Durham County

A county palatine of four wards or deaneries (Chester, Darlington, Easington and Stockton) Durham was agriculturally diverse and had rich deposits of coal, iron and lead. Despite their repeated requests to be transferred to Northumberland, the detached rural districts of Bedlingtonshire, Islandshire and Norhamshire, south of Berwick-upon-Tweed, remained part of the representative county of Durham until 1832 and of the administrative county until 1834. The only parliamentary borough, the city of Durham, was the assize and election town. The other principal market towns were Barnard Castle, Bishop Auckland, Chester-le-Street, Darlington, Gateshead, Hartlepool, Sedgefield, South Shields, Staindrop, Stanhope, Stockton and Sunderland. Parl. Gazetteer of England and Wales (1844), i. 631-9; Durham Chron. 10 June 1826; Durham Co. Advertiser, 21 Mar. 1834. Commercial, mining and shipping enterprises in Tyneside (Gateshead and South Shields) and Weardale (Sunderland), in which the gentry had a stake, had blurred the distinction between land and trade in the populous northern wards of Chester and Easington, where 59 per cent of the enumerated population resided in 1821. This proportion had by 1831 fallen to 54 per cent, reflecting the rapid industrialization of the southern wards, especially the development of the Teesdale towns of Stockton, Darlington and Hartlepool. (Seaham, where the 3rd marquess of Londonderry built a new harbour and coal mining town, 1821-32, was in Easington Ward.) Based on VCH Dur. ii-iv. The clamour for attendant local legislation, especially rival schemes for tramways, roads, railways harbours and civic improvements, placed unprecedented demands on the Members, while underrepresentation (two county and two borough seats for a population of 207,673 in 1821 and 253,910 in 1831), commercial and dynastic rivalries and depressions in the shipping, wool and lead markets encouraged political in-fighting. Tenure or control of a county and a city seat by the same family had habitually been resisted. Durham CRO, Londonderry mss D/Lo/C83/177.

The strongest territorial interests were those of the Whig boroughmonger William Harry Vane†, 3rd earl of Darlington, of Raby Castle, the lord lieutenant since 1792, and of the church, whose head, the bishop of Durham, appointed the sheriff and county officers. The freeholders had last polled in 1807, and party loyalties, fostered in the Tory Durham County Advertiser, the Whig Durham Chronicle and the Newcastle-upon-Tyne papers, remained well defined. The Whigs were dominant among the gentry, many of whom also had votes and interests in neighbouring Northumberland and Newcastle. In 1820 the sitting Members were the Whig reformer John George Lambton, first returned on the death of Sir Harry Vane Tempest of Wynyard in 1813, and the Whig moderate William Powlett, Darlington’s second son, who had been substituted for his brother Viscount Barnard* in 1815. Both were expected to seek re-election. HP Commons, 1790-1820, ii. 148-51. Lambton’s role in returning the Whig veteran Michael Taylor* for Durham in 1818 and his decision to promote a radical address and reform meetings after Peterloo (which Powlett had shunned because he accepted that some repressive legislation was necessary) had, however, triggered a formidable campaign to unseat him, orchestrated by the dean of Durham, Henry Phillpotts. Newcastle Courant, 23 Oct., 6 Nov. 1819; ‘Tracts (1819-20)’ [BL 8135.e.l.]; R.N. Shutte, Life of Phillpotts (1863), i. 44-47. Neither Member signed the ‘moderate’ declaration headed by the bishop, Shute Barrington, the sheriff, his nephew William Keppel Barrington of Sedgefield, and his brother Viscount Barrington. The signatories included the earl of Bridgwater, Lord Strathmore of Streatlam and Sir Thomas Henry Liddell† of Ravensworth and Matthew Russell* of Brancepeth, whose sons were manoeuvring as prospective candidates and deliberately wanted to distance themselves from Lambton. Newcastle Courant, 13 Nov. 1819. The Members issued canvassing notices directly the death of George III was announced, Lambton as an unrepentant reformer, Powlett as a protector of ‘people’s rights and the safety of the state’. The Times, 2 Feb.; Tyne Mercury, 8 Feb. 1820. Initially, it seemed that hostility to Lambton would be deflected and confined to the city, where the foreign secretary Lord Castlereagh’s half-brother Lord Charles Stewart† was, as husband of the Vane Tempest heiress Frances Anne, determined to substitute his kinsman Sir Henry Hardinge* for Taylor, whose cause Lambton again espoused. A.J. Heesom, ‘"Legitimate" versus "Illegitimate" Influence: Aristocratic Engineering in Mid Victorian Britain’, PH, vii (1988), 289-91. However, faced with making Hardinge their priority in the city, where the sitting Tory Richard Wharton† lacked funds, government encouraged Wharton to switch to the county, where Russell and Liddell declined now to put forward their sons. He was duly requisitioned, 26 Feb., approved by the bishop, Strathmore, Stewart and the Liddells, and declared the following day as a ‘church and state’ candidate of proven commitment to local concerns. He acknowledged that ‘in point of property I have no pretensions to that high station’. Six thousand pounds subscribed and £4,000 promised supplied the deficit. Tyne Mercury, 8, 29 Feb.; Newcastle Courant, 26 Feb., 4 Mar. 1820; PRO NI, Londonderry mss D3030/Q2/2; Lonsdale mss, Lowther to Lonsdale, 9 Feb., Wharton to Lowther, Mon., Thurs. [1820]. Assessing Wharton’s prospects, Strathmore, who had already been sounded by the patronage secretary Charles Arbuthnot*, warned the premier Lord Liverpool, 28 Feb., that the Sunderland ship owners who had first suggested Wharton could not finance a contest. Arbuthnot added that certain country squires resented being asked to back the ship owners’ choice, while others disliked having Wharton foisted on them to further Stewart’s Durham interest. Add. 38485, f. 294. In his letter of 5 Mar. to Powlett’s committee chairman William Chaytor† of Witton Castle, Phillpotts conceded that Wharton lacked status, but he eschewed all compromise:

The opposition is directed against Mr. Lambton. Mr. Powlett’s most honourable and constitutional line of politics secures to him the good wishes of those who think differently from him. Yet, unhappily, it will not be easy for us to support him, unless his friends show a readiness to give their second votes to Mr. Wharton. It would be a matter of deep regret if the results of our struggle were to unseat him ... Mr. Lambton’s strength in the great towns is understood to be very great; and he will be further strengthened by all that zeal, activity and ... expenditure can do for him. That party is made of more energetic material than their other opponents. Pprs. of Sir William Chaytor, 1771-1847 ed. M.Y. Ashcroft (N. Yorks. Co. RO Publications, l (1993 edn.)) [Hereafter, Chaytor Pprs.], 35.

