Boroughbridge (UK Parliament constituency)
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| Boroughbridge Borough constituency |
|
|---|---|
| Created: | 1553 |
| Abolished: | 1832 |
| Type: | House of Commons |
| Members: | two |
Boroughbridge was a parliamentary borough in Yorkshire from 1553 until 1832, when it was abolished under the Great Reform Act. Throughout its existence it was represented by two Members of Parliament in the House of Commons.
The constituency consisted of the market town of Boroughbridge in the parish of Aldborough (which was also a borough with two MPs of its own). By 1831 it contained only 154 houses, and had a population of 947.
Boroughbridge was a burgage borough, meaning that the right to vote was vested in the tenants of certain specified properties, of which there seem to have been about 65 by the time the borough was abolished. Since these properties could be freely bought and sold, the effective power of election rested with whoever owned the majority of the burgages (who, if necessary, could simply assign the tenancies to reliable placemen shortly before an election). For more than a century before the Reform Act, Boroughbridge was owned by the Dukes of Newcastle, who controlled around fifteen seats across the country; however in the 1790s they sold one of the seats for £4,000 to the banker Thomas Coutts, who used it to put his son-in-law, Francis Burdett, into Parliament.
Contents |
[edit] Members of Parliament
- Constituency created (1553)
[edit] 1553-1660
- 1586-1587: George Savile
- 1601: Thomas Fairfax
- 1601: Richard Whaley
- 1640: Ferdinando, Lord Fairfax
- 1640: ?
- 1640-1653: Thomas Mauleverer (Parliamentarian) - Sir Thomas Mauleverer, Bt., from August 1641
- 1640-1647: Sir Philip Stapylton (Parliamentarian) - died September 1647
- 1648: Henry Stapylton - excluded in Pride's Purge, December 1648
Boroughbridge was unrepresented in the Barebones Parliament and the First and Second Parliaments of the Protectorate
- 1659: Colonel Parsons
Long Parliament (restored)
- 1660: Henry Stapylton
Second seat vacant owing to the death of Sir Thomas Mauleverer
[edit] 1660-1832
| Year | First member | First party | Second member | Second party | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1660 | Conyers Darcy | Sir Henry Stapylton | ||||
| 1661 | Sir Richard Mauleverer, Bt | Robert Long[1] | ||||
| 1673 | Sir Henry Goodricke, Bt | |||||
| 1675 | Sir Michael Warton | |||||
| March 1679 | Sir Thomas Mauleverer, Bt | |||||
| August 1679 | Sir John Brookes, Bt. | |||||
| 1685 | Sir Henry Goodricke, Bt | |||||
| 1689 | Christopher Vane[2] | Whig | ||||
| 1690 | Sir Brian Stapylton | |||||
| 1695 | Thomas Harrison | |||||
| 1698 | Sir Brian Stapylton | |||||
| 1705 | John Stapylton | Craven Peyton | ||||
| 1708 | Sir Brian Stapylton | |||||
| 1713 | Edmund Dunch | |||||
| 1715 | Thomas Wilkinson | Sir Richard Steele | Whig | |||
| 1718 | Sir Wilfrid Lawson, Bt | |||||
| March 1722 | Conyers Darcy[3] | James Tyrrell | ||||
| October 1722 | Joseph Danvers | |||||
| 1727 | George Gregory | |||||
| 1742 | William Murray | Tory | ||||
| 1746 | Earl of Dalkeith | |||||
| 1750 | Hon. Lewis Monson Watson | |||||
| April 1754 | Lewis Watson the younger | |||||
| December 1754 | John Fuller | |||||
| 1755 | Sir Cecil Bisshopp, Bt | |||||
| 1756 | Earl of Euston[4] | Whig | ||||
| 1757 | Thomas Thoroton | |||||
| 1761 | Brice Fisher | |||||
| 1767 | James West the younger | |||||
| 1768 | Nathaniel Cholmley | James West the elder | ||||
| 1772 | Henry Clinton | |||||
| 1774 | Anthony Eyre | Charles Mellish[5] | ||||
| 1775 | William Phillips | |||||
| 1780 | Charles Ambler | |||||
| 1784 | Sir Richard Sutton, Bt | The Viscount Palmerston | ||||
| 1790 | Morris Robinson | |||||
| 1796 | Francis Burdett[6] | Independent | Sir John Scott | Tory | ||
| 1799 | John Scott (junior) | Tory | ||||
| 1802 | Edward Berkeley Portman | Whig | ||||
| January 1806 | Viscount Castlereagh | Tory | ||||
| November 1806 | William Henry Clinton | Tory | Henry Dawkins | Tory | ||
| 1808 | Henry Clinton | Tory | ||||
| 1818 | Marmaduke Lawson | Tory | George Mundy | Tory | ||
| March 1820 | Richard Spooner | Tory | ||||
| June 1820 | Captain George Mundy, RN[7] | Tory | Lt Colonel Henry Dawkins | Tory | ||
| 1830 | Sir Charles Wetherell | Tory | Matthias Attwood | Tory | ||
- Constituency abolished (1832)
[edit] Notes
- ^ Created a baronet as Sir Robert Long in 1662
- ^ Vane was returned as MP at the election of 1689, but on petition he was unseated and Stapylton declared to have been elected in his place
- ^ Darcy was also elected for Richmond, which he chose to represent, and never sat for Boroughbridge
- ^ Euston was elected two weeks later in a by-election for Bury St Edmunds, which he chose to represent, and never sat for Boroughbridge
- ^ Mellish was also elected for Pontefract, which he chose to represent, and never sat for Boroughbridge
- ^ Succeeded to a baronetcy as Sir Francis Burdett in 1797
- ^ Spooner and Lawson were initially declared re-elected at the 1820 general election, but they were unseated and Mundy and Dawkins were returned on petition
[edit] References
- Michael Brock, "The Great Reform Act" (London: Hutchinson, 1973)
- D Brunton & D H Pennington, “Members of the Long Parliament” (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1954)
- 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)
- Frederic A Youngs, jr, "Guide to the Local Administrative Units of England, Vol II" (London: Royal Historical Society, 1991)
This page incorporates information from Leigh Rayment's Peerage Page.
