Salisbury

Salisbury, a cathedral city in the hundred of Underditch, was the principal town in the southern division of Wiltshire. It boasted cutlery production ‘brought to the highest degree of perfection’, and the remnants of a cloth industry, and was otherwise in a prosperous condition. The parliamentary borough comprised most of the area covered by its three parishes, but excluded The Close, which had a population of over 500. J. Easton, Salisbury Guide (1825), 22; Pigot’s Commercial Dir. (1830), 809, 810; PP (1831-2), xl. 113-15; (1835), xxiv. 677, 686, 687; VCH Wilts. vi. 129-32. Many of the senior clergymen and leading inhabitants lived there, including the banker and stationer William Bird Brodie, who was the proprietor of the largely impartial local newspaper, the Salisbury and Winchester Journal. His younger brother Charles George Brodie was his business partner, while an elder, the royal surgeon Benjamin Collins Brodie, was given a baronetcy in 1834. Mrs. H. Richardson, ‘Wilts. Newspapers’, Wilts. Arch. Mag. xli (1920), 64, 65. The independence of Salisbury, one of the few respectable corporation boroughs, was only partial, due to the interest of the Tory 2nd earl of Radnor of neighbouring Longford Castle, whose family, the Pleydell Bouveries, had controlled one seat since 1741. F. O’Gorman, Voters, Patrons, and Parties, 39; HP Commons, 1715-1754, i. 351. In 1821 Maria Edgeworth described Radnor, a former Member, as

a shambling figure in gaiters appended in the oddest way to breeches that looked too short. His face looked all flabby muscles - weakness trying to look strong - with a glimmer of sense and good nature too in his eyes. But poor man he has fits of complete loss of memory. Edgeworth Letters, 294.

Since 1802 he had returned his eldest son, Lord Folkestone, a Whig of an advanced or radical stripe, with whom he frequently, though usually amicably, differed over politics. His pride in the longevity of the family’s connection with Salisbury was severely stung by Folkestone’s attempted resignation in 1812. Neither then nor later would he replace him with one of his other Whig sons, Duncombe Pleydell Bouverie*, a naval captain (who had, however, been Member for Downton, 1806-7), or Philip Pleydell Bouverie*, a London banker, both of whom he also refused to seat for his pocket borough of Downton. Berks. RO, Pleydell Bouverie mss D/EPb O28, Radnor to Folkestone, 18 Aug. 1812; Longford Castle mss 30/7, Folkestone to corporation of Salisbury, 31 July 1827. Another son, Frederick, was a canon of Salisbury, while Edward Bouverie, the son of his half-brother Bartholomew Bouverie, Member for Downton, was a prebendary there. The family enjoyed cordial relations with the predominantly Tory corporation, whose senior member, the attorney William Boucher of Thornhill House, near Stalbridge, Dorset and The Close, was Radnor’s agent. It was composed of 24 aldermen and 30 assistants (or common councilmen), and there were a small number of free citizens (or freemen) who played no part in municipal affairs or parliamentary elections. The mayor, who acted as returning officer, was chosen from among the assistants each year. The recorder (Radnor), who was also a member of the corporation, and his deputy (William Henry Tinney, a barrister of Lincoln’s Inn), who theoretically could only act in the recorder’s absence, apparently had a de facto, though rarely exercised, right to vote. The turnover of corporators was low, and vacancies were filled by members of a number of interrelated families of some social standing. There were a few non-residents, but most corporators lived in the vicinity. PP (1830-1), x. 30, 99; (1831-2), xxxvi. 584; (1835), xxiv. 680, 681; Longford Castle mss 30/7, Boucher to Radnor, 14 July 1830; Wilts. RO, Radnor mss 490/1375, same to same, 26 Apr., [?15 May] 1831. The corporation generally picked a respectable local man as their Member, with Radnor giving his tacit approval.