Committees for the three candidates met daily in London, Durham, Barnard Castle, Berwick-upon-Tweed, Bishop Auckland, Gateshead, South Shields, Stockton and Sunderland. Lambton, who had the full backing of his father-in-law Lord Grey and the Northumberland and Durham Whigs, impressed with grand cavalcades and bold denouncements of the Liverpool government, in which he equated his campaign to safeguard the county’s ‘independence’ with Henry Brougham’s* ‘crusade’ against the Lowthers in Westmorland. Wharton’s committee secretary Rowland Burdon† of Castle Eden admitted that his candidate’s personal canvass was a disaster; but he could still rely on the ship owners and the anti-Catholic clergy. Powlett, whose father also had contests at Camelford, Ilchester, Milborne Port and Tregony to finance, denied coalescing with Lambton and further jeopardized his return by trying to don the mantle of ‘independence’. Lincs. AO, Tennyson d’Eyncourt mss 2Td’E/H108/32; Add. 38485, f. 294; Durham CRO, Strathmore mss D/St X/1/4/1-77; Grey mss, Tierney to Grey, 4 Mar., Grey to Ellice, 6 Mar.; The Times, 7, 13 Mar.; Newcastle Courant, 11 Mar.; Lonsdale mss, Long to Lonsdale, 1 Mar. 1820. The candidates assembled before a crowd of 12-15,000 in Durham, 13 Mar. Lambton, proposed by George Baker† of Elmore and the Newcastle banker and Member Sir Matthew White Ridley, denounced Wharton, a former chairman of ways and means and treasury secretary, as a ‘keeper of rotten boroughs’. The quarter sessions chairman General Arthur Aylmer of Walworth Castle and Chaytor sponsored Powlett, who with Lambton won the show of hands. Wharton, ill with gout (as was Strathmore), had retreated to the family estate of Old Park, Bishop Auckland, leaving his proposers, Colonel Sleigh of Stockton and James Grieve of Ord House, Berwick-upon-Tweed, to prove his qualification as a candidate, which Samuel Moulton Barrett* had disputed, and to demand a poll on his behalf. Lonsdale mss, Long to Lonsdale, 14 Mar.; The Times, 16, 17 Mar. 1820. Writing to Sir Robert Wilson* that evening, with the poll at Lambton 182, Powlett 87, Wharton 53, Grey predicted a swift victory for Lambton, which would ‘protect him against future attack’. Grey mss. Wharton (‘Pensioner Dick’) was criticized mercilessly in the Whig College Times, 13, 15, 17, 20 Mar., which, to the Liddells’ embarrassment, on the 17th printed Sir Thomas’s barbed correspondence with Lambton. It publicized the breach between them, the superficiality of Liddell’s support for Wharton (£1,000 and his personal vote only) and his manoeuvring to bring forward his son Henry Thomas Liddell* for Northumberland. Add. 38458, ff. 318, 320; Reid, Lord Durham, i. 136-8; The Times, 21 Mar.; Tyne Mercury, 21 Mar. 1820. After five days’ polling Lambton, whose friends were ‘out in all directions’, remained comfortably ahead (Lambton 1,627, Powlett 1,102, Wharton 865) and the poll closed suddenly on the morning of the sixth day at Lambton 1,731, Powlett 1,137, Wharton 874. Fewer than half the estimated electorate voted and 238 who tendered had their votes disallowed. PP (1831), xvi. 181; Newcastle Courant, 25 Mar. 1820. Lambton’s counsel, the Newcastle barrister James Losh observed:

Thus has ended this contest which has been gratifying in all respects, except the expense, to Mr. Lambton and his friends. It has proved no doubt that his popularity is great, but it has proved still more decisively, that his enemies are feeble, unpopular and formidable only from their intolerance, their violence and their hostility to every species of reform. Diaries and Corresp. of James Losh ed. E. Hughes (Surtees Soc. clxxi), i. 109.

Powlett’s costs are not known. Lambton, who spent an estimated £30,000, claimed 1,417 unpolled supporters and took the credit for turning over 150 votes to Powlett, ‘who might otherwise have been in danger’. Grey surmised:

I believe on the whole this has been a fortunate event for Lambton’s interest. I thought that by his advertisement he had rather unnecessarily challenged his adversaries to a contest. But as there could be no doubt of their hostility to him, and of their determination to attack him in the first opportunity; it was fortunate for him that they were provoked to do so just at the moment when he stood highest in popular favour, and when they could find no candidate but one, who united in his own person, in addition to the unpopularity of his cause, every possible disadvantage. Lambton has now shown a strength and power, and has created such a feeling in his favour, as will probably secure him against future attack; and the church have sustained a severe blow, not only from the general effect of such a defeat, but by the disqualification of at least 150 votes, which they commanded in the parish clerks, sextons, Sherborne Hospital, and one or two other hospitals. Grey mss, Grey to Ellice, 20 Mar. 1820.

Ministers were furious at the manner of Wharton’s retirement and the money wasted. Lonsdale mss, Long to Lonsdale, 20, 23 Mar. 1820; Fitzwilliam mss 101/1. Of 2,757 who polled, 64 per cent cast a vote for Lambton, 41 for Powlett and 33 for Wharton. Lambton received 928 plumpers (53 per cent of his total), Powlett 307 (27) and Wharton 487 (54). Lambton and Powlett had 618 split votes (35 and 54 per cent of their respective totals). Lambton shared 205 votes with Wharton (12 and 23 per cent of their respective totals); Powlett 212 (19 and 23 per cent of their respective totals). Eighty-five per cent of those polled cast a straight party vote (67 per cent Whig, 18 per cent Tory). Of 1,722 who plumped (62 per cent overall), 72 per cent did so for a Whig. Lambton topped the poll everywhere except in the hundred of Darlington. There, Powlett, who performed badly in the hundreds of Easington and Chester, obtained 58 per cent of his total vote (including 251 plumpers), and over a third (315 of 928) split Lambton-Powlett, leaving Wharton, who came second in Chester and Easington, a poor third. Durham Pollbook (1820) ed. G. Walker, which has printing errors in the votes for Easington and Chester Ward. Lambton hosted ‘independence’ dinners countywide and proposed the address of condolence and congratulation to George IV at a county meeting, 28 Mar. 1820. It gave his seconder Henry Liddell an opportunity to defend his father’s conduct at the election. Durham Chron. 1 Apr.; The Times, 4 Apr. 1820. Powlett subsequently made arrangements for closer scrutiny of the land tax returns, and Darlington withdrew his opposition to the Stockton-Darlington railway bill. Improvement bills for Stockton and Darlington were enacted and the route of the railway was altered to pacify the dowager duchess of Strathmore. It opened, 25 Sept. 1825. Chaytor Pprs. 37, 42-44, 47; CJ, lxxvi. 218, 249, 254, 281; lxxviii. 137, 274, 334; Durham Co. Advertiser, 30 Sept. 1825.

