England (1882), 19. He had ‘an infinite charm of manner’ and a flair for mathematics, languages, music and poetry, but also possessed a ‘tiresome, violent, “infernal”’ temper.3Ibid., 20.

The second son of Rees Goring Thomas, a Carmarthenshire squire, Morgan Thomas (as he was originally known) had qualified as a barrister in 1827. However, he never practised as he inherited a ‘considerable fortune’ from both his father and uncle in the 1820s, and he acquired Gate House in Sussex through his marriage to an heiress in 1835.4Ibid., 1. In 1832 Thomas stood as a Tory for Coventry, apparently with the approval of the corporation.5S. Boote Powell, ‘Coventry corporation and the myth of paternalism: electoral politics in Coventry, 1826-35’, Midland History, 34 (2009), 77-97 (at. 84). He called for the re-imposition of the prohibition on foreign silk ribbons, but finished a distant fourth.6Searby, ‘Weavers and freemen’, 287. In 1833 he challenged the newly-appointed secretary at war Edward Ellice at a by-election, but was again defeated.7Ibid., 294. However, Thomas, who declared himself a staunch defender of the established church and constitution, performed better at the next two general elections at Coventry in 1835 and 1837.8S. Boote Powell, ‘Electoral politics in Coventry in the age of reform, 1826-1841’, Univ. of Warwick MA thesis (2004), 81. He came third on both occasions and in the former case finished just thirty-five votes behind Ellice.9Searby, ‘Weavers and freemen’, 296, 311.

The poor health of his wife prompted Thomas to take his family to live in Florence from 1840 to 1846. He was a ‘man of strict integrity, scrupulous to a fault in everything affecting his reputation’ and that of his family.10Weldon, My orphanage, 4. While in Italy he was paranoid about protecting his family’s virtue. His daughter drily recalled ‘My father’s opinion was that eleven o’clock at night was a respectable time for leaving parties; this was the hour at which parties began.’11Ibid. Thomas considered standing at the 1854 Coventry by-election, but his support for the reintroduction of the corn laws undermined any prospects he had.12Searby, ‘Weavers and freemen’, 381.

Thomas had long claimed an ‘illustrious genealogy’ apparently dating back to the Plantagenets and Hywel Dda, an ancient Welsh king.13Weldon, My orphanage, 2. In 1856 he assumed the patronymic of Treherne, ‘an old family name’.14Ibid., 13. Two decades after his last contest, Treherne stood at Coventry at the 1857 general election, declaring that his principles were ‘in unison with those of the British Constitution’ and opposing an extension of the franchise.15Searby, ‘Weavers and freemen’, 382. He finished third, and repeated his performance at the 1859 general election, when, despite his criticism of Lord Derby’s reform bill, he declared that he was now in favour of a very moderate extension of the suffrage.16Ibid., 385.

Treherne finally succeeded in being elected as MP for Coventry at the 1863 by-election. ‘A Tory to the backbone’, his hostility to the 1860 Anglo-French commercial treaty that had been negotiated by Richard Cobden was popular with local ribbon weavers who blamed cheap French imports for their distress.17Ibid., 558; Coventry Times, 30 Sept. 1863. Silk portraits of Treherne were sold during the election: Coventry Times, 7 Oct. 1863. Even better, his Liberal opponent, as a son of the late Sir Robert Peel, was strongly associated with free trade.18The Times, 9 Oct. 1863. Treherne’s election, on an essentially protectionist platform, horrified much of the Liberal and London press, which derided and dismissed him as a reactionary throwback.19The Times, 10 Oct. 1863. See also the excerpts quoted in Coventry Times, 14 Oct. 1863.

Treherne lent credence to such attacks in his maiden speech on Locke King’s county franchise bill, 13 Apr. 1864. During a decade when some Conservatives were re-branding themselves as Liberal Conservatives for electoral purposes, Treherne defiantly declared that ‘he had been returned to that House as a Tory’. He sought to rescue the label from being a term of abuse employed by Liberals. For Treherne, ‘a Tory was a gentleman of independent means, of independent mind, who would speak the truth, and would not be deterred by the laughter of one party or the frowns of another’. He opposed the bill on the ground that there should be a ‘comprehensive’ measure to settle the issue rather than piecemeal bills. He later voted against the borough franchise bill and the secret ballot, 11 May, 21 June 1864.

Treherne drew attention to the distress of Coventry’s staple trade, 30 June 1864. The 1860 treaty meant that French silks were freely admitted, but that British silks paid a duty of 7.5% to get into the French market. Appealing to the English sense of fair play, he called for the government to pressure the French authorities into ensuring a level playing field. He returned to the issue, 16 Mar. 1865, noting that the state of the Coventry riband trade was ‘most deplorable’, and again complained that the ‘French had a virtual monopoly in their own market’, despite the lowering of the duty on British silks to 3.5%. He protested against the ‘one-sided’ and ‘unfeeling’ reports of the poor law inspectorate which implied that there was still full employment in the city. On both occasions, Thomas Milner Gibson, the president of the board of trade, was unreceptive to Treherne’s arguments, unsurprisingly given that he had been a member of the Anti-Corn Law League and remained a staunch free trader. Milner Gibson denied that the French duty on British silks was large and contended that other factors, such as changing fashions, were the causes of the trade’s recession. He ruled out any legislative remedy for the distress.

Treherne was re-elected in second place at the 1865 general election, but appears to have played no further part in the division lobby or in the chamber. His daughter, from whom Treherene was later estranged, subsequently recalled how her father had been disillusioned by his experience of the House:

Once in Parliament, my father, although cranky, soon found out that “love of your country” meant “love of good places”, and that “party spirit” was everything … He who had been so enthusiastic for … politics all his life gave it all up. Had he but known, he said, he would never have troubled himself about them.20Weldon, My orphanage, 20.

However, elsewhere his daughter wrote that Treherne was gripped by insanity in his later years.21Ibid., 10.

Notwithstanding his disappointments with parliamentary life, Treherne represented Coventry until his death in July 1867. He left a personal estate sworn under £30,000 and was succeeded by his eldest son Morgan Dalrymple Thomas Treherne (1836-1908).22Calendar of Grants of Probate and Letters of Administration, 1867, 185. Treherne had disinherited and disowned his eldest daughter Georgina (1837-1914) following her disastrous marriage to William Henry Weldon in 1860. In the 1870s her husband, in collusion with a number of doctors, attempted to get her certified as insane. In the following decade Mrs. Weldon became a noted litigant, who won numerous law suits instigated against her husband and his abettors.23J. Martin, ‘Weldon, Georgina (1837-1914)’, www.oxforddnb.com; B. Thompson, A monkey among crocodiles: the life, loves and lawsuits of Mrs. Georgina Weldon (2000).