Stafford

Lying ‘in a low but pleasant situation’, on a fertile plain near the northern bank of the River Sow, Stafford enjoyed ‘fine romantic scenery’ and ‘highly salubrious’ air. The town produced hats and cutlery, but its traditional industry was leather, most notably the manufacture of shoes, which ‘at one time was so extensive that a single manufacturer has been able to give employment to 800 persons’, although this had recently ‘much declined’. The custom of Borough English, ‘by which the youngest son succeeds to property as heir’, still existed in this period, and was said to have arisen ‘from the ancient system of vassalage which gave the lord of the manor certain rights over his vassal’s bride’, rendering ‘the legitimacy of the eldest born uncertain’. Pigot’s Commercial Dir. (1822-3), 61; (1828-9), 731, 732. Stafford, whose electorate almost doubled in this period, was contested at ten of the 13 elections which took place between 1790 and 1831. From 1820 to 1831 its self-elected corporation of a mayor, ten other aldermen and ten capital burgesses made 639 new admissions to the freedom: 364 (57 per cent) by servitude, 253 (40) by birth and 22 (three) by honorary creation. In the election years of 1820, 1826 and 1830 there were 77, 286 and 199 respectively, it having become ‘a custom of the borough to hold courts (for admitting freemen) immediately preceding an election, sometimes on the morning of opening the poll’. PP (1831-2), xxxvi. 588; Staffs. Advertiser, 2 Nov. 1832. It was not unusual for the costs, which ranged from 50s. for servitude to 6s. 6d. for birth, to be ‘paid to the corporation by the agents of the candidates’. PP (1835), xxv. 622.

During the 1820s the corporation was challenged in a series of court cases brought by reformers. The investigations of a local solicitor, Charles Flint, who obtained a writ of mandamus to inspect the borough’s records in 1823, revealed 13 illegal members of the 1822 corporation, including the mayor, William Fowke. Of the 568 freemen investigated, 44 were declared dead, 33 illegal and 20 non-resident. Staffs. RO D3315/2. In spite of the ensuing litigation, which left the corporation owing costs of £8,500, the legality of the mayor’s conducting elections was, curiously, overlooked. His control over the admission of freemen gave the corporation and the Trentham interest of the 2nd marquess of Stafford, with whom it usually bargained, considerable influence, albeit one which declined during this period. Otherwise there was no commanding electoral interest, besides money. Stafford’s venality, as Edward Ellice told the Commons, 29 Mar. 1833, was as ‘notorious as the sun at noon-day’. Its Members were usually wealthy manufacturers or gentlemen, and at ‘all elections a regular market was opened for votes’. Bribery was routine and openly acknowledged by all the candidates, some of whom even defended the practice in their addresses. In 1825 the barrister John Campbell, who stood unsuccessfully in 1826 and was returned in 1830, reckoned the expenses at ‘£7 a single vote, £14 a plumper, to be paid about a twelvemonth after the election’. This put the costs of ‘voting-money’ somewhere ‘between £3,000 and £4,000’ and, with the addition of other expenses, total costs of £6,500 were not uncommon. In the House, 18 May 1835, Edward Divett claimed that ‘the price of a plumper’ was ‘fixed at £5 and of a split vote at £2 10s’. It was later alleged that the term ‘tipping’ derived from Tipping Street, situated in the town centre, where ‘the buying of votes usually took place’. Life of Campbell, i. 428; C. Calvert, Hist. Stafford, 23.