At the general election of 1818, Folkestone, despite his unpopularity as an anti-ministerialist and pro-Catholic, was joined by the Tory and anti-Catholic Wadham Wyndham of St. Edmund’s College, whose opponent at the contested 1813 by-election, George Purefoy Jervoise*, withdrew. The joint expenses amounted to £212. The tradition of electing two anti-ministerialists was therefore broken and the representation was to remain divided along broadly party lines. HP Commons, 1790-1820, ii. 426-7; VCH Wilts. v. 220-2; vi. 122; Pleydell Bouverie mss O27; Salisbury Jnl. 22 June 1818. In late 1819 Boucher, the mayor, and some of his colleagues signed the address against the calling of a county meeting on Peterloo. Devizes Gazette, 4 Nov. 1819. The sitting Members were returned by the 30 corporators present at the general election of 1820, when Folkestone, who defended his opposition to the recent repressive legislation, was proposed by Boucher and Edward Stevens, a linen and woollen draper, and Wyndham by Thomas Brown, a currier, and one of the Brodies (probably William Bird), both of whom were aldermen. Radnor and Wyndham split the total expenses of £198. Salisbury Jnl. 13 Mar. 1820; Wilts. RO, Salisbury borough recs. G23/1/7; Radnor mss 490/1396. A Salisbury address in support of Queen Caroline was presented to her, 18 Oct. 1820, and news of her acquittal the following month was marked by celebrations and disturbances, during which the bank of Brodie and Dowding was illuminated. The corporation agreed a loyal address to the king, 15 Nov. 1820, after speeches in its favour from Boucher, Tinney and Henry Emly, another London barrister. Salisbury Jnl. 16, 23, 30 Oct., 13, 20 Nov.; Devizes Gazette, 16 Nov. 1820; Sir R.C. Hoare, Wilts. Salisbury, 564. John Benett, the county Member, presented Salisbury petitions for revision of the criminal laws, 13 Apr. 1821, 17 May 1822, and repeal of the leather tax, 7 June. Henry Grey Bennet presented a petition against the severity of Henry Hunt’s* gaol sentence, 24 Apr., to the annoyance of the corporation, who requested a copy of it from the Members, 1 May 1822. A petition for repeal of the Insolvent Debtors Acts was brought up by Folkestone, 6 Mar. 1823, and he presented others against the duties on publicans’ licences, 13 Feb., the hides and skins bill, 13 May, and the beer bill, 17 May 1824. Benett brought up another Salisbury petition against the beer bill, 21 May 1824. Petitions against colonial slavery were presented, 8 May 1823, 16 Mar. 1824, 6 May 1825 (by Benett), as was one for inquiry into the trial of the Methodist missionary John Smith in Demerara, 27 May 1824. CJ, lxxvi. 262; lxxvii. 200, 276, 326; lxxviii. 95, 296; lxxix. 33, 168, 358, 375, 394, 442; lxxx. 383; The Times, 14 Apr. 1821, 25 Apr., 18 May, 8 June 1822, 7 Mar. 1823, 14 Feb., 17 Mar., 14, 18, 22 May 1824, 7 May 1825; Salisbury borough recs. 1/7. A successful attempt was made to improve economic conditions in the city with the establishment of a silk factory in early 1825, and Benett presented the petition of the owners and occupiers of land in the vicinity of Marlborough and Salisbury against alteration of the corn laws on 28 Apr. CJ, lxxx. 350; Devizes Gazette, 17, 24 Feb., 17 Mar.; The Times, 29 Apr. 1825. Anti-Catholic petitions from the archdeacon and clergy of the archdeaconry of Sarum were presented to the Lords, 9 Apr. 1821, 2 Mar. 1825, and to the Commons, 14 Apr. 1825; when Radnor and Wyndham returned to Salisbury at the end of that session, they were publicly thanked for their anti-Catholic votes. LJ, liv. 179; lvii. 69; CJ, lxxx. 303, 304; Salisbury Jnl. 27 June, 4 July 1825; Longford Castle mss 36/14, Radnor diary; Hoare, 565, 566. At a meeting on slavery, 1 Feb. 1826, Tinney and Boucher opposed the resolutions of Alderman George Atkinson (possibly the naval officer of that name who had served under Duncombe Pleydell Bouverie on the Medusa). However, a petition was approved, and this was presented by Wyndham on the 9th. W.R. O’Byrne, Naval Biog. i. 24, 25; CJ, lxxxi. 27; Salisbury Jnl. 6 Feb.; The Times, 10 Feb. 1826.

