Bletchingley (UK Parliament constituency)
Bletchingley | |
---|---|
Former Borough constituency for the House of Commons | |
County | Surrey |
Major settlements | Bletchingley |
1295–1832 | |
Seats | Two |
Replaced by | East Surrey |
Bletchingley was a
Elections were held using the
The constituency was just 31⁄2 miles south-east of the similar rotten borough of Gatton.
History
Bletchingley was one of the original boroughs enfranchised in the Model Parliament, and kept its status until the Reform Act. The borough consisted of the former market town of Bletchingley in Surrey, which by the 19th century had shrunk to a village. In 1831, the population of the borough was 513, and it contained only 85 houses. It was a burgage borough: the right to vote was exercised by the owners or resident tenants of the 130 "burgage tenements". No doubt at some point in history these were simply the inhabited houses of the town, but it was already an artificial franchise by the time it was disputed before the House of Commons in 1624, when it was settled that Bletchingley's burgage holders should keep the vote as they had "time out of mind". By the 19th century of course, with more burgages in the borough than houses, the notion of its being a residential franchise was no more than a legal fiction.
Like other burgage boroughs, Bletchingley quickly fell into the hands of a single landowner who thereby had the safest of
However, the 1624 dispute occurred when the voters daringly defied Lady Howard, and it may not have been entirely secure for any single "patron" for the rest of the century. By 1700, there were two rival influences: the Evelyns of
Parliamentary elections were held from 1733 in what is now the White Hart inn: a book in 1844 notes this and that eight to ten people voted, as well as a sale of the manor for £60,000 in 1816.[1]
The Claytons retained Bletchingley until 1779. In that year, short of money and with talk of parliamentary reform in the air, Sir Robert Clayton decided to realise the asset while it still had a value, and sold the reversion of his property at Bletchingley (which by now included all the burgages) to his cousin, John Kenrick, for £10,000. Once the prospect of parliamentary reform had receded for the time being, Clayton repented of his bargain and filed an action in Chancery against Kenrick, claiming that he had been "imposed upon" and had been paid quite an inadequate amount; but the court sympathised with Kenrick, and dismissed the action with costs.
In 1816 (see above), Kenrick's son later sold the rights to
Bletchingley was abolished as a constituency by the Reform Act. From then on, the village was included in the Eastern division of Surrey.
Members of Parliament
1295–1640
1640–1832
Year | First member | First party | Second member | Second party | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
April 1640 | Edmiund Hoskins | Edward Bysshe the elder | ||||
November 1640 | John Evelyn, senior | Parliamentarian
|
Edward Bysshe the younger | Parliamentarian
| ||
December 1648 | Evelyn and Bysshe excluded in Pride's Purge: both seats vacant | |||||
1653 | Bletchingley was unrepresented in the Parliaments of the Protectorate. | |||||
January 1659 | John Goodwin | Edmund Hoskins | ||||
May 1659 | Not represented in the restored Rump | |||||
April 1660 | John Evelyn, senior | John Goodwin | ||||
1661 | Sir William Hawarde | Edward Bysshe | ||||
February 1679 | George Evelyn | Edward Harvey | ||||
October 1679 | John Morris | |||||
1681 | Sir William Goulston | |||||
1685 | Ambrose Browne | Sir Marmaduke Gresham
|
||||
January 1689 | Thomas Howard | John Glyd | ||||
December 1689 | Jeffrey Amherst | |||||
1690 | Sir Robert Clayton
|
Whig
| ||||
1695 | Maurice Thompson | |||||
1698 | Hugh Hare | Sir Robert Clayton
|
Whig
| |||
1701 | Sir Edward Gresham | John Ward | ||||
July 1702 | John Evelyn | |||||
December 1702 | Sir Robert Clayton
|
Whig
| ||||
1705 | George Evelyn | |||||
1708 | Thomas Onslow | |||||
1715 | (Sir) William Clayton[7] | |||||
1724 | Henry Herbert | |||||
1727 | Sir Orlando Bridgeman | Whig
| ||||
1734 | (Sir) Kenrick Clayton[8]
|
|||||
1745 | William Clayton | |||||
1761 | (Sir) Charles Whitworth[9] | |||||
1768 | (Sir) Robert Clayton | |||||
1769 | Frederick Standert | |||||
1780 | John Kenrick | |||||
1783 | John Nicholls | |||||
1787 | (Sir) Robert Clayton | |||||
1790 | Philip Francis
|
|||||
1796 | Sir Lionel Copley[10] | John Stein | ||||
1797 | Benjamin Hobhouse | |||||
1802 | James Milnes | John Benn Walsh | ||||
1805 | Nicholas Ridley-Colborne | |||||
1806 | Josias du Pre Porcher
|
William Kenrick | ||||
January 1807 | John Alexander Bannerman | |||||
May 1807 | Thomas Freeman-Heathcote | |||||
1809 | Charles Cockerell | |||||
October 1812 | Sir Charles Talbot | |||||
December 1812 | Robert Newman | |||||
1814 | John Bolland | |||||
1818 | Matthew Russell | Whig
|
George Tennyson | Whig
| ||
February 1819 | Sir William Curtis | Tory
| ||||
February 1819 | Marquess of Titchfield
|
Whig
| ||||
1820 | Edward Henry Edwardes | |||||
1822 | Lord Francis Leveson-Gower | Tory
| ||||
1826 | William Russell
|
Whig
|
Charles Tennyson | Whig
| ||
1827 | Hon. William Lamb | Whig
| ||||
1828 | William Ewart
|
Whig[11]
| ||||
1830 | Robert William Mills | Whig[12]
| ||||
February 1831 | Sir William Horne
|
Whig[13]
| ||||
April 1831 | Hon. John Ponsonby | Whig[14]
| ||||
July 1831 | Thomas Hyde Villiers | Whig[15]
|
Viscount Palmerston | Whig
| ||
1832 | Constituency abolished |
Notes
- ^ Brayley, Edward Wedlake (1844). The history of Surrey, Volume 4, Part 1. p. 114.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q "History of Parliament". History of Parliament Trust. Retrieved 23 October 2011.