At the general election of 1820 George Chetwynd of Brocton Hall, near Lichfield and Richard Ironmonger, a ‘great coach proprietor’ and intimate friend of Richard Sheridan, a former Member, came forward. Samuel Homfray retired, but Benjamin Benyon of Haughton Hall, Shropshire, a linen manufacturer and Stafford’s radical Member since 1818, offered again. Sir William Burroughs of Castle Bagshaw, county Cavan, Member for Taunton, 1818-19, and George Harry William Hartopp, the eldest son of Sir Edmund Cradock Hartopp† of Four Oaks Hall, Warwickshire, offered but did not canvass, while Ralph Benson of Lutwyche Hall, Shropshire, Member in the 1812 Parliament, made a brief appearance after his arrangements at Bridgnorth had gone awry, but declined. Ironmonger’s first published address, in which he advocated ‘shorter parliaments’ and promised to help ‘rescue’ the depressed middle and lower classes from ‘the usurpations of the rich and powerful’, 26 Feb., was hastily retracted as having been ‘modified’ by ‘a friend’ following a meeting of the inhabitants and corporation called to vote an address of loyalty to the king, 1 Mar. In his modified address he declared himself to be ‘the advocate of temperate reform’ and ‘a loyal subject’. Benyon and Chetwynd, who had obtained the support of the corporation, emphasized their ‘independent principles’, and all three candidates spent ‘liberally’, Chetwynd to such an extent that he reversed ‘a probable desertion from his ranks’ and took the lead with 295 votes after the first day, when Benyon obtained 281 and Ironmonger 233. Staffs. Advertiser, 26 Feb., 4, 11 Mar.; Wolverhampton Chron. 1, 15 Mar. 1820. He maintained his lead throughout, securing support from 70 per cent of the 457 who polled (184 as split votes shared with Benyon, 114 shared with Ironmonger, and 24 as single votes or plumpers). Benyon received a vote from 67 per cent (118 shared with Ironmonger and four as plumpers), and Ironmonger 54 per cent (13 as plumpers). Of the 13 members of the corporation who voted, nine split for Benyon and Chetwynd and three plumped for Chetwynd, while a solitary alderman split for Ironmonger and Chetwynd, whose election dinner was attended by the mayor and clerk of the peace. An address from the town, signed by 375 electors, paid tribute to the conduct of Ironmonger in promptly settling his bills. William Salt Lib. Salt mss 445/8; Jones mss 7/42/00, Stafford ms pollbook; Staffs. Advertiser, 18, 25 Mar., 8 Apr. 1820.

On 19 Nov. 1820 Stafford was ‘partially illuminated’ to celebrate the abandonment of the bill of pains and penalties against Queen Caroline, but no meeting is known to have taken place. Staffs. Advertiser, 25 Nov. 1820, In the House, Chetwynd and Benyon took opposite sides on this issue and that of Catholic relief, against which petitions were presented to the Commons, 27 Feb. 1821, 17 Apr. 1823, 19 Apr. 1825 (the latter signed by 400-500 inhabitants, ‘many of them of the first respectability’), and to the Lords, 21 Apr. 1825. CJ, lxxvi. 114; lxxviii. 218; lxxx. 319; Staffs. Advertiser, 23 Apr. 1825; LJ, lvii, 607. One in favour reached the Commons, 19 Apr. 1825. CJ, lxxx. 320. A petition from the town’s tradesmen and shopkeepers against the Hawkers and Pedlars Act was presented by Chetwynd, 28 Feb. 1823. Ibid. lxxviii. 78. Littleton, the county Member, presented a petition from Stafford’s tanners, curriers and shoe manufacturers for repeal of the leather tax, 23 Feb. 1824, and the following day Chetwynd presented one for the abolition of slavery. CJ, lxxix. 81, 90. A petition against the beer retail bill from the town’s victuallers and brewers was presented by Benyon, 21 May, and one from the inhabitants for investigation into the prosecution of the Methodist missionary John Smith in Demerara was presented by Wrottesley, the other county Member, 25 May 1824. Ibid. 394, 412.

That April king’s bench, acting on information obtained from the investigation of the corporation the previous year, issued a writ of quo warranto against Chetwynd and another freeman, John Hawthorn, requiring them to show on what authority they claimed their rights, given that they were both non-resident. Their appeals were rejected, 20 May 1824, and the ensuing hearing at Gloucester assizes turned on whether or not ‘the right of electing burgesses’ had been transferred to the common council under ‘a by-law now lost’, and whether ‘11 members’ of the corporation ‘were sufficient’ for such elections. Similar prosecutions the following year challenged the legality of individual aldermen and capital burgesses, arguing that the practice of their election by a majority of the whole council, instead of a majority of aldermen and capital burgesses separately, was also invalid. These two sets of cases, initially distinct, became closely linked: if the election of individual corporate members were void, the existence of any form of legal majority within the council could also be questioned, effectively invalidating all its actions. S.M. Hardy and R.C. Baily, ‘Downfall of Gower Interest in Staffs. Boroughs’, Colls. Hist. Staffs. (1950-1), 287-9; Staffs. Advertiser, 29 May 1824, 16, 23 Apr. 1825; VCH Staffs. vi. 225, 226. Rumours of an impending dissolution during the summer of 1825 prompted a deputation from the ‘independent’ freemen to approach Campbell, who was professionally involved in both cases against the corporation. Fearing that ‘the expense would be enormous’, he declined, but following a renewed approach, 8 Sept., when he was assured that ‘a great majority’ of the electors ‘were willing to renounce voting-money’, he agreed to stand at the next election. In a speech before his canvass, 12 Sept. 1825, he referred to his leading role in the litigation against the corporation, which, he claimed, was guilty of ‘modern usurpation’ of the borough’s ancient rights. He declared himself ‘a friend to Catholic emancipation’, but after ‘some slight disapprobation’, added that he was ‘no friend to Popery’, to which he had ‘a peculiar aversion’. Pledging his support for free trade, he praised the ‘liberal and wise’ commercial policy of the government. His canvass was promising. ‘Were Parliament now dissolved’, he informed his brother, 18 Sept., ‘I really believe that I should have a very fair chance’. The dissolution, however, did not take place at that time, allowing friendly feelings to ‘subside, and most of the promises I have received [to] be forgotten’. When it finally occurred in late May 1826, he nevertheless resolved to ‘go down and take my chance’. The Times, 16 Sept. 1825; Life of Campbell, i. 428-30.