Both Members were considered secure at the general election of 1826, when Folkestone, who was proposed by Boucher and Atkinson, and Wyndham, who was nominated by Henry Hinxman of Ivy House, Alderbury, and seconded by Stevens, were returned by the 27 corporators present, each having laid claim to an honourable independence. ‘A citizen’ complained that the election had been the ‘usual farce’ because Folkestone ‘is one of the most violent opposition men in the House of Commons’ and Wyndham ‘votes with the ministers on all occasions, when he is in the House’, so that ‘in fact this city has not any voice in the senate, as one Member’s vote neutralizes the other’. The joint expenses were £183. Devizes Gazette, 22 Sept. 1825, 8, 15 June; Salisbury Jnl. 12 June 1826; Salisbury borough recs. 1/7; Radnor mss 490/1396. A petition from the neighbourhood of Salisbury against Catholic relief was brought up by Sir John Astley, the other county Member, 26 Feb. 1827. Petitions for repeal of the Test Acts were presented from the Protestant Dissenters of the city, 22 May, 8 June (by Folkestone), 11 June 1827 (by Benett), 18, 22 Feb. 1828, and from the inhabitants (by Benett), 25 Feb., and the clergy of the archdeaconry of Sarum (by Alexander Powell, Member for Downton), 7 Mar. 1828. CJ, lxxxii. 231, 482, 534, 540; lxxxiii. 79, 96, 101, 142; The Times, 9, 12 June; Devizes Gazette, 1 Mar. 1827, 21 Feb. 1828. Radnor’s ailing condition induced Folkestone, in mid-1827, to prepare a letter to the corporation of Salisbury dwelling on their relationship, in which he wrote that

my wish of course must be, that the connection should continue, but I desire it, not so much as an object of aggrandizement and of advantage to my family, or of ambition or even perhaps of personal gratification to myself ... [but] because it is harmful to break off long continued intercourse and dissolve ties long cherished and much valued.

He then recommended that his brother Duncombe should replace him, a plan with which the latter, despite a certain diffidence, agreed. Longford Castle mss 30/7, Folkestone to corporation of Salisbury, 31 July, D. Pleydell Bouverie to Folkestone, 6 Aug. 1827. Folkestone succeeded his father as 3rd earl of Radnor in January 1828, and managed to maintain the broad consensus that existed over the choice of Members. Pleydell Bouverie calculated that he had over 30 promises, but noted that Tinney, Henry Pern Tinney, an attorney and pamphleteer, Charles William Everett, a banker, and Henry Everett, another attorney, objected to him on account of his politics, and that Brodie was ‘doubtful’ because of Radnor’s association with William Cobbett†, an antagonist of his. Radnor was elected recorder in succession to his father, 6 Feb., when, as was usual with candidates, Pleydell Bouverie was made a free citizen. Introduced by Boucher, Hinxman and Atkinson, 20 Feb., he was duly elected by the 18 corporators present, who included his brother, and his expenses were £117. Ibid. Morrice to Radnor, 4 Feb., D. Pleydell Bouverie to same, 7, 8, 10 Feb.; Radnor mss 490/1396; Salisbury Jnl. 25 Feb. 1828; Salisbury borough recs. 1/7; Cobbett’s Rural Rides ed. G.D.H. and M. Cole, ii. 386, 387. The 12th earl of Pembroke of nearby Wilton House was elected steward, 8 Oct. 1829, in place of his father, who had died the previous year. Salisbury borough recs. 1/8.

It was probably Pleydell Bouverie who presented a Salisbury petition against the Malt Act, 18 Mar. 1828, and others were brought up against alteration of the corn laws (by Benett), 22 Apr., and from the corporation against the alehouses licensing bill (by Wyndham), 6 June. He also presented petitions for relief from the Catholics of Salisbury, 2 May 1828, and would presumably have voted for this the following year had he not be absent on naval service, while Wyndham presented the anti-Catholic petition of the archdeaconry and clergy of Sarum, 26 Feb. 1829, and voted steadily against emancipation. CJ, lxxxiii. 181, 259, 303, 406; lxxxiv. 84. Although an anti-Catholic petition had been in preparation, Henry Everett was able to inform the duke of Wellington, the prime minister, that he had ensured that no petition should be sent from the inhabitants by persuading enough of his friends to stay away from the council in order to prevent the mustering of a quorum. In the Lords, Radnor voted in favour of the Catholics, but Thomas Burgess, bishop of Salisbury, who in private raised strenuous objections with Wellington, voted against them. Hoare, 567; Wellington mss WP1/999/3; 1002/11; 1003/13, 29; 1004/27; 1007/25. In late 1829 there was an attempt to limit the building of new cottages and to introduce a bill to make their tenants liable to pay poor rates, but, despite the efforts of Joseph Pitt*, local opposition saw off the measure during the following session. Salisbury borough recs. 1/239; Salisbury Jnl. 24 Aug., 21 Dec. 1829, 5 Apr.; Wilts. RO, Peniston mss 451/59, Peniston to Baker [?9 Feb.], 2 Apr., to Benett [?9, 17 Feb.] 1830; Hoare, 567, 568. On Tinney’s resignation, there was a contest for the deputy recordership, 9 Dec. 1829, in which the Tory Robert Benson of 3 New Square, Lincoln’s Inn defeated another London barrister, Henry Alworth Merewether, a Whig, by 11-8. There was also a poll for the election of an assistant, 5 May 1830, when George Sampson, a surgeon, won by 21-20 against the clerk of the peace for the city, Mathias Thomas Hodding. Emly objected to the result on the grounds that of Sampson’s supporters neither Benson, as deputy recorder, nor the attorney George Sutton, as mayor, was entitled to vote. Devizes Gazette, 10, 17 Dec. 1829; Salisbury borough recs. 1/8. Wyndham brought up the Salisbury petition against the sale of beer bill, 14 May 1830. CJ, lxxxv. 422.

