The principal interests at Malton, a borough by prescription, belonged to the Eure and Hebblethwaite families. The widow and daughters of Colonel William Eure held the manors of Old and New Malton, and claimed the right to appoint the returning officer, while the Hebblethwaites lived at Norton, just outside the borough. Both families were royalist, and when the representation of Malton was restored in 1659 their interests were exercised respectively by Philip Howard, whose mother had been Colonel Eure’s sister, and George Marwood, the father-in-law of Thomas Hebblethwaite. In 1660 Mrs Eure nominated her brother, Dr Thomas Denton, who wrote to Sir Ralph Verney on 8 Mar.: ‘I guess the charge will be none or inconsiderable. If there should come a dispute a charge might arise, but sure not much. My sister is solicited for others, but she intends you or me.’ Howard wrote ‘very civilly’ that he would not oppose Denton, but the latter, expecting the Parliament to be short-lived, withdrew his candidature and ‘returned it as civilly as I could to him and Marwood’. In the Convention, however, Hebblethwaite replaced his father-in-law, and he was re-elected in 1661. Howard transferred to Carlisle, leaving the second seat to be contested by his brother-in-law, Sir Thomas Gower, and Thomas Danby, the husband of Margaret Eure. Gower was a nearby resident, but may also have enjoyed the support of some other member of the notably inharmonious Eure family. Danby was returned, but on Gower’s petition the elections committee found that he had the majority of the votes, and his opponent was unseated.2

On Hebblethwaite’sdeath in 1668, leaving his son under age, William Palmes, husband of Mary Eure and devisee of her estates, was returned ‘by the major part of the burgesses’.When Gower died four years later, the claims of his son, William Leveson Gower, to succeed him were urged on Margaret Danby by the secretary of state, Lord Arlington, By this time James Hebblethwaite was old enough to stand as a country candidate, and the result was a double return, which took five years to decide. The rival petitions were first referred to the elections committee on 3 Mar. 1673, but nothing further was done till 27 Oct. 1675, when a petition was received from the inhabitants. On 26 Feb. 1677, after the long recess, Leveson Gower revived his petition, but he had already been returned for Newcastle-under-Lyme, and renounced his claim to the Malton seat in the following month. But the inhabitants’ petition had still to be considered, and it was not until 18 Mar. 1678 that Hebblethwaite was awarded the seat, and then only after the House had divided against the recommendation of the elections committee.3

It is perhaps unsurprising that Hebblethwaite did not stand again, and the borough was ‘engrossed’ by Palmes. In the Exclusion Parliaments he was accompanied by an obscure North Riding baronet, Sir Watkinson Paylor. Both belonged to the country party, and it is significant that no loyal addresses were presented in 1681-3. On the accession of James II, however, his ‘loyal subjects’ of New Malton informed him that they had resolved in future elections ‘never to agree to the choosing of any person who either voted or promoted that most covenanting bill for your exclusion’. At the general election two Tories were returned. Thomas Worsley was a nearby resident, and Thomas Fairfax enjoyed the support of Margaret Danby. The Whig candidates, Palmes and Paylor, petitioned separately, as did the bailiff, burgesses and inhabitants, but they received no satisfaction from the elections committee. In 1688 Palmes and Paylor were ‘judged to be right’ by the King’s electoral agents. Palmes was, indeed, returned unopposed to the Convention, accompanied not by Paylor, but by his own son-in-law, Sir William Strickland. The return, though damaged, bears over 130 signatures.4