At the 1826 general election the sitting Members retired, Chetwynd on account of his succession to the family seat in Warwickshire and Benyon to attend to his ailing business. Ironmonger and Benson both came forward with the backing of the corporation, whose activities, especially in the creation of illegal freemen, remained at the nub of Campbell’s campaign. Assisted by his brother-in-law James Scarlett, the soldier son of the Whig lawyer, who ‘rendered himself so popular’ that ‘he was strongly pressed to start as a candidate himself’, Campbell reiterated his support for Catholic emancipation, while Benson pledged to do nothing which ‘would endanger the Protestant establishment’. Staffs. Advertiser, 27 May, 3 June; Aris’s Birmingham Gazette, 29 May, 12 June 1826; Life of Campbell, i. 434. ‘A week of great uproar and drunkenness’ ensued, during which the electors ‘fared well every day ... without a single drawing from his own exchequer’. On the eve of the poll ‘the greatest activity prevailed among the different parties’, with Campbell ‘between the hours of twelve and three ... haranguing the burgesses in various parts of the town’ and ‘some of his adherents ... parading the streets throughout the whole night’. At the end of the first day Ironmonger had a clear lead, with 384 votes, leaving the contest mainly between Benson and Campbell, who had 287 and 281 respectively. The mayor’s admission of nearly 300 new voters, including 100 non-resident freemen ‘who had not taken their oaths previously to the election’, many of whom were ‘honorary’, helped to secure Benson’s return in second place the next day. Staffs. Advertiser, 10, 17, 24 June; The Times, 13 June; Wolverhampton Chron. 14 June 1826; Hardy and Baily, 286. Ironmonger received support from 74 per cent of the 826 who voted (368 as split votes shared with Benson, 224 as splits with Campbell, and 17 as plumpers). Benson secured support from 59 per cent (84 as split votes with Campbell and 35 as plumpers), and Campbell from 49 per cent (98 as plumpers). The pollbook does not record occupations or residence, but the local press credited Ironmonger and Benson with backing from ‘the most respectable part of the burgesses’, and Campbell with the support of ‘those moving in the lower ranks of life’. All 12 members of the corporation who voted split for Ironmonger and Benson. Stafford Pollbook (1826); Staffs. Advertiser, 10 June 1826. Campbell, who had ‘objected to the honorary burgesses (or towheads) being allowed to poll’, hoped ‘that it would still turn out that he had a majority of legal votes’, and publicly threatened to petition against their admission. In private, however, he admitted that his chances had been ‘considerably diminished’ when his ‘principal agent was taken dangerously ill about ten days before’, whereupon Benson’s agents had begun ‘openly offering money to be instantly paid to those who would turn from me’. Staffs. Advertiser, 17, 24 June 1826; Life of Campbell, i. 431-3.