Lambton, who, with Taylor’s assistance, undertook most constituency business in the 1820 Parliament, presented petitions to the Commons for agricultural protection, 26 May 1820. Both Houses received petitions against the proposed alterations in the timber duties from the ship owners of Sunderland, 7 June. CJ, lxxv. 241-2, 286; LJ, liii. 114. The Members supported the campaign on Queen Caroline’s behalf and Barnard Castle, Bishop Auckland, Chester-le-Street, Darlington, Stockton, Sunderland and parts of Durham were illuminated, the cannon at Raby was fired, and ‘radical’ addresses were adopted to mark the abandonment of the bill of pains and penalties in November 1820. Add. 30115, f. 163; Tyne Mercury, 21, 28 Nov., 3 Dec. 1820. Lambton presented the resulting petitions, 24 Jan., 1, 2, 6 Feb. 1821, and he also instigated the requisition headed by Darlington for a county meeting, 13 Dec. 1820, to petition the Commons, 31 Jan., and the Lords, 5 Feb. 1821, in protest at the queen’s treatment. It also served as a platform for anti-government speeches by Lambton, Grey, Baker, Ridley, Taylor, the militia Colonel Henry Tower and Powlett, and a means of attaching a plea for reform to Caroline’s case. Henry Liddell, whose father became a coronation peer, Baron Ravensworth, in July 1821, was the sole dissentient. Fitzwilliam mss 102/5, 7; A. Mitchell, Whigs in Opposition, 151-2; Durham Co. Advertiser, 9 Dec.; Newcastle Courant, 16 Dec.; The Times, 14, 18, 19 Dec.; Grey mss, Tierney to Grey, 12, 13 Dec.; Bessborough mss, Grey to Duncannon, 25 Dec. 1820; CJ, lxxvi. 5, 15, 22, 27, 39; LJ, liv. 31. A scheme, hatched in the wake of the duke of Sussex’s October 1822 visit to Lambton Castle, for a county reform meeting was abandoned. Grey mss, Lambton to Grey, 7, 15 Dec. 1822. The county joined in the petitioning for government action to combat agricultural distress, 22 Feb. 1821, 29 Apr., 10 May 1822, and against corn law revision, 25, 26 Apr. 1825. CJ, lxxvi. 100; lxxvii. 213; lxxx. 337, 343; LJ, liv. 165. Opposition to liberal economic policies, the quest for continued tariff protection and measures to boost falling profits in the coal and carrying trades during the economic downturn motivated the ship owners of Shields and Sunderland to submit further petitions for revision of the timber duties, 26 Feb. 1821, and repeal of the coastwise coal duty, 21 Mar., 9 Apr. 1821, 27 Mar., 16 May 1823, and against the relaxation of the navigation laws, 6, 20 May 1822, 12, 14 Apr. 1826. The Commons received petitions from the same sources against the warehousing bill, 21 Apr. 1823. CJ, lxxvi. 108; lxxvii. 235; lxxviii. 182, 317; lxxx. 180, 258; LJ, lviii. 179, 186; Add. 38293, f. 150; 40375, 301. Darlington’s woollen manufacturers and merchants sent petitions to the Commons for protection, 15, 29 Mar., and to both Houses in favour of the county courts bill, 8, 12 Apr. 1824. CJ, lxxix. 163, 222, 264; LJ, lvi. 166. Others, for abolition of the death penalty for forgery, 26 Feb., 4 May 1821, revision of the criminal code, 26 Feb. 1821, 24 May 1822, and in favour of the Dissenters’ marriages bill, 7, 10 Mar. 1823, were instigated by the Dissenters of Stockton, South Shields and Westoe. The same towns with Hartlepool, the village of Hamsterley and the nearby Aucklands and parishes in the Sunderland area pressed for repeal of the Insolvent Debtors Act, 4, 10 Mar. 1823, 12 Apr. 1824, and the abolition of colonial slavery, 15, 16 Mar., 24 June 1824, 6, 10 Mar., 18 Apr. 1826. Several also petitioned in protest at the indictment in Demerara of the Methodist missionary John Smith, 26 May, 24 June 1824. CJ, lxxvi. 108, 304; lxxviii. 90, 102; lxxix. 161, 168-9, 417; LJ, liv. 67, 200; lv. 559; lvi. 166, 467; lviii. 81, 99, 203. Both Houses received petitions for relief from the county’s Roman Catholics, 21, 28 Apr., while Gateshead and Darlington petitioned against concessions, 9, 17 May 1825. CJ, lxxx. 325; LJ, lvii, 61, 771, 831.

Lambton’s intervention in the 1823 Durham city by-election failed to check the growing influence of Stewart, who had increased his share of county patronage following Lord Strathmore’s death (1821) and succeeded as 3rd marquess of Londonderry in 1822. He was granted the Seaham peerage the following year for the issue of his second marriage. Add. 38289, f. 49; Hatherton diary, 10 Oct.-2 Nov. 1821. See Heesom, 289-91. Like William Russell, who had inherited Brancepeth in 1822, he refrained from testing his strength in the city or county in 1826, when attention focused on the bitter by-election and general election contests involving Liddell in Northumberland, which engaged most county Durham attorneys. Durham Co. Advertiser, 21 Jan.; Tyne Mercury, 21 Mar.; The Times, 7 Apr. 1826. Sunderland welcomed the passage in 1825 of the River Wear Navigation Act, but the seamen’s revolt there, the collapse of the Stockton and Cleveland bank of William Skinner and Company and the Jarrow colliery disaster of January 1826 were powerful reminders of industrial depression and strife before the general election. J. Sykes, Local Recs. ii. 186-8; Durham Chron. 24 Dec. 1825, 6 May; The Times, 21, 24 Jan. 1826. County business was in any case paralysed by the death in March 1826 of Bishop Barrington, and the home secretary Peel had to legislate precipitately to empower the existing county officers to act pending the installation of William Van Mildert as the new bishop. Add. 40386, f. 105; Sykes, ii. 195; The Times, 31 Mar., 4, 5, 7 Apr., 2 May; Durham Chron. 1 Apr. 1826. Lambton, whose death had been erroneously reported in January 1826, recovered from the spate of debilitating headaches which had plagued him to take charge of Grey’s son Lord Howick’s* Northumberland canvass at the general election in June. Lambton’s tirades against the sitting Whig ‘madman’ Thomas Beaumont, with whom Liddell coalesced to defeat Howick, were a major issue on the hustings at Durham, 15 June 1826. Add. 36361, f. 398. The Globe, 31 May; ‘Coll. Of Speeches, Addresses and Squibs’ [BL J/8133.i.13.], ii. 815; Durham Co. Advertiser, 17 June 1826. No serious opposition was raised to the return of Lambton, sponsored by Baker and Sir Hedworth Williamson of Whitburn, and Powlett, proposed by Aylmer and Anthony Surtees of Hamsterley. Both had confirmed their support for Catholic relief and the abolition of slavery, and they were left in no doubt of the Sunderland ship owners’ dissatisfaction with them for supporting the government’s liberalizing commercial policy. Durham Chron. 3, 10, 17 June; The Times, 19 June 1826.

