A History of Parliamentary Elections and Electioneering in the Old Days / Showing the State of Political Parties and Party Warfare at the Hustings and in the House of Commons from the Stuarts to Queen Victoria

by Joseph Grego

“TO THE GENTLEMEN, CLERGY, AND FREEHOLDERS OF THE COUNTY OF MIDDLESEX.

“Gentlemen,

“In support of the liberties of this country against the arbitrary rule of ministers, I was before committed to the Tower, and am now sentenced to this prison. Steadiness, with, I hope, strength of mind, do not however leave me; for the same consolation follows me here, the consciousness of innocence, of having done my duty, and exerted all my abilities, not unsuccessfully, for this nation. I can submit even to far greater sufferings with cheerfulness, because I see that my countrymen reap the happy fruits of my labours and persecutions, by the repeated decisions of our Sovereign courts of justice in favour of liberty. I therefore bear up with fortitude, and even glory, that I am called to suffer in this cause, because I continue to find the noblest reward, the applause of my native country, of this great, free, and spirited people.

“I chiefly regret, gentlemen, that this confinement deprives me of the honour of thanking you in person, according to my promise; and at present takes from me, in a great degree, the power of being useful to you. The will, however, to do every service to my constituents remains in its full force; and when my sufferings have a period, the first day I regain my liberty shall restore a life of zeal in the cause and interests of the county of Middlesex.

“In this prison, in any other, in every place, my ruling passion will be the love of England and our free constitution. For those objects I will make every sacrifice. Under all the oppressions which ministerial rage and revenge can invent, my steady purpose is to concert with you, and other true friends of the country, the most probable means of rooting out the remains of arbitrary power and Star-chamber inquisition, and of improving as well as securing the generous plans of freedom, which were the boast of our ancestors, and I trust will remain the noblest inheritance of our posterity, the only genuine characteristic of Englishmen.

“JOHN WILKES.

“King’s Bench Prison, May 5th, 1768.”

By this letter it will be seen that Wilkes chiefly appealed to what is best described as clap-trap sensationalism; he continued, however, to be the cause of constant apprehension, the military and other authorities taking every precaution to preserve the peace of the metropolis.

While Wilkes was kept a prisoner in the King’s Bench, the authorities made demonstrations of resorting to armed force for the ostensible purpose of preserving the peace of the metropolis, and, taught precaution by the famous “45” demonstration which followed Wilkes’s election for Middlesex, to check further rioting with firmness, which unfortunately degenerated into ferocity.

Parliament met on the 10th of May, Lord Camden being now lord chancellor. It seems the misconception had arisen that Wilkes’s outlawry would be reversed, and that in any case he would be suffered to attend the assembling of parliament. With the design of conveying him thither in triumph, a great body of people were gathered at the King’s Bench. Finding their expectations disappointed of seeing the idol of the hour set at large and reinstated as “the tribune of the people,” they demanded him at the prison, and grew very tumultuous; whereupon the Riot Act was read by two justices of Surrey, but the mob threw stones and brickbats while it was reading, when one of the spectators, seeing other persons run, ran too, but was unhappily singled out by a picket of the Scotch Guards, who broke their ranks—a breach of military discipline—and followed him about five hundred yards into a cowhouse, and there shot him dead. “Soon after this, the crowd increasing, an additional number of the Guards was sent for, who marched thither, and also a party of horse grenadiers (two regiments had, it appears, been under arms in St. George’s Fields throughout the disturbances), when, the riot continuing, the mob were fired on by the soldiers, and five or six were killed on the spot, and about fifteen wounded, among them being two women, one of whom subsequently died of her wounds. She was, it appears, trying to move her oranges out of danger. Another account says (Gentleman’s Magazine) several of the people killed were passing along the road at a distance; and, later on, it is said not one of the persons actually concerned in the rioting were hurt by the firing. Several versions of the fatal affair appeared immediately. The case of the inoffensive youth who was thus barbarously slaughtered excited general sympathy; his name was William Allen, and his father was master of the Horseshoe Inn and Livery Stables, Blackman Street, Southwark. On the Scotch faction was heaped all the opprobrium of this regretable transaction.”