In June 1830, with the death of George IV believed to be imminent, Boucher advised Radnor to have Philip Pleydell Bouverie ready to canvass on behalf of his brother Duncombe, once a dissolution was announced. He also assured him that

the corporation of Salisbury have not the least wish that Captain Bouverie should decline to offer himself at the next election, on account of his engagement in the service of his country, nor has any such idea been started by anyone (except perhaps two or three only) and I am persuaded that they would feel much concern if Captain Bouverie should not offer himself. Longford Castle mss 30/7, Boucher to Radnor, 1, 5, 16 June, 3 July; Radnor mss 490/1374, same to same, 6 July 1830; R.K. Huch, The Radical Lord Radnor, 111.

The rival Wiltshire newspaper reported that

the more respectable portion of the elective body (or corporation) of Salisbury are desirous, we are informed, of bringing in Sir Edward Poore [of Rushalls] for that city; but we fear they will not succeed. As in many other corporations, there are here a great number of automatons, nearly all of which are managed by the chief of the opposite party.

Both Poore and the Salisbury Journal denied the story, and no opposition was offered to the sitting Members, who were duly re-elected by the 28 corporators present, 30 July. Returning thanks, Wyndham praised Pleydell Bouverie’s attachment to the interests of the city, and Philip, who was elected for Cockermouth three days later, promised that Duncombe would resign the seat if he were not shortly released from the navy (which he was). The total expenses were £196. Devizes Gazette, 1, 15 July; Salisbury Jnl. 5, 12 July, 2 Aug. 1830; Salisbury borough recs. 1/8; Radnor mss 490/1396. In November 1830 the exertions of Brodie, commanding the Salisbury volunteer corps, and others prevented the 5th November disturbances of previous years, but they were called into action to deal with ‘Swing’ rioters in the neighbourhood of the city. Salisbury Jnl. 19 Nov. 1827, 29 Nov., 6 Dec. 1830; Hoare, 568-9; E.J. Hobsbawm and G. Rudé, Captain Swing (1985), 95, 96. For many years, assistants elected to serve their turn as mayor had decided not to fulfil their duties and had paid a £100 fine, a considerable source of revenue for the corporation. In 1829 five had declined to serve, leading Radnor and 12 corporators to request the election of a mayor, and in 1830, when a further five refused, a writ of mandamus had to be obtained in king’s bench, which effectually put an end to the practice. Radnor mss 490/1409; Salisbury borough recs. 1/8; Salisbury Jnl. 20 Dec. 1830; PP (1835), xxiv. 681, 684, 685; T. J. Northy, Popular Hist. Old and New Sarum, 311, 312. Salisbury petitions were presented to the Commons against slavery, 3, 17 Nov., 15 Dec. 1830, 25 Mar. 1831, and candlemakers’ licences (by Benett), 7 Mar. CJ, lxxxvi. 20, 105, 175, 347, 435. A reform petition from 580 gentlemen, yeomen, tradesmen and inhabitants was presented by Edward Berkeley Portman, 9 Feb., and one in favour of the ballot from the inhabitants was brought up by Duncombe Pleydell Bouverie, 26 Feb. At a meeting chaired by William Andrews, a surgeon and corporator, 4 Mar., Robert Squarey, a chemist and druggist, and Henry Everett moved a reform petition, drawn up by Alderman John Sparshatt, a haberdasher and linen draper. Signed by 27 corporators, it was presented and endorsed by Pleydell Bouverie, 9 Mar., when Benett said that the corporation had always honourably executed its trust, and Hunt approved the sentiments of the petition despite its promoters having invariably returned a member of a noble family. Benett brought up another reform petition from the inhabitants of south Wiltshire, 19 Mar. Ibid. 226, 310, 355, 406; Salisbury Jnl. 7 Mar. 1831. Following a requisition, at a meeting on 11 Apr. 1831 a reform address to the king was moved by Richard Fowler of Milford, a corporator and physician, and seconded by John Toone, a surgeon; and it was agreed after speeches from Brodie, Sparshatt, Squarey and others. Salisbury Jnl. 11, 18 Apr. 1831.

