Gloucestershire

Cirencester was an important wool town, situated on the southern slopes of the Cotswolds. Its glory was the Friday wool market, in this period still counted the greatest in England. A Monday market in provisions, cattle and grain provided an important focus for trade with the rich agricultural hinterland. Glos. RO, P86/1/IN6/3, f. 80. It was not an incorporated borough. Instead, the town was a hundred of Gloucestershire of itself, and was divided into seven wards, with two high constables and 14 wardsmen appointed at the court leet.

There was some apprehension in Tewkesbury that the town’s franchise, comprising corporation burgesses, freemen and freeholders, also extended to the inhabitant householders, although it was not until 1797 that the question was ever examined and decided upon in the committee of elections. On this occasion the right of election was awarded to the freeholders against a counter-claim on behalf of the inhabitant householders, an indication that men of both categories had at various times been permitted to poll.

The steady expansion of Gloucester’s freeman electorate during the earlier decades of the 17th century had prevented the evolution of any controlling interest. The city’s governing body could adopt favoured candidates, and provide them with additional electoral support through ‘mass’ creations of new freemen, though this was not necessarily enough to sway the outcome of elections.