Among others, appeared the illustration of “The Scotch Victory,” 1768; on the wall of the outhouse, to which the lad had fled for shelter when pursued, is “’45,” an allusion to the cruelties of the Highland raid in 1745, as well as to the “XLV. North Briton.” Alexander Murray, the officer, Donald Maclury, a corporal, and MacLaughlin, a grenadier, are shown in the act of assassinating Allen. A halter which lies near the feet of the soldiers and a sketch of a gallows and a man hanging indicate the public sentiments on the matter. The letterpress is to this effect:—

“The monumental inscription on a tombstone erected over the grave of Mr. William Allen, junior, in the churchyard of St. Mary Newington, Surrey. ‘Sacred to the memory of William Allen, an Englishman of unspotted life and amiable disposition, who was inhumanly murdered near St. George’s Fields, the 10th day of May, 1768, by Scottish detachments from the army.’

“’Twas Grafton plann’d the horrors of that day;
’Twas Weymouth urg’d th’ enforcing his commands;
’Twas Barrington that gave th’ exciting pay,
The price of blood flow’d through his guilty hands.”

The Duke of Grafton was first lord of the treasury. Viscount Weymouth, afterwards Marquis of Bath, was one of the secretaries of state; he had urged the advisability of calling out military aid to strengthen the civil authority. Viscount Barrington was secretary at war. He had thought proper to convey to the field-officer in command of the Foot Guards the royal approval of the men’s behaviour.

“WILKES AND LIBERTY” RIOTS. THE SCOTCH VICTORY. MURDER OF ALLEN BY A GRENADIER. MASSACRE OF ST. GEORGE’S FIELDS. 1768.

[Page 174.

He begged “that they may be assured that every possible regard shall be shown to them in return for their zeal and good conduct on this occasion,” “and in case any disagreeable circumstance should happen in the execution of their duty, they shall have every defence and protection that the law authorities, and this Office (the War) can give.”

Justice Gillam, who was the first to give the order to the third regiment of Guards to fire on the people, was tried for the murder of Redburn, a weaver; the judges acquitted him of all responsibility, and complimented him on the humane manner in which he had exercised his authority. Sergeant Glynn, Wilkes’s friend and adviser, was for the prosecution. In the course of the evidence it appeared that there had been assembled in St. George’s Fields a disorderly concourse, where, after shouting “Wilkes and Liberty,” they made an attack on the King’s Bench Prison, threw stones into the marshal’s house, and at length burst open the outward gate of the prison, to the terror of the keepers, who not only feared for the security of their prisoners, but imagined their own lives were endangered; notwithstanding their apprehensions, the keepers guarded the inner gates from the mob, so that the rioters dispersed without effecting their purpose.

The marshal, anticipating another attack the day following, applied to the magistrates for assistance, as shown in the foregoing. On the 10th of May, a larger mob assembled, repeating the cry of “Wilkes and Liberty;” whereupon the magistrates began to expostulate with them. The Riot Act was then read, and its intentions endeavoured to be explained. The rabble hissed and hooted the soldiers, who endeavoured to scatter them. At last, a stone struck Justice Gillam, and he ordered the firing, though, as far as could be proved, there existed no absolute necessity for this extreme measure. Gillam, who was exhibited to ridicule as “Midas, the Surrey justice,” appears to have been most unpopular, if not altogether unfit for the responsible position in which he was placed; “the note sent to a bookseller by a magistrate” is attributed to this hero: “Sir, Send me the ax Re Latin to a Gustus of Pease.” On his trial, James Derbyshire, a bookseller, deposed that Mr. Gillam said publicly in the hearing of the soldiers, “that his orders from the ministry were, that some men must be killed, and that it were better to kill five and twenty to-day than one hundred to-morrow.” According to the Rev. John Horne (afterwards Tooke, and known to fame as the “Brentford Parson”), who was present at the riot, it was he who procured the warrant for the arrest of the soldiers. The trial did not take place until the 9th of August. Witnesses appeared against Donald Maclury, who was charged with firing the fatal shot; it was Maclury (or M’Laury) who said “Damn him, that’s him, shoot him.” Mr. Allen’s ostler declared that when Allen fell, after the prisoner had fired, Maclury said, “Damn it, it is a good shot.” On his way to gaol, the day after the murder, it was proved Maclury acknowledged “that what they had done was in consequence of orders, and he hoped they should obtain mercy.” The defence was that MacLaughlin, a grenadier, acknowledged to Mr. Gillam and six soldiers that it was he who shot Allen, and that his piece went off by accident. He had since deserted, and, it was openly stated in the papers, received one shilling a day to keep out of the way. The verdict was “not guilty;” and it was admitted that, in order to save the life of the soldier, who was liable for murder, it had “been found necessary to suffer the prosecutors to persist in their mistake in apprehending and impeaching an innocent man, and in the mean time giving the grenadier who actually fired the gun an opportunity to escape.” Both soldiers were charged at the King’s Bench, when, by arrangement, the guilty man was admitted to bail, to be smuggled out of harm’s way; “the other was remanded back to prison as the person who actually shot the lad,” according to the proceedings, May 16, 1768.