- ^ "EYLOVE, Roger II, of Bletchingley, Surr. | History of Parliament Online".
- ^ Cavill. The English Parliaments of Henry VII 1485-1504.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j "History of Parliament". History of Parliament Trust. Retrieved 23 October 2011.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j "History of Parliament". History of Parliament Trust. Retrieved 23 October 2011.
- ^ Created a baronet, January 1732
- ^ Succeeded to his baronetcy, December 1744
- ^ Knighted 1768
- ^ Copley was also elected for Tregony, which he chose to represent, and never sat for Bletchingley
- ^ Escott, Margaret. "EWART, William (1798-1869), of Mossley Hill, Liverpool, Lancs. and 16 Eaton Place, Mdx". The History of Parliament. Retrieved 25 May 2020.
- ^ Fisher, David R. "MILLS, Robert William (1777-1851), of Willington, co. Dur". The History of Parliament. Retrieved 25 May 2020.
- ^ Fisher, David R. "HORNE, Sir William (1773-1860), of 19 Old Square, Lincoln's Inn; 49 Upper Harley Street, Mdx. and Epping House, Little Berkhampstead, Herts". The History of Parliament. Retrieved 25 May 2020.
- ^ Fisher, David R.; Salmon, Philip. "PONSONBY, John George Brabazon (1809-1880)". The History of Parliament. Retrieved 25 May 2020.
- ^ Fisher, David R. "VILLIERS, Thomas Hyde (1801-1832), of 8 Suffolk Street, Haymarket and 6 Cleveland Court, Westminster, Mdx". The History of Parliament. Retrieved 25 May 2020.
Election results
Elections in the 1830s
Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Whig | Thomas Hyde Villiers | Unopposed | |||
Whig | Henry John Temple | Unopposed | |||
Registered electors | c. 70 | ||||
Whig hold | |||||
Whig hold |
- Caused by Ponsonby's resignation and Tennyson's decision to sit for Stamford, where he had also been elected.
Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Whig | John Ponsonby | Unopposed | |||
Whig | Charles Tennyson | Unopposed | |||
Registered electors | c. 70 | ||||
Whig hold | |||||
Whig hold |
Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Whig | William Horne
|
Unopposed | |||
Registered electors | c. 70 | ||||
Whig hold |
- Caused by Mills' resignation
Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Whig | Charles Tennyson | Unopposed | |||
Registered electors | c. 70 | ||||
Whig hold |
- Caused by Tennyson's appointment as Clerk of the Ordnance
Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Whig | Robert William Mills | Unopposed | |||
Whig | Charles Tennyson | Unopposed | |||
Whig hold | |||||
Whig hold |
References
- Robert Beatson, A Chronological Register of Both Houses of Parliament (London: Longman, Hurst, Res & Orme, 1807) [1]
- D Brunton & D H Pennington, Members of the Long Parliament (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1954)
- Cobbett's Parliamentary history of England, from the Norman Conquest in 1066 to the year 1803 (London: Thomas Hansard, 1808) [2]
- David W Hayton, Stuart Handley and Eveline Cruickshanks, The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1690-1715 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002)
- Maija Jansson (ed.), Proceedings in Parliament, 1614 (House of Commons) (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1988) [3]
- Lewis Namier & John Brooke, The History of Parliament: The House of Commons 1754-1790 (London: HMSO, 1964)
- J. E. Neale, The Elizabethan House of Commons (London: Jonathan Cape, 1949)
- T. H. B. Oldfield, The Representative History of Great Britain and Ireland (London: Baldwin, Cradock & Joy, 1816)
- J Holladay Philbin, Parliamentary Representation 1832 - England and Wales (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1965)
- Henry Stooks Smith, The Parliaments of England from 1715 to 1847 (2nd edition, edited by FWS Craig - Chichester: Parliamentary Reference Publications, 1973)
- Robert Walcott, English Politics in the Early Eighteenth Century (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1956)
- Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs – Constituencies beginning with "B" (part 3)