Van Mildert’s nominee Cuthbert Ellison* of Hepburn replaced Barrington as sheriff in September 1826, and the agriculturists and ship owners adopted protectionist petitions before Parliament met. Durham Co. Advertiser, 26 Aug., 16, 30 Sept., 21 Oct., 4, 11, 15 Nov. 1826. Lambton had engaged in a bloodless duel and further acrimonious exchanges with Beaumont before retiring, ill, to Italy for the 1826-7 session. Constituency business was accordingly delegated to Darlington and Londonderry in the Lords, assisted in the Commons by Hardinge, Taylor and Powlett, who had also to fend off embarrassing disclosures in the press and in the House, 9 Apr. 1827, concerning his conduct as a director of the beleaguered ‘bubble’ Cornwall and Devon Mining Company. Reid, i. 171-3; Durham Chron. 8, 15 July, 11 Nov. 1826; Add. 30111, f. 308; Brougham mss, Powlett to Brougham, 2 Feb. 1827. The seamen and shipwrights petitioned for corn law revision, 28, 29 Nov., 6 Dec. 1826, 16 Feb., 9, 13 Mar. 1827, and the agriculturists against it, 21, 23, 27 Feb., 27-29 Mar., 6 Apr., and the millers objected to any relaxation in the prohibition on foreign flour imports, 21 Mar. 1827. CJ, lxxxii. 40, 44, 99, 181, 206, 208, 245, 301, 311, 340, 362, 394; LJ, lix. 97, 112, 209, 212; Durham Co. Advertiser, 3 Feb., 3 Mar. 1827. Londonderry, who, notwithstanding his pro-Catholic views, went into opposition when Canning succeeded Liverpool as premier in April 1827, supported the ship owners’ petitions for protection (received by the Lords, 15-30 Mar.), as did his political organ the Durham County Advertiser. He also mounted a strong show of support for the duke of Wellington in Stockton, Sunderland and Durham during his 1827 tour of the North-East. Durham. Co. Advertiser, 3, 17 Feb., 10, 24 Mar., 7 Apr., 30 June 1827; LJ, lix. 161, 179, 219; Sykes, ii. 209-12; Durham CRO, Londonderry mss C83/7(1), 10(1), 12; Wellington mss WP1/895/48; 899/9. Darlington, as a supporter of the Canning and Goderich’s ministries, boycotted these festivities. He had been promoted in the peerage, as marquess of Cleveland, on the latter’s recommendation. Aberdeen Univ. Lib. Arbuthnot mss, Hardinge to Mrs. Arbuthnot, 6 Oct. 1827. Reports of a peerage for Russell were erroneous, but before relinquishing the premiership to Wellington in January 1828, Goderich arranged Lambton’s elevation to the Lords as Baron Durham. Durham Chron. 12 May 1827; NLS, Ellice mss, Grey to Ellice, 13 July 1827. Speculation concerning Lambton’s successor was rife. Brougham mss, Cleveland to Brougham, 9 Jan. 1828. Londonderry considered putting Hardinge forward as locum for his son Viscount Seaham†, but he would not be tempted and surmised:

Whether Lambton’s brother or Russell stand, in a political sense (as both support Canning) the effect to our party is the same ... I should say, as a general rule, that it is your policy to coalesce (as you have done in the county of Down) with the most powerful family of adverse political principles to your own. Fortunately you have no great Tory competition to fear in Durham. The Lambtons, Russells and Rabys must always embarrass each other for the next 12 to 20 years. As in the city, the county will prefer two Members of opposite principles and if Seaham were of age the result would not be doubtful. Then your choice of ally must be made from the Whigs with a view to carry the county for your son, and to keep a seat in the city. Of the three Whig families Lambton’s is decidedly the most powerful from coal expenditure and family habits of representation. Therefore as far as Seaham’s interest is concerned in the county, and the family interest in the city, I should say your political alliance ought to lean towards Lambton in preference to the other families ... Regarding the expected opening for carrying a seat for the county and retaining the city seat, it is evident if I were to stand that you would have a double contest now and, to a certainty, a double contest at the next general election. If I were to stand for the county in a single contest we should have a decided union of all the Whigs against us as it would be a fair trial of strength between Whig and Tory in the county ... My opinion of the result would be that as Russell has a much fairer claim to county representation, standing in his own person, than Lambton’s brother, so I, having no land in the county, should, as your brother-in-law, have a worse claim than either ... The purse for a present contest ought, at least for the county, to be £30,000 and for the city £20,000, to be repeated at the next general election. For a determined hostility would inevitably grow out of the present attempt. I therefore consider my standing pregnant with mischief to your permanent family interest and with ruinous expense both at present and hereafter. Durham CRO, Londonderry mss C83/3(1).

Londonderry was furious to find his options further curtailed by Hardinge’s appointment to Wellington’s coalition ministry in January 1828, which rendered by-elections necessary almost simultaneously in both constituencies. He settled with Lord Durham on shared representation in the city, and joined him and Cleveland in declaring steadfast neutrality in the county, with a view to conciliating the absent Russell, the county’s richest commoner. Russell’s canvass commenced under the direction of his uncle and borough manager Charles Tennyson*, assisted by Colonel Robert Mills* of Willington. Ibid. C83/13(1), 14, 16(1); Ellice mss, Grey to Ellice [Feb. 1828]; Add. 36464, f. 213. Russell declared personally on arriving in London from Florence, 29 Jan., and hurried to Sunderland, where he promised to do all he could to support the shipping interest, 5 Feb. He then retreated, ‘exhausted’ by travel, to Brancepeth, until the election on the 13th. Durham Chron. 26 Jan., 2, 9 Feb.; ‘Coll. of Speeches, Addresses and Squibs’, ii. 817, 819, 831. Appeals for an alternative candidate failed and Russell’s unopposed return that day was proposed by John Allen of Blackwell and Captain Archibald Cochrane of Hendon House, Sunderland, who after praising him for attending to the county’s agricultural and commercial interests, left him to speak of his support for Catholic relief and the 1827 corn bill. On the hustings and at the subsequent celebrations Russell promised to support Wellington’s coalition ministry ‘provided they backed the liberal measures brought forward by Canning’. Durham Co. Advertiser, 16 Feb.; Durham Chron. 16 Feb. 1828; H.R. Klieneberger, Durham Elections, 27; Sykes, ii. 215, 239-40.