Another version of the “Scotch Victory,” with the rebus of the jack-boot standing under a petticoat, and enclosed by Scotch thistles, forms part of a mock dedication: “To the Earl of (Bute), Protector of our Liberties, this plate is humbly inscribed by F. Junius Brutus.”

“The Operation,” a frontispiece to the Political Register for June, 1768, shows Lord Bute stabbing Britannia with a dagger, while the ministers already mentioned in association with the death of Allen are catching the blood which flows from her wounds:—

“The Blood of Vitals from her wounds he drew,
And fed the Hounds that help’d him to pursue.”

(Dryden.)

The Oxford Magazine for 1769 gives an engraving of the monument finally erected over the grave of Mr. Allen, junior. It represents an altar tomb enclosed by iron rails: on one side is introduced the reprobated Scotch thistle, with the legend, “Murder screen’d and rewarded;” on the other side is shown a Scotch soldier of the third regiment of Foot Guards, evidently intended for the murderous MacLaughlin, approaching and pointing to the inscription on the tomb, exclaiming, “I have obtain’d a pension of a shilling a day, only for putting an end to thy days!”

CHAPTER VII.
MIDDLESEX ELECTIONS, 1768-9.

Within a month of his return died George Cooke, the Tory colleague of Wilkes in the representation of Middlesex, who had sat from 1750; he was prothonotary of the Court of Common Pleas, one of the joint paymasters of the forces, and colonel of the Middlesex Militia. Consequent on his decease a seat for the county was to be contested in December, 1768, and the public were indulged with another exciting struggle at the Brentford hustings. The candidates were John Glynn, the friend and advocate of Wilkes, and Sir William Beauchamp Proctor, the candidate defeated in the previous election. The superheated state of popular feeling had not had time to cool down; moreover, Wilkes, the chosen of the electors, was a prisoner. Both parties on this occasion seem to have resorted to terrorism; mutual recriminations as to the hiring of ruffians and bludgeon-men were made during the inquiries into the disturbances which ensued. A view of the situation, “Scene at the Brentford Hustings,” 1768, exhibits the violent and brutal behaviour of mercenaries in the pay of Proctor’s faction—chiefly reckless bullies, according to the engraving of the Brentford election. Females are beaten causelessly; a fruit-stall is wrecked, and a respectably attired person is taking advantage of the confusion to help himself from the stock, whilst the proprietress is wantonly beaten with a heavy cudgel; the legion of bludgeons is enlisted in the cause of “Liberty and Proctor;” a hero whose head is shaven, and who is evidently a professional pugilist of the Figg and Broughton type, is made to exclaim, “For a guinea a day; damn Glynn and all his friends.” Other beaters—chairmen, linkmen, and the like—are driving all before them, and carrying the hustings by assault, demanding, “Bring down the poll-book—Proctor shall be the man.” The scattered remnants of a rival mob are retiring; one of these is exclaiming, “D—— ye, you dogs—we’ll match you all presently.”

THE HUSTINGS AT BRENTFORD, MIDDLESEX ELECTION, 1768. SERJEANT GLYNN AND SIR W. BEAUCHAMP PROCTOR.