Pleydell Bouverie and Wyndham, who in the House had respectively voted for and against the Grey ministry’s reform bill, were joined as candidates at the general election of 1831 by Brodie, whose views, expressed through the Salisbury and Winchester Journal, had increasingly inclined to reform. Responding to a requisition from 40 reformers, including two corporators, Sparshatt and James Bennett, a silversmith and distant relative of Benett, R. Moody, ‘James Bennett of Salisbury’, Wilts. Arch. Mag. (2001), 183, 184, 187. he issued an address, 15 Apr., in which, by stressing Wyndham’s respectability as their Member, he was careful not to alienate his supporters. He had, in fact, visited Wyndham immediately after receiving the requisition, but failed to persuade him to commit himself to the bill, even with the government’s expected modifications. Therefore, in spite of the criticisms of his conversion to the belief that reform was now essential, he wrote another address, 23 Apr., and began to canvass in earnest. He rightly feared that the electors on both sides would wish to see their own candidate secure first and would also prefer the sitting Members to any intruder, so he made overtures to Pleydell Bouverie for an alliance. He assured him that he would in any case keep his earlier promise to vote for him, and asked him to propose to his ‘particular friends’ (Andrews, Boucher, Fowler and Edward Davies, an attorney) that they should give Pleydell Bouverie plumpers, in order to deprive Wyndham of their second votes. However, Pleydell Bouverie, following the discreet advice of Radnor, declined any form of co-operation and, not without some anxiety as to the outcome, undertook his own canvass. Reform was certainly popular, as was shown by the address to the corporation calling on it to elect only candidates who pledged themselves to support the whole bill, which was headed by the signatures of Charles Stokes and John Leach, both grocers and tea dealers, and Edward Vandenhoff, a dyer, and had 167 others, including Bennett’s. Salisbury Jnl. 18, 25 Apr., 2 May; Devizes Gazette, 21 Apr.; Radnor mss 490/1375, D. Pleydell Bouverie to Radnor, 19, 24-28 Apr., Squarey to same, 23 Apr., Boucher to same, 24, 26-28 Apr. 1831; Hoare, 570; Huch, 117-19. There were rumours of a fourth candidate, and the names of the Irishman Eyre Coote*, and one Garrett (possibly William Garrett of Andover, Hampshire) were mentioned. Tinney wrote from London to the attorney and corporator James Cobb, 28 Apr., to ask what he thought of ‘my being a candidate with Wyndham and against Bouverie ... Do not think that I am ambitious of getting into Parliament. I would come forward against revolution’. Nothing came of this. Radnor mss 490/1375, D. Pleydell Bouverie to Radnor, 24 Apr. 1831; Wilts. RO, Wilts. Arch. Soc. mss 1553/10. Wyndham was proposed by Stevens and James Sutton, a clothier, Pleydell Bouverie by Boucher and Atkinson, and Brodie by Sparshatt and Bennett. While Pleydell Bouverie and Fowler advocated reform, Wyndham condemned it and attacked Brodie for inconsistency. In particular, he alleged that after Folkestone had offered £50 towards the electoral campaign of Cobbett at Preston in 1826, Brodie had declared that he would never again dine at Longford, yet had now become a reformer. Brodie vindicated his change of attitude, denounced a scurrilous handbill against him, and turned the charge of inconsistency against the corporators who had signed the reform petition but now refused to support a reformer. He trailed badly in the poll and could not silence his critics. Salisbury Jnl. 2, 9 May; Devizes Gazette, 12 May 1831. Wyndham was correct when he wrote, about this time, to an unknown correspondent, that ‘you may let Brodie alone. Give him your line, and he may drown himself. Give him my rope and he may hang himself’. Wilts. Arch. Soc. mss 1553/10. Pleydell Bouverie informed Radnor that the election meeting, during which ‘Wyndham and his party were much molested’, was ‘a very stormy one, but the contest, the ill will and unkindly feelings being all between the other parties and their partisans I escaped without hard blows or hard words’. He paid for his own expenses of £103. Radnor mss 490/1375, D. Pleydell Bouverie to Radnor, 30 Apr., 1 May, Boucher to same, 30 Apr. 1831; 1396.