Talk of a petition was cut short by Ironmonger’s death the following month. ‘The burgesses’, observed the local press, ‘had scarcely wiped away the tears when their spirits returned with an unusual flow at the prospect of a warm contest and, consequently, plenty of drink’. Staffs. Advertiser, 12 Aug. 1826. A ‘whole posse’ of candidates was rumoured, among them Charles Sheridan, a son of the former Member, John Evelyn Denison of Ossington Hall, Nottinghamshire, late Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme, Colonel Thomas Wilson Patten of Wotton Park, Staffordshire, who had sat for the borough, 1812-18, Sir Roger Gresley* of Drakelow Park, a candidate for Lichfield at the general election, and one Waterhouse, a coach proprietor. Chetwynd and Campbell, who was busy ‘repairing his broken fortunes’, declined. Fortunatas Dwarris, a barrister of the midland circuit, William Hughes Hughes* of Clapham Common, Surrey, a candidate for Oxford at the general election, and Sir William Wynne, the governor of Sandown Fort, Isle of White, declared an interest, and Richard Spooner*, a Birmingham banker, commenced a canvass, boasting that ‘not all the candidates under heaven could prevent his return’. Wynne offered, but on 1 Dec. withdrew without explanation, casting ‘a gloom over electioneering matters’ and prompting an unsuccessful deputation to the metropolis ‘for the purpose of bringing Mr. Campbell once more into the field’. On 8 Dec., with only a week left before polling, Thomas Beaumont, Whig Member for Northumberland in the 1820 Parliament, came forward as the advocate of reduced public expenditure, repeal of the leather tax and, like Spooner, free trade. The Times, 8, 24 Aug., 12, 16 Dec.; Staffs. Advertiser, 19 Aug., 2, 9 Dec.; Life of Campbell, i. 435; Aris’s Birmingham Gazette, 4, 11 Dec. 1826. Campbell later claimed to have

sent him there, that the world might see what Stafford is, and not blame me for relinquishing it. On his entering the town, by way of foretaste, he gave a £1 Bank of England note to every voter who applied for it; and he soon distributed as many bank notes as there are voters in the place. They put them in their hats, and openly paraded the streets with them by way of cockades. No credit would be given for voting-money for more than five minutes after the vote was given. Having voted, the voter had a card, which he carried to an adjoining public house, and which instantly produced him eight guineas. Life of Campbell, i. 436.

Ellice later told the Commons, 29 Mar. 1833, that Beaumont had spent ‘£14,000 or £15,000’. Lurid newspaper accounts spoke of ‘beastly drunkenness’ and ‘rounds of pugilistic appeal’, prompting the Staffordshire Mercury to point out that ‘the clamour and corruption of the lower classes’ was hardly ‘entirely new or foreign to the place’. The Times, 16 Dec.; Staffs. Mercury, 30 Dec. 1826. After the first day’s poll, when Beaumont and Spooner secured 136 and 125 votes respectively, the former’s supporters ‘demolished the glass and frame of all the lower windows’ of his rival’s headquarters at the George Inn. Spooner ‘gradually lost ground’ the next day, many voters breaking their pledges in ‘outrageous breaches of good faith’, as if a ‘powerful magic charm’ had ‘been at work during the night’. At the close Beaumont had a majority of 60 votes, but he admitted in public that

as a reformer, he would not be so hypocritical as to withhold the fact that unconstitutional means had been used to secure his return. It was a system which was inconsistent with the constitution, but it was one which was permitted to exist, and had the sanction of precedent. He had acted upon the principle that the end justified the means ... The town would be benefited by the sums that had been expended upon it, and many poor families would be made comfortable.

‘The business’, concluded The Times, ‘has been done in so open a manner, that it is said the borough will be Grampounded’. An address signed by 281 electors paid tribute to Spooner and condemned the way in which he had been ‘scurvily treated by many of the burgesses’. Staffs. Advertiser, 16, 23 Dec.; Aris’s Birmingham Gazette, 18 Dec.; The Times, 21 Dec. 1826.

In 1827 the successful prosecution of the mayor, Francis Hughes, by Campbell effectively made the corporation ‘legally defunct’, and it was forced to petition for a new charter on the ground that its members were below the number required by law to constitute a legal assembly. The old charter, which dated back to 1206, was dissolved and a new one ‘differing in little from the former’, but requiring ‘a majority of each component part’ of the corporation in elections, was granted, 6 Sept. 1827. The reformers’ victory, however, was short-lived. Chetwynd demonstrated that his election as a burgess, 6 Mar. 1820, had been valid, and in February 1828 Campbell lost a suit against Hughes, whose re-election as mayor had been challenged ‘on the grounds that the charter lately granted had not been duly accepted’. Staffs. Dir. (1834), 118, 137-40; PP (1835) xxv. 618; Boroughs and Municipal Corporations of the United Kingdom (1835) ed. H.A. Merewether and A.J. Stephens, iii. 2214-15; The Times, 24 Jan., 11 Feb. 1828; Staffs. RO D1323/A/1/4, 5, town council order bks. 1818-41; Hardy and Bailey, 286-93. Petitions from local Catholics for relief reached both Houses, 6 May 1828. CJ, lxxxiii. 319; LJ, lx. 344. One from the clergy and archdeaconry against the Wellington ministry’s concession of emancipation was presented to the Lords, 7 Apr. 1829. LJ, lxi. 365. Both Members supported that measure, although Benson was initially hostile. He presented a local petition against the town’s improvement bill, 5 Apr. 1830, but moved its second reading that day, and it became law, 29 May 1830. CJ, lxxxv. 259, 499.