[Page 178.

The Oxford Magazine (vol. i.) has printed the correspondence which ensued upon the disgraceful violence and the attack on the hustings, in which several persons were injured and at least one fatally. The candidate ultimately returned, John Glynn, began by addressing a “Letter to the Freeholders of Middlesex,” pledging himself that the blood of his constituents so wantonly shed should be vindicated, and the charge brought home both to the hired and the hirers—“the more exalted their stations and the more privileged their persons, the louder is the call for justice.” The serjeant continues, “The freedom of a county election is the last sacred privilege we have left; and it does not become any honest Englishman to wish to survive it. There is virtue still left in the country; we are come to a crisis, and the consequence of this struggle shall determine whether we shall be Slaves or Free.”

Following suit, Sir W. Beauchamp Proctor also addressed a letter to the freeholders of Middlesex, rebutting the charges made against him. After referring to twenty years, during which, by fair and honourable means, he had endeavoured to obtain their esteem,—

“Calumniated as I have been during a long-depending canvass, I was in hopes that every topic of defamation had been exhausted; and I never expected that the daring and tumultuous interruption of last Tuesday’s poll would have been ascribed to me in so illiberal and inflammatory a style as my antagonist has thought proper to use. For his conduct in the course of this business the serjeant appeals to me, and I appeal to the sense of mankind, whether a band of writers has not been let loose to be the assassins of my reputation? whether the serjeant has not, in a manner unworthy of a gentleman and a lawyer, exerted every effort to set up usage in opposition to the law of the land, and endeavoured in a dictatorial manner to compel the sheriffs to close the poll in one day, to the prejudice of the electors, and in violation of the authority vested in the returning officers, by the wisdom of the legislature.”

Proctor declared that he was not only struck by “the banditti,” but in the utmost peril of his life.

“If a signal was given,—if Proctor and Liberty appeared in the hats of the ruffians, how that might be contrived by the election arts of my adversaries need not now be mentioned. It was the opinion of my counsel, when a riot was artfully talked of by my opponents, above an hour before it happened, that the sheriffs in that case should resort immediately to the protection of parliament.” Finally, he expressed hopes “to bring this dark transaction into open daylight, and to show the world who has been the man of blood;” moreover, the writer “has full confidence that on the last day of the poll lawless men will not again dare to invade the rights of the freeholders.”

The disavowal, which “doth protest too much” as published by Proctor, goaded the virtuous indignation of the friends of freedom up to fever heat, and acted like a red rag on an infuriated bull in the instance of John Horne (Tooke), “the Brentford parson;” he addressed a scathing philippic to Proctor, declaring that Sir William’s refutations “subscribed his own guilt, and that the Court candidate had signed his name to a lie:”—

“I here declare in form, that you, Sir William Beauchamp Proctor, did both hire and cause to be hired, that mob which committed the outrages at Brentford; that mob, which immediately after the total interruption of the poll, demanded which was the house that belonged to the parson of Brentford; and to whose fury a neighbouring clergyman, who heard them ask after my house, was apprehensive of falling a sacrifice, by the mistake of a person who called himself by my name. Boast of your humanity, Sir William, to Captain Read; that gentleman, to save his own life, declared himself your friend. Persuade Mr. Allen they were not your mob; that gentleman brought you to the side of the hustings where they were, and heard them answer to his question, and to your face, that you, Sir W. Beauchamp Proctor, were the person that gave them orders for what they were about.”

As to the “band of writers,” Parson Horne frankly avowed himself the author of most of the letters that appeared against Proctor in the papers, and concluded with a stinging reference to those “new-fashioned constables,” as Sir John Fielding termed the hireling bullies.

“Where you endeavour to justify your proceedings by the usage of all contested popular elections, and where you affect to consider your hired ruffians, the Irish chairmen, as ‘assistants to the civil magistrates.’ The business of the approaching poll prevents my saying half what I have to tell you; but I promise you, you shall hear from me again and again, if you will please to issue out your orders to your ruffians to grant me a Reprieve till after the election.”

The main features of this ill-advised attack, which, it was believed, was intended to put an end to the election should the polling prove adverse to the party