The franchise at Bath was in the corporation, a close body, recruited by co-option. In spite of this narrow franchise, against which some of the citizens petitioned unsuccessfully to the House of Commons in 1728,CJ, xxi. 49. Bath was an outstandingly independent and respectable borough. For most of the period it was run by its famous postmaster, Ralph Allen, whose father-in-law, George Wade, held one seat from 1722 till his death in 1748.
James II was told in 1687 that ‘the committee of elections have sometimes admitted Members chosen by the mayor, aldermen and burgesses only, and sometimes Members chosen by the whole town’. However, all the returns in this period are in the name of the mayor, the seven ‘masters’ or aldermen, and the 16 ‘burgesses’ of the common council. The corporation interest was very strong, and except in the Cavalier Parliament the recorder always filled one seat.
Taunton, as a result of its resolute defence in the Civil War, was notorious for its hostility to the Stuarts, a reputation that was confirmed by its cordial reception of the Duke of Monmouth in 1685. Dissent flourished, counterbalanced by the prestige and charity of the Anglican Sir William Portman, who lived just outside the town; though even his great wealth was not equal to the demands created (perhaps deliberately) by redundancies in the serge industry.J. Toulmin, Taunton, 278; CSP Dom. 1668-9, p. 114; 1680-1, p. 515; J. R. Jones, Revolution of 1688, p.
Minehead was dominated by the Luttrells of Dunster Castle, who were returned for the senior seat at every general election of the period, usually with a colleague of their own choice. All the candidates came from Somerset gentry families. Since the forfeiture of the charter in 1604 elections were held in the court feet of the manor, with the two constables acting as returning officers. The indentures are very numerously attested, those for 1661 and 1673 bearing over 120 signatures.Ibid. 38-40, 429-38; Som. RO, Luttrell mss 59/1, 4.
By Jacobean times Milborne Port could be described by a local antiquary as the mere ‘carcase’ of a once flourishing town. Nevertheless it was restored as a parliamentary borough in 1628, and provided surprisingly easy seats for the neighbouring gentry. It seems to have been a perfect oligarchy controlled by the owners of the nine capital burgages, in whose court leet the two bailiffs, who acted as returning officers, were elected.
Ilchester was a decayed borough set amid a rich dairy-farming area but remarkable in this period only for housing the county gaol. It was governed by a corporation consisting of 12 ‘capital burgesses’ (as they liked to style themselves) and a bailiff who acted as returning officer. The representation of the borough had been restored in 1621 on the initiative of Sir Robert Phelips, and the Montacute interest dominated most of the elections in this period.
Bridgwater, the chief port of Somerset, had suffered extensive damage in the Civil War as a royalist garrison under Edmund Wyndham. It became a Presbyterian stronghold, remarkable for the acrimony between churchmen and dissenters. Moreover ‘it hath always been disputed by the magistrates and the populace who should have the right of choosing burgesses’. All the Members were Somerset landowners.Collinson, Som. iii. 75-76; J. R. Jones, Revolution of 1688, p. 156; Duckett, Penal Laws (1883), 16.
Although as a rising spa and fashionable resort Bath had closer connexions with the great world than the ordinary West of England clothing town, all its Members in this period came from local gentry families. In 1660 the corporation, consisting of 20 common councilmen and eight aldermen, returned two Presbyterian Royalists, Alexander Popham and William Prynne, without opposition. On 18 Feb.
The borough of Wells was dominated by the bishops of Bath and Wells. The town had received its first charter from a twelfth-century bishop and successive bishops resisted all attempts by the townsmen to increase their privileges. It was not until 1589 that the borough was incorporated. Before 1589 the principal officer in the town had been the master of the guild of merchants, elected annually, but under the new charter a corporation was established consisting of a mayor and 23 common councilmen, from whom seven were chosen as ‘masters’.Wells City Charters (Som. Rec. Soc.
The borough, castle and manor of Taunton, owned by the diocese of Winchester, were sequestered by the Crown in 1559, on the deprivation of the Marian bishop, White, leased to Sir Francis Knollys in 1561, and returned to the see of Winchester by 1575. The borough was not incorporated in this period, and was administered by the court leet of the lord of the manor. Returns were made by the constables of the borough and the burgesses.R. G. H. Whitty, ‘Taunton under the Tudors and Stuarts’ (London Univ. Ph.D.