At the 1830 general election Benson and Beaumont retired, but ‘to the great grief of the burgesses’, no candidate ‘announced himself’, causing the price of votes to drop. A number of possible contenders were ‘spoken of’, including Forest Cunliffe, son-in-law of the late Lord Crewe, Ralph Bourne of Hilderstone Hall and Gresley. Thomas Gladstone*, the eldest son of a Liverpool ship owner and West India merchant, was advised by Littleton that success was ‘positively certain’ for £5,000, ‘with a future return secured by paying your money within two years’, but, in deference to his father’s opinions, he ‘felt that Stafford would not do’. Staffs. Advertiser, 10, 17 July; Wolverhampton Chron. 14 July; Lichfield Mercury, 16 July; St. Deiniol’s Lib. Glynne-Gladstone mss 195, T. to J. Gladstone, 28 June 1830. As Campbell observed, shortly before accepting ‘a very tempting invitation from my old friends’ to stand, ‘the character of the place is so bad that all other candidates are frightened away’. Life of Campbell i. 474. The declaration of Thomas Gisborne of Horwich House, Derbyshire, the eldest son of the Rev. Thomas Gisborne of Yoxall Lodge, Staffordshire, whose agents immediately ‘set to work’ distributing ‘money tickets indiscriminately to the burgesses’, left only the question of a third man, without whom there would be no contest. C. H. Webb, a solicitor, and Thomas Hawkes, captain of the Himley troop of yeomanry cavalry in Derbyshire and a county magistrate, were rumoured, but Spooner, whose treatment in 1826 had won him sympathy, was persuaded to come forward, only to withdraw almost immediately on account of having spent ‘£6,500 and upwards’ at the previous election. The eminent civilian Joseph Phillimore* went to Stafford in secret, hoping to enter the field ‘for a few hundreds’, but was pre-empted by a successful deputation to Hawkes who, having been ‘brought into the town in triumph, attended by a vast concourse of persons’, started canvassing with only two days to go. Christ Church, Oxf. Phillimore mss, E. to R. Phillimore, 26 July 1830; Birmingham Jnl. 31 July; Wolverhampton Chron. 4 Aug. 1830. Gisborne, who spent liberally, publicly defended the ‘poor man’s disposing of that by retail, which the rich man could with impunity sell by wholesale’, and promised to oppose any ‘partial reforms’ of the representative system and support only a measure ‘which went to the bottom of things’. Campbell declared his approval of the Wellington administration and the recent repeal of the leather tax. All three candidates professed ‘independent political principles’. Staffs. Mercury, 24 July; Lichfield Mercury, 30 July; Staffs. Advertiser, 7 Aug. 1830. At the end of the first day Gisborne led on 486, with Campbell on 437 and Hawkes on 206. Next day Gisborne was returned at the top of the poll with support from 77 per cent of the 864 who voted (417 as split votes with Campbell, 222 as splits with Hawkes, and 27 as plumpers). Campbell obtained backing from 71 per cent (78 as splits with Hawkes and 115 as plumpers). Hawkes, whose defeat was ‘solely attributable to the late period at which he commenced his canvass’, received only 35 per cent (five as plumpers). Stafford Pollbook (1830). Like Ironmonger and Spooner in earlier contests, he was praised for his ‘gentlemanly behaviour’, which had ‘made a deep and lasting impression’ on the freemen, a ‘great number’ of whom ‘pledged their support at any future period’ and subscribed towards ‘a piece of plate, to be presented by them’. Wolverhampton Chron. 4 Aug.; Staffs. Advertiser, 7 Aug.; Staffs. Mercury, 7 Aug. 1830. Constituency petitions for the abolition of slavery were presented by Campbell, 3 Nov., and by Gisborne, 9 Nov. 1830, and to the Lords, 9, 22 Nov. 1830, 19 Apr. 1831. CJ, lxxxvi. 20, 49; LJ, lxiii. 32, 115, 472. One in support of the Grey ministry’s reform bill, which was ‘in course of signature in this town’ on 9 Apr., was presented by Gisborne on the 18th. CJ, lxxxvi. 505-6; Staffs. Advertiser, 9 Apr. 1831. Both Members supported that measure, although Campbell initially had misgivings and welcomed concessions which would preserve freemen’s rights.