The list of the poll generally confirmed the assessments made by Pleydell Bouverie and the more sanguine Boucher. A handbill (printed by W. B. Brodie and Company) giving the poll is in Radnor mss 490/1375, which also contains Boucher’s ms list, and Wilts. Arch. Soc. mss 1553/10, and was published in Pol. Reg. 4 June 1831. Of the 55 named, the mayor, the linen draper John Pinckney, remained neutral, despite being a known reformer. Radnor was one of the 13 listed as absent and, of the other 12, there were three ‘supposed friendly’ to Pleydell Bouverie and one (John Pern Tinney) who had opposed him in 1828. Sampson avoided attending ‘on account of his difficulties in making up his mind’, and although Wyndham thought that Samuel Fisher, a Bath physician, had ‘been tampered with by my opponent’, Pleydell Bouverie and Radnor gave up the idea ‘of bringing Dr. Fisher from Bath by paying his expenses, without which he will not budge’. Of the total of 41 voting, there were only seven who voted for Brodie, and they all split with Pleydell Bouverie. These included Brodie himself, his brother, Bennett, Sparshatt, who had deserted Wyndham (whom he had seconded at the general election of 1830) because of his anti-reform votes, and, much to Boucher’s surprise, the physician John Grove, one of Pleydell Bouverie’s ‘avowed and most decided friends’. Seven others, including Atkinson, plumped for Pleydell Bouverie (and two of his four ‘particular friends’, Andrews and Fowler, indirectly helped Brodie by voting in this way). All seven were friends of varying degree, except for one (Walter Goddard), who had originally been placed with those who would only support Pleydell Bouverie once Wyndham was considered safe. Five others in that category, including Stevens and James Sutton, were among the 17 who split for the sitting Members. Boucher, Emly and others considered ‘friendly’ to Pleydell Bouverie also split with Wyndham, as did at least six who had promised Pleydell Bouverie their vote. In addition, he benefited from the splits of Alexander Minty, a clothier, whom, ‘from his conversation’, he had ‘supposed unfriendly’, and William Ellis, a non-resident barrister, who had earlier remarked that he was ‘sorry I am so circumstanced that I cannot promise you my vote’. The remaining ten corporators plumped for Wyndham, his cousin George Wyndham of Roundhill House, Wincanton, Somerset, being one of them. Five others, including George Sutton and the Everetts, did so in order not to endanger Wyndham’s return by giving their second votes to Pleydell Bouverie. The printer James Easton abandoned his promise to vote for Pleydell Bouverie once Brodie entered, and the anti-reformer John Hussey, great-nephew of the former Member William Hussey, did the same, and refused to support Brodie, his brother-in-law. Benson’s vote for Wyndham was objected to by Boucher and Brodie, and, despite his Remarks on the Office of Deputy Recorder of Salisbury (1831), counsel’s opinion was given against him, his authority to act being curtailed. Brodie and Cobbett, who otherwise attacked each other mercilessly in their newspapers, agreed in condemning the corporators for inconsistency. Of the 27 who had signed the reform petition, three (Easton and the Everetts) plumped for the anti-reform candidate, and eight split for him and Pleydell Bouverie, while only seven voted for Brodie. Cobbett was also scathing in his attack on the Radnor interest for conniving in Wyndham’s success, when a candidate pledged to support the bill, whatever his other faults, could have been returned instead. There was some truth in this charge, but it was denied by Pleydell Bouverie in a letter to Cobbett, 1 June 1831. Radnor mss 490/1375; Wilts. Arch. Soc. mss 1553/10; Salisbury Jnl. 2 May; Pol. Reg. 28 May, 4, 18 June 1831; PROB 11/1541/82; Salisbury borough recs. 1/8.

Attended by Squarey, Bennett and others, Brodie immediately began to canvass the prospective voters of Salisbury, which induced the sitting Members to offer again for the general election that was expected once the reform bill had been passed. Pleydell Bouverie, who also made preparations for an election dinner, had a meeting held in his support, chaired by Atkinson, 8 June 1831, and Wyndham, whose address accused his colleague of undertaking an ‘active canvass’, apologized to Radnor for using this expression. Radnor mss 490/1375, D. Pleydell Bouverie to Radnor, 5 May, Boucher to same, 3, 5, 13 [?15] May, Fowler to same, 5 June, Radnor to Wyndham, 5 June, replies, 6, 8 [?10, ?11] June; Salisbury Jnl. 16, 23 May, 6, 13 June 1831. A subscription for the relief of the Irish poor was agreed at a meeting in Salisbury, 23 June. Salisbury Jnl. 20, 27 June 1831. A reform petition signed by 1,500 inhabitants was forwarded to Radnor, but he, who voted for the second reading, 7 Oct. 1831, had apparently not presented it before the Lords rejected the bill that day. Amid rumours of disturbances, a meeting on the 21st, which was chaired by Pinckney and attended by the leading reformers, agreed an address to the king in favour of the bill. Ibid. 26 Sept., 3, 24 Oct.; Devizes Gazette, 29 Sept., 13 Oct. 1831. Pleydell Bouverie voted steadily for it and Wyndham against it, while in the Lords Radnor voted in its favour, 13 Apr., 7 May 1832. In May an address calling on the king to appoint only ministers who would carry it unimpaired was circulated for signature, and a meeting, at which Brodie and other reformers spoke, approved a petition to the Commons to withhold supplies until it was passed, 12 May, which was presented by Pleydell Bouverie, 21 May 1832. The formation of a political union, which had been rumoured at the end of the previous year, was now agreed, but its activities were suspended after the passage of the bill, the news of which was greeted with extensive celebrations. Old Navy Printable Coupon- $10 off $50 Printable Coupon and 20% off Coupon Code, February 2013 - Cha Ching Queen. Visit Old-Navy on Facebook and score a printable coupn for 20% off Old Navy purchase in-store or online ! Use this Old Navy coupon to save 5 off your purchase of $25 or more at Old Navy Stores. CJ, lxxxvii. 326; Dorset RO, Fox Strangways mss D/FSI 332, Lansdowne to Ilchester Ponsonby, 19 Nov. 1831; Salisbury Jnl. 14, 21, 28 May, 11, 18 June, 2 July 1832.">

Under the Boundary Act, Salisbury was enlarged to include The Close and parts of the neighbouring parishes of Milford and Fisherton Anger, giving it a population of 11,672 and a registered electorate of over 600. PP (1831-2), xxxvi. 327; xl. 113-15. There was a hard-fought contest at the general election of 1832, when the same three candidates again stood. Philip Pleydell Bouverie, Member for Downton since July 1831, had declined the suggestion that he should replace his brother in order to strengthen the family’s connection, which Denis Le Marchant† thought had ‘of late years been much neglected’ and was ‘one of the instances to show that aristocratical influence will not, henceforth, stand of itself’. Duncombe Pleydell Bouverie was defeated, but was seated on petition in 1833 and sat until the following general election, when the 94-year-old Radnor interest expired (although the 3rd earl’s son-in-law, Major-General Edward Pery Buckley of New Hall, near Salisbury, was Member for the city, 1853-65). Wyndham, who was unseated in 1833 but re-elected the following year, sat as a Conservative until his death in 1843, and his seat was occupied until the general election of 1847 by his nephew and heir, John Henry Campbell Wyndham of Corhampton House, Hampshire. Brodie, who was returned in 1832, continued to sit as a Liberal until 1843, going bankrupt four years later. In 1847 the division of the two seats between the two principal parties was ended, and thereafter Salisbury returned two Liberals until 1886, when it was partially disfranchised. Longford Castle mss 30/7; 36/3; Radnor mss 490/1375, 1382; Salisbury Jnl. 17 Dec. 1832, 28 Jan. 1833; Devizes Gazette, 29 Oct. 1863; Three Diaries, 288; VCH Wilts. vi. 123.