Petitions received by Parliament for repeal of the 1827 Malt Act, 18 Mar. 1828, 26 Feb. 1830, protection for lead ore, 28 Mar., 15, 25, 28 Apr., 2 May, and wool, 1, 5 May, 1828, and the continued circulation of small bank notes, 20 May, 3, 12, 13 June 1828, 12 Mar. 1830, were initiated by the agriculturists, the miners of the Derwent district and the ship owners, who with the merchants and traders of Sunderland also petitioned for repeal of the stamp duty on receipts, 25, 27 Feb., and in protest at the Northumberland and Durham coal owners’ price fixing ‘vends’, 9, 12 May 1828. Durham Co. Advertiser, 16 Feb., 5, 19 Apr., 10 May, 21 June 1828; CJ, lxxxiii. 109, 181, 237, 267, 294, 335, 367, 392, 430; lxxxv. 103, 173; LJ, lx. 77, 146, 251, 308, 323, 427, 534. The contentious Clarence railway bill (linking Stockton and Port Clarence), which Cleveland backed and to which Londonderry and Lord Durham raised early opposition, was enacted that session despite the objections of the corporation and certain Stockton owners and occupiers whom it adversely affected. The 1828 Tees navigation and Middlesborough dock bills found favour with the inhabitants and corporations of Barnard Castle, Bishop Auckland, Darlington and Stockton, but were the subject of hostile petitions from the South Durham coal owners, 2, 18 Apr., and were amended in the Lords for this reason. Durham CRO, Londonderry mss C86/1, 6; CJ, lxxxiii. 224, 197, 229, 252-3, 263, 375, 448; LJ, lx. 170, 173, 365, 464 562. Further legislation for the Clarence railway (petitioned against by the inhabitants of Durham and Stockton) and the River Wear navigation bill were carried in 1829, when royal assent was also granted to the Tees bridge bill (13 Apr.), South Shields improvement bill (14 May) and legislation to finance the Tyne ferry linking North and South Shields (1 June). Sykes, ii. 251-2; LJ, lxi. 373, 408, 418, 422, 453, 479, 486, 526, 528. Both Houses received petitions for repeal of the Test Acts from the Dissenters and friends of religious liberty of Barnard Castle, Chester-le-Street, Darlington, Staindrop, Stockton and Wolsingham, 25 May 1827, 15 Feb.-17 Mar. 1828. LJ, lix. 340; lx. 55, 111; CJ, lxxxiii. 45, 52, 53, 83, 176; Durham Co. Advertiser, 26 Apr. 1828. Phillpotts, the author of tracts hostile to Canning, was responsible for the submission of anti-Catholic petitions from the clergy and the Stockton area in 1827 and 1828. The magistrates and inhabitants of South Shields and Westoe and the Catholic congregations of Stockton, Darlington, Lanchester, Stockton and Sunderland now petitioned favourably. Shutte, 173, 241; H. Phillpotts, Letters to Canning; Durham Co. Advertiser, 17 Feb., 10, 24 Mar. 1827, 3 May 1828; CJ, lxxxiii. 268, 312-13; LJ, ix. 327; lx. 250, 307, 464, 521. The Members welcomed the concession of Catholic emancipation in 1829, and favourable petitions were sent up by the Protestant Dissenters, friends of religious liberty and lawyers of Gateshead, South Shields and Stockton, and by the Roman Catholics of Sunderland Bridge and Croxdale. Those from the magistrates and clergy of Gateshead, Sunderland, the Wearmouths and several rural parishes remained hostile. Durham Co. Advertiser, 14, 21 Feb.; Durham Chron. 7 Mar.; Add. 51834, Cleveland to Holland, 1 Feb. 1829; CJ, lxxxiv. 59, 72, 98, 115, 121, 146, 174, 182; LJ, lxi. 19, 23, 28, 70, 91, 93, 109, 116, 125, 152, 199, 257-8, 312, 313. Petitions to the Lords from the Dissenters of South Shields requested civil registration, 9 Feb. 1829, 10 May 1830. LJ, lxi. 20; lxii. 343. The artisans of Darlington petitioned for repeal of the corn laws, 28 May, 1 June 1829. CJ, lxxxiv. 346; LJ, lxi. 530. A branch of the East India Association, with Bernard Ogden as chairman, was established in Sunderland following James Silk Buckingham’s† visit on 2 Dec. 1829, and the town’s ship owners and merchants were at the heart of the North-East’s campaign against renewal of the East India Company’s charter. The Lords received their petition, 1 May, and the Commons, 4 May 1830. CJ, lxxxiv. 255; LJ, lxi. 412; Sykes, ii. 268. Others were presented from Stockton, Darlington and Barnard Castle, 15 Mar., 26 Apr., 3 May. The bankers of the same towns petitioned urging the abolition of the death penalty for forgery, 12, 18 Mar., 29 Apr., 4, 12, 24 May, 21, 22 June 1830. Durham Co. Advertiser, 6 Mar., 19 June; Durham Chron. 13 Mar. 1830; CJ, lxxxv. 172, 179, 193, 330, 347, 367, 410, 463; LJ, lxii. 216, 228, 305, 759. The distress petition of the county’s nobility, freeholders and magistrates, which the Commons received, 15 Mar. 1830, had been covertly adopted with minimal publicity and was similar to that previously imposed on the Northumberland meeting by Liddell and the ship owner Sanderson Ilderton. It requested inquiry, attributed the economic downturn to the restoration of the gold standard in 1819, compounded by the Small Notes Act, and called for retrenchment and cuts in such taxes as those on soap, bread, tea and candles ‘most affecting the poor’. CJ, lxxxv. 178; Durham Chron. 20 Mar. 1830. Assisted by Powlett, now nominally a supporter of the Wellington ministry, certain Sunderland ship owners continued to seek relief through protection and exemption from paying the Greenwich Hospital levy, 29 Mar., 5 Apr., 10 May, while their colleagues in South Shields advocated repeal of the coastwise coal duties to boost their trade, 25 May. Wellington mss WP1/1086/5; 1090/40; Durham Chron. 23 Jan., 27 Feb. 1830; LJ, lxii. 343, 525; CJ, lxxxv. 236, 265; LJ, lxii. 343, 525. Legislation for a new harbour at Sunderland received royal assent, 29 May 1830. CJ, lxxxv. 93, 334, 454, 500.