At the 1831 general election Gisborne, whose hopes of filling a vacancy for Derbyshire had foundered, and Campbell offered again as reformers, both claiming the credit for obtaining from ministers ‘a promise that the children and apprentices of burgesses should not lose their right’ to the franchise under the bill’s provisions. Campbell’s initial reception was ‘not enthusiastic’, however, on account of his refusing ‘to pay anything till the election is completed’. Staffs. Advertiser, 23 Apr. 1831; C. E. Hogarth, ‘Derbys. Parl. Elections of 1832’, Derbys. Arch. Jnl. lxxxix (1969), 72-73; Life of Campbell, i. 512. A third reform candidate, Francis Lloyd, the son of a Birmingham banker connected with trade, also came forward, only to withdraw after his ‘sojourn amongst the burgesses of Stafford for a few hours cost him upwards of £500’. News of his flight left the electors ‘panic struck’, and a deputation immediately set off to Hawkes who, on the strength of his popularity at the previous election, and allegedly ‘backed by the purse’ of the eccentric earl of Dudley, accepted. A ‘sharp contest’ ensued in which ‘the taps of all the public houses in the town ran freely’. By the day of nomination, Gisborne’s ‘cause seemed to be rather on the wane’, and during the first day of polling Hawkes and Gisborne ‘were within but a few votes of each other’, closing on 299 and 298 respectively. Next day, however, ‘a manifest alteration took place’ as ‘many of Gisborne’s friends began voting singly in his favour’, enabling him to be returned in second place. Staffs. Advertiser, 23, 30 Apr., 7 May; The Times, 27 Apr.; Lichfield Mercury, 29 Apr.; Staffs. Mercury, 30 Apr., 7 May 1831. Campbell, who led throughout, received support from 66 per cent of the 847 who polled (258 as split votes with Gisborne, 207 as splits with Hawkes, and 91 as plumpers). Gisborne secured backing from 62 per cent (182 as shared votes with Hawkes and 82 as plumpers), and Hawkes from 49 per cent (27 as plumpers). Stafford Pollbook (1831). Hawkes’s defeat was ‘attributed by some to his not having declared himself decidedly in favour of schedules A and B in the reform bill, and by others to his refusing to spend a sum of money sufficiently large to secure his return’. In private, Campbell admitted that there had been sufficient ‘bribery and treating ... to unseat the whole House of Commons’, and Hawkes’s supporters spoke of petitioning ‘on the grounds of bribery’, but nothing came of this. Explaining ‘why he was not as formerly at the head of the poll’, Gisborne cited the presence of Mrs. Campbell at the hustings and vowed to ‘not now come among them unattended by his lady’. ‘She has been very popular’, Campbell informed his brother, and ‘the common mode of giving a plumper was to vote for Mr. and Mrs. Campbell’. Staffs. Advertiser, 7 May; Staffs. Mercury, 7 May 1831; Life of Campbell, i. 512.

Both Members gave general support to the reform bills and on 7 June 1832 Campbell said in the House that he saw nothing objectionable in Stafford’s treatment by the boundary commissioners, who had recommended adding Forebridge, ‘a suburb on the south side’ containing about 40 houses rated at £10 or above, to the existing constituency. By the Reform Act 468 £10 householders joined the remaining freemen (some of whom had been registered as householders), giving a total registered electorate of 1,176. PP (1831-2), xxxvi. 326; xl. 5, 6. Campbell presented a petition against the removal of the polling place for North Staffordshire from the borough, 13 June. CJ, lxxxvii. 397. A declaration against the bill ‘signed by certain parties in Stafford’ and expressing ‘dissent from the resolutions in favour of the reform bill passed at a county meeting held in Stafford in March last’ appeared in The Times, 17 June 1832. Both Members retired at that year’s general election, when 1,049 polled in a contest between three Liberals. Following an inquiry into the disappearance of the pollbook and allegations of gross bribery, the result was declared void and the writ suspended. The borough narrowly escaped disfranchisement in 1835, and a writ was again withheld following the resignation of one of the Members in May of that year. ‘Notorious for its bribery’, Stafford remained ‘one of the purest examples, technically speaking, of a rotten borough after the Reform Act’. PP (1833), xi, passim.; VCH Staffs. vi. 238; N. Gash, Politics in Age of Peel, 158.