Cornwall

County

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1660-1690, ed. B.D. Henning, 1983
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Background Information

Number of voters:

over 1,700 in 1660

Elections

DateCandidateVotes
21 Apr. 1660SIR JOHN CAREW, Bt. 
 HON. ROBERT ROBARTES843
 Hugh Boscawen862
 [John] Eliot 
 BOSCAWEN vice Robartes on petition, 12 July 1660 
25 Mar. 1661JONATHAN TRELAWNY I 
 (SIR) JOHN CORYTON I 
3 Mar. 1679HON. FRANCIS ROBARTES 
 (SIR) RICHARD EDGCUMBE 
15 Sept. 1679HON. FRANCIS ROBARTES 
 (SIR) RICHARD EDGCUMBE 
28 Feb. 1681HON. FRANCIS ROBARTES 
 (SIR) RICHARD EDGCUMBE 
5 May 1685CHARLES GRANVILLE, Lord Lansdown 
 CHARLES BODVILE ROBARTES, Lord Bodmin 
c. Aug. 1685HON. FRANCIS ROBARTES vice Bodmin, called to the Upper House 
15 Jan. 1689SIR JOHN CAREW, Bt. 
 HUGH BOSCAWEN 

Main Article

The family of Robartes (ennobled in 1625) represented Cornwall in five of the seven Parliaments of the period. The traditional venue of county elections at Lostwithiel, within two miles of their principal residence, no doubt assisted their interest. They were originally Presbyterian in outlook, but Francis Robartes, the most active of the younger generation, became a churchman and a Tory. By contrast the Granvilles were zealous supporters of the Stuarts up to the Revolution, and Sir John Granville played an important part in the Restoration, for which he was later created Earl of Bath; but as a Cavalier’s son he could not stand at the general election of 1660, which was fought out by four Presbyterians. A correspondent described to Francis Buller ‘the greatest appearance that ever was’. On the ‘cry’ the sheriff gave it to Sir John Carew and Hugh Boscawen, but Lord Robartes demanded the poll for his son Robert. John Eliot also stood, but finished last. The sheriff had a majority of 19 over the latter. Robartes took his seat, but both the defeated candidates petitioned. It was not until 12 July that (Sir) Edward Turnor could report from the elections committee that the sheriff had been guilty of a misdemeanour, and recommended that Robartes should be unseated in Boscawen’s favour. There was evidently a strong feeling in the House that the whole election should be declared void. The debate was terminated by a motion for the previous question, which was carried by 135 votes to 106, and the House resolved to agree with the committee.1

The Robartes interest suffered several rebuffs at borough elections in 1661, and it is unlikely that any candidate was put forward for the county. Nor, with a peerage in the offing, was Granville interested otherwise than as manager for the Court, a position which his offices as lord lieutenant and warden of the stannaries enabled him to occupy for the remainder of the period. He was doubtless well satisfied with the election of two prominent Cavaliers, Jonathan Trelawny and John Coryton. After the dissolution of the Cavalier Parliament it was reported that Granville, now Earl of Bath, ‘was so wise as to recommend nobody in Cornwall’ though he may have given covert assistance to the moderate Sir Richard Edgcumbe. Lord Robartes was reckoned in opposition at the time, and the senior seat was taken by his younger son Francis. Although the Robartes family soon went over to the Court, this had no electoral consequences, and the sitting Members were re-elected to the second and third Exclusion Parliaments.2

At the general election of 1685 Lord Bath reached the zenith of his power, with 15 of the Cornish corporations remodelled on his recommendations. His son, Lord Lansdown, was returned as senior knight of the shire, and accompanied in the first session of James II’s Parliament by Lord Bodmin, the son of Robert Robartes, who had died in 1682. Edgcumbe, being ‘exceedingly afflicted with the gout’, did not stand again, though his support for loyal candidates was canvassed. When Bodmin succeeded to the peerage a new writ was ordered during the one-day session of 4 Aug., and he was replaced by his uncle Francis. In the spring of 1688 Bath was authorized to buy support for the King’s ecclesiastical policy with an offer of free trade in tin, but he returned from the county empty-handed. His son, who was serving as ambassador in Madrid, was recommended for reelection as court candidate for the abortive Parliament, to be joined with a dissenter, either Hugh Fortescue or William Harris, an unlikely coalition in view of Bath’s animosity towards the local regulator, Edward Nosworthy II, a Whig collaborator. The lord lieutenant was one of the first Tory magnates to join William of Orange in November; but Lansdown was still abroad, and in his absence the two Whigs Carew and Boscawen regained the county seats after an interval of 28 years.3

Authors: Paula Watson / Basil Duke Henning

Notes

  • 1. Buller Pprs. ed. Worth, 117; CJ, viii. 87.
  • 2. Beaufort mss, Ld. to Lady Worcester, 22 Feb. 1679.
  • 3. Burnet ed. Routh, iii. 16; CSP Dom. 1685, pp. 21, 35; 1687-9, pp. 286-7; Cobbett, Parl. Hist. iv. 1344; Macaulay, Hist. 977; Duckett, Penal Laws (1883), 217; Luttrell, i. 480.