Dissatisfaction with Powlett for ‘trimming between the parties’ and with the mentally unstable Russell as a drunkard and ineffective Member had grown. Lord Durham suggested to Grey that if Howick should offer, ‘there is literally no one qualified in South Durham, to make even the shadow of an opposition, so much so, that I cannot imagine who would even think of starting, even were Howick not proposed’. Grey mss, Durham to Grey, 20 Jan., 9 Mar. 1830. A third man was advertised, and this prompted the sitting Members to engage in a rigorous canvass before the 1830 general election, when the city, which Hardinge vacated, was hotly contested. Klieneberger, 30-31; Durham Chron. 10, 17, 24, 31 July, 7 Aug. 1830; Tennyson d’Eyncourt mss H89/4. The defeated candidate there, Chaytor, had the mob but neither Cleveland nor Russell on his side, and he was encouraged to retaliate by opposing the Londonderry-Durham coalition in the county by standing himself or putting forward his son William Richard Carter Chaytor*. Chaytor Pprs. 146-8. In the event Powlett, proposed by Aylmer and Robert Eden Duncombe Shafto† of Whitworth, and Russell, whose sponsors were Allan and Thomas Hopper of Silksworth, Sunderland, came in unopposed, after the sheriff, Charles John Clavering of Axwell Park, rejected a belated attempt to nominate the elder Chaytor, who was cheered when he arrived at the election. Tennyson d’Eyncourt mss H89/9. Both Members called for retrenchment, ‘moderate’ reform and abolition of the death penalty for forgery and commended the concessions on the Test Acts and Catholic emancipation. Powlett, who defined ‘moderate reform’ as the piecemeal enfranchisement of the large manufacturing towns, was praised for declaring for protection and against slavery, but his open endorsement of the ministry’s policies caused a furore. Newcastle Chron. 14 Aug.; Durham Chron. 14, 21 Aug. 1830. The Durham Chronicle urged the Members to declare for reform and vainly urged its inclusion in the loyal address adopted at the county meeting, 26 Aug. 1830. Its proposer, Russell, was escorted to the meeting by Mills and the younger John Gregson (son of the Durham electioneering attorney), whom he had returned respectively for Bletchingley and Saltash. Powlett arrived with his elder brother Lord Darlington (formerly Barnard), for whom Russell had found a seat at Saltash. Durham Chron. 21, 28 Aug. 1830.

Powlett divided with the Wellington ministry when they were brought down on the civil list, 15 Nov. 1830. Russell, who subsequently made his boroughs available to the Grey ministry, was ‘shut out’. A hostile petition and declaration instigated by Cuthbert Rippon of Stanhope Castle, 22 Nov., enabled the Whigs to make political capital of Wellington’s decision to appoint Phillpotts bishop of Exeter while holding the lucrative living of Stanhope in commendam. Shutte, i. 283-9; Grey mss, Grey-Van Mildert corresp. Oct.-Dec. 1830; Strathmore mss X17/28. Despite their West Indian interests, both Members claimed to support a gradual abolition of colonial slavery, and both Houses received anti-slavery petitions, 4 Nov. 1830-15 Apr. 1831 from Wesleyan Methodist congregations countywide, and the parishes, Dissenters and other inhabitants of Barnard Castle, Beddlington, Bishop Auckland, Darlington, Easington, High Pelling, Houghton-le-Spring, Jarrow, Monkwearmouth, South Shields, Staindrop, Stockton and, Sunderland; more were presented to the Lords than to the Commons. LJ, lxiii. 19, 31, 50, 103, 107, 115, 117, 125, 128, 184, 192, 221, 408, 435, 438; CJ, lxxxvi. 55, 74, 163, 436. Lord Durham, a member of Grey’s cabinet and one of the committee responsible for drafting their reform scheme, laid plans with Londonderry to deploy the yeomanry to protect their collieries and harbours during the 1830-1 pitmen’s strikes, when multitudes assembled at Black Fell above Chester-le-Street, 26 Feb., 12 Mar. 1831. Durham CRO, Londonderry mss C86/9, 10, 16; Sykes, ii. 291, 293; Wellington mss WP1/1152/13. A South Shields meeting, 31 Dec. 1830, chaired by Nicholas Fairless of Monkton (a hardline magistrate murdered in 1832 by the striking colliers) petitioned for reform and its own enfranchisement, 8 Feb. 1831. Newcastle Chron. 8 Jan. 1831; CJ, lxxxvi. 221. The Durham reformers, Baker, Rippon, Shafto and Sir Robert Johnson Eden of Windleston Hall (one of the promoters of the Bishop Auckland petition), were the principal requisitionists and main speakers at the county reform meeting, 1 Feb. Chaytor, who also advocated the ballot, endorsed the ‘unanimous’ petition for a sweeping reform. Liddell had forfeited his Northumberland seat at the 1830 election, and he and Powlett (the petition’s presenter, 9 Feb.), who had gone to the meeting on Cleveland’s instructions, spoke against wholesale disfranchisements. Durham Co. Advertiser, 21 Jan., 4 Feb.; Brougham mss, Cleveland to Brougham, 24 Jan.; Durham Chron. 5 Feb. 1831; CJ, lxxxvi. 221, 226. Petitions for a comprehensive reform were received by the Commons from Norham and Islandshire, 26 Feb., and Barnard Castle, 28 Feb., and by the Lords from Bishop Auckland, 3 Feb., North Durham, Chester-le-Street, the Lumleys, Newbottle, Wapping and other parishes, 28 Feb. Berwick Advertiser, 8, 22 Jan. 1831; CJ, lxxxvi. 309, 324; LJ, lxii. 201, 265. The ministerial bill proposed to increase the county’s representation from four to ten, giving two seats to Sunderland (1831 population 40,735), one each to Gateshead (15,177) and South Shields (18,576), and doubling the county representation by dividing it in two: Chester and Easington wards to form Durham North, and Darlington and Stockton wards Durham South. Durham city was to retain its seats. Canvassing for the new constituencies was under way by 8 Mar., and reform associations in Bishop’s Auckland, Chester-le-Street, Gateshead, Great Lumley, Houghton-le-Spring, Newbottle, Staindrop, Stockton, Sunderland and the Wearmouths joined the freeholders, leaseholders and copyholders of north Durham in petitioning in favour of the bill and the enfranchisement of manufacturing towns. They also resolved, in the event of a dissolution, to return only reformers. Durham Chron. 12, 19, 26 Mar., 2 Apr. 1831; CJ, lxxxvi. 372, 407; LJ, lxiii. 306, 346, 354, 356, 369, 385, 501. The Lords received an unfavourable petition from north Durham, 20 Apr. LJ, lxii. 494. Cleveland had recently transferred his allegiance to the Grey ministry and he was praised with Russell in the Whig press as a reformer ready to sacrifice his boroughs. Powlett’s pro-reform vote, 22 Mar., however, failed to allay dissatisfaction with him for criticizing the measure in debate, and his majority vote for Gascoyne’s wrecking amendment made his position untenable. Durham Co. Advertiser, 11 Mar.; Durham Chron. 19, 26 Mar. 1831. At the insistence of Cleveland, who offered to subscribe £10,000 to bring in a reformer, he resigned at the dissolution, 23 Apr. His notices confirmed his hostility to reform. ‘Coll. of Speeches, Addresses and Squibs’, ii. 797, 803; St. Deiniol’s Lib. Glynne-Gladstone mss 198, T. to J. Gladstone, 20 Apr.; Stair mss (History of Parliament Aspinall transcripts), J.A. Murray to Sir J.H. Dalrymple, 24 Apr.; Durham Chron. 29 Apr. 1831. The only other issues discussed at the election were slavery and the Richmond shilling. The latter had not been conceded when the coal duty, the subject of hostile petitions backed by Darlington and Powlett, 11 Nov. 1830-3 Mar. 1831, from Sunderland, Stockton and the south Durham coal owners, was repealed in March. CJ, lxxxvi. 86, 106, 222, 226, 237; LJ, lxii. 42, 172, 286; Durham Co. Advertiser, 29 Oct., 12 Nov. 1830, 25 Feb. 1831. Londonderry, who returned his kinsman Hill Trevor for the city, applied to the duke of Northumberland and the Tories’ Charles Street committee for finance to put up another anti-reformer for the county. Approaches to Liddell and the elder Chaytor, whose son had come in for Durham as a reformer, failed. Hardinge, whose candidature was advertised as ‘a gentleman of sound constitutional principles, great experience, tried integrity and a decided but moderate reformer’, also declined. Edward Braddyll of Conishead Priory, Lancashire, was more amenable, but he did not have his father’s authority to spend. Wellington mss WP1/1182/25; 1184/15; Chaytor Pprs. 157; Durham CRO, Londonderry mss C141/9, 10, 13; Durham Advertiser, 29 Apr. 1831. The ‘select few’ who requisitioned Williamson to stand as a reformer at a meeting chaired by Lord Durham’s brother Hedworth Lambton at the Queen’s Head, Durham, 28 Apr., included delegates from the Darlington, Gateshead, Hetton-le-Hole, Monkwearmouth, Newcastle, South Shields, Stockton and Sunderland reform committees, and the same men were also the requisitionists for the county meeting to boost his candidature, 7 May, which had ostensibly been convened to thank the king for dissolving Parliament to carry reform. Durham Co. Advertiser, 29 Apr.; Durham Chron. 30 Apr. 1831. Undeterred by their ‘shoddy’ tactics, Londonderry informed Wellington, 1 May, that the farmers, who formed the bulk of the 7-9,000 electorate, opposed the bill, although the towns were for it, and that the united interests of Clavering, Ravensworth, Wynyard and the church would defeat Russell and Williamson. Wellington mss WP1/1184/3, 5. Hardinge, writing on 4 May, following his election for Newport, disagreed:

I am of opinion that Sunderland, South Shields and Gateshead, which expect Members, will be decidedly adverse to an anti-reformer, exclusive of Lord Cleveland’s and Lord Durham’s interests. The fact is the reform mania uncontrolled by positive influence, as in the case of close boroughs or of anger of the freemen, whom the bill disfranchises, is not to be overcome at this crisis. Durham CRO, Londonderry mss C83/32.

Van Mildert warned Londonderry similarly, 3, 5 May:

For the clergy generally and for the chapter in particular, it is impossible for me to answer, nor can I pretend to any other influence than what may be supposed to arise from their knowledge of my sentiments. Nor, I confess, do I expect to find them at all unanimous on the question. Ibid. C108/1, 2.

Williamson declared for the bill, economy and retrenchment and canvassed the principal towns with Mills, who deputized for Russell (then at Saltash) until the nomination. As anticipated, on 7 May the county adopted the address of thanks to William IV, proposed by Wilkinson and the Durham barrister William Charles Harland†, and a resolution, put by Barker and Rippon, in favour of Williamson and Russell. They were required to contribute only £1,000 towards their election costs. Ibid. C86/17; Durham Advertiser, 29 Apr., 6, 13 May; Durham Chron. 14 May 1831. They travelled together from Brancepeth to the election, 10 May 1831, when Russell was proposed by Allan, with George Townsend Fox of Westoe seconding, and Williamson by Wilkinson and the Rev. John Fawcett of Newton Hall. Backed by the Chaytors, he hailed the triumph of reform candidates throughout the northern counties. The Members dined their supporters at the Queen’s Head and afterwards in the main towns. Durham Co. Advertiser, 27 May, 3 June 1831.

No alterations affecting Durham were incorporated in the reintroduced reform bill. Williamson supported it steadily, but Russell, whose speech at Gateshead, 19 May, prompted unease, only paired for its enfranchisement in preference to Merthyr, 10 Aug. 1831, and became increasingly erratic in his conduct and attendance. Durham Chron. 28 May 1831, 19 May, 2 June 1832. Norhamshire and Islandshire petitioned for additional representation, 12 July. CJ, lxxxvi. 644. Wilkinson, Rippon, Shafto and the barristers Thomas Colpitts Granger and Harland were the main speakers, and Francis Johnson of Aykley Head the sole dissentient when the county met, in response to a 220-signature requisition, to petition the Lords in support of the bill, 30 Sept. They received similar petitions from Bedlington, Bishop Auckland and Staindrop, 3 Oct., and another from the inhabitants of Stockton, 10 Oct. Newcastle Chron. 24 Sept., 8 Oct.; Durham Co. Advertiser, 7 Oct. 1831; LJ, lxiii. 1036-7, 1076. Gateshead, where the Political Unionist Thomas Attwood† was the main speaker, 13 Oct., and Sunderland, where Williamson dominated the meeting, 27 Oct., addressed the king in protest at the bill’s rejection, and paid tribute to the Members for voting for it. On the 31st a county meeting, for which 150 had signed a requisition headed by Williamson, Russell and the Chaytors, did the same. Chaytor Pprs. 159; Durham Chron. 15, 29 Oct., 5 Nov.; Durham Co. Advertiser, 21, 28 Oct., 4 Nov. 1831; Sykes, ii. 333-4. The reformer Losh, who estimated the crowd at 7,000, was there at Williamson’s request, ‘under an idea that the marquess of Londonderry, Sir H. Hardinge (and it was said Sir Chas. Wetherell*) would attend to oppose us. Nothing of that kind however took place and everything was conducted very quietly’. Diaries and Corresp. of James. Losh ed. E. Hughes (Surtees Soc. clxxiv), ii. 123. Lord Durham’s agent Henry Morton described the event to Grey as a humiliation for the Tories and praised Hedworth Lambton’s speech, 1 Nov. 1831. Grey mss. Londonderry, who suffered at the hands of the London mob and was burnt in effigy following his anti-reform vote, had stayed away on Van Mildert’s advice. He accepted that outright opposition to reform had become counterproductive and campaigned instead for the enfranchisement under it of his stronghold of Stockton. Durham CRO, Londonderry mss C108/5, 6.

The boundary commissioners confirmed the arrangements for the boroughs of Durham, Gateshead, Sunderland and South Shields (which had petitioned for a second Member, complaining that its population was understated, 20 Mar. 1832); and likewise the county division, with the Northern wards polling at Chester-le-Street, Lanchester, South Shields, Sunderland, Whickham and the election town of Durham, and the Southern wards at Barnard Castle, Bishop Auckland, Middleton-in-Teesdale, Sedgefield, Stanhope, Stockton and the election town of Darlington. PP (1831), xvi. 116-23, 341-7; (1831-2), xxxviii. 159-171; Newcastle Chron. 25 Feb.; Durham Co. Advertiser, 2 Mar. 1832; CJ, lxxxvii. 208. Backed by Hardinge and Hill Trevor in the Commons and Londonderry in the Lords, Stockton petitioned in support of the bill and for its own enfranchisement, 7 Feb., citing its population (9,000), 600 £10 householders (more than the enfranchised resorts of Cheltenham and Brighton) and the growing importance of south Durham and its port of Billingham. However, few anti-reformers supported their amendment substituting it for Gateshead, 5 Mar. The Durham Chronicle quipped that ‘Stockton escaped the thraldom ... intended for it by Londonderry’. Durham Co. Advertiser, 23 Dec. 1831; Durham CRO, Londonderry mss C108/6; CJ, lxxxvii. 81; Durham Chron. 10 Mar. 1832; T.J. Nossiter, Influence, Opinion and Political Idioms in Reformed England, 22, 59. The gentry, clergy, merchants and freeholders of the Stockton ward petitioned the Lords in an unsuccessful bid for separate enfranchisement as a county division, 30 May. LJ, lxiv. 245. Nationally, the anti-reformers made great play of the generous allocation of Members ‘by Lord Durham’ to his county, but local Conservatives thought the number justified, notwithstanding their support for the campaign to have Gateshead included in the Newcastle constituency. Tyne Mercury, 13 Mar. 1832. Darlington, Gateshead, South Shields, Sunderland and the county petitioned for withholding supplies when the passage of the bill was threatened in May and a ministry headed by Wellington contemplated. The 1831 reform committees were also now revived in anticipation of a dissolution. Durham Chron. 19, 26 May 1832; Sykes, ii. 358-9; CJ, lxxxvii. 332. Londonderry’s last-ditch opposition to the enfranchisement of Gateshead failed, 23 May. The reform bill’s passage in June 1832 was celebrated countywide, and with at least 20 Liberals and five ‘moderate reformers’ already announced, canvassing for the first post-reform election intensified. Durham Co. Advertiser, 18, 25 May, 1, 15 June 1832; Sykes, ii. 362-6.

As elsewhere in the North, the Grey ministry’s registry of deeds bill was especially disliked for failing to grant customary tenants equal status with copyholders. Representations against it were made to Lord Durham and his brothers and it became the subject of a sustained and hostile petitioning campaign, volubly supported by Hill Trevor on Londonderry’s behalf, 18 Oct. 1831, 31 Jan., 1 and 2 Feb. 1832. LJ, lxii. 385; CJ, lxxxvi. 932; lxxxvii. 59, 60, 63, 67; Chaytor Pprs. 166; Durham Co. Advertiser, 2 Mar. 1832. The struggle to carry local legislation that Parliament crossed party lines and centred on rival schemes to develop harbours and associated railways in Sunderland North, where Williamson was the major landowner, Sunderland South, where the corporation and the Chaytors sponsored the bill, and Hartlepool, where Chaytor was the scheme’s banker and Cleveland, as the major landowner, dominated the corporation. Backed by petitions from Sunderland and north Durham, Williamson, his Dundas relations and Hill Trevor successfully opposed the South Shields and Monkwearmouth railway bill by having it referred to a committee of appeal, 26 Mar.; and they also engineered the controversial committee defeat of the Sunderland (South Side) wet dock scheme, 2 Apr., assisted, as revealed in the division list published by the Durham Chronicle, 6 Apr., in breach of privilege, by the ‘turncoat’ Russell, who in June, his electoral interest wrecked by the reform bill and his own conduct, announced his retirement. CJ, lxxxvii. 62, 66, 102, 202-3, 210-11; LJ, lxiv. 335, 364; Durham Chron. 16, 30 Mar., 6, 13, 20 Apr., 16 June; John Bull, 24 June 1832. The supporters of the South Side bill defeated the North Side bill by 12-2 in a similar manoeuvre in the Lords, where it was entrusted to Ravensworth, 17 July. 1832. The elder Chaytor orchestrated a campaign against Williamson in Durham North at the 1832 general election, when he topped the Sunderland poll as a Liberal. Legislation for the Clarence railway and Hartlepool docks, pier and railway was carried with minimal protest before the dissolution. CJ, lxxxvii. 159, 183, 241, 292, 362; LJ, lxiv. 249; Chaytor Pprs. 168-80.

The registration of 4,267 electors in Durham North (population 175,321) and 4,336 in Durham South (population 78,506) before the 1832 general election was closely scrutinized by both parties. Durham CRO, Londonderry mss C146/61, 64. Six of the seven constituencies were contested and the Liberals took all ten seats. Ibid. C146/48; The Times, 21, 25 Dec.; Durham Co. Advertiser, 21, 28 Dec. 1832; N. McCord, ‘Gateshead Politics in Age of Reform’, Northern Hist. iv (1969), 167-83. Durham North, where Hardinge declined to stand and the Liberals Hedworth Lambton and Williamson defeated the Conservative Bradyll, was contested six times between 1832 and 1884. Only during the period between Williamson’s retirement in 1837 and the return of his son in 1864 was a Conservative returned with a Liberal. Durham South, where in 1832 John Bowes of Streatlam and the Quaker Joseph Pease defeated the third Liberal Shafto, was contested seven times in the same period and first returned a Conservative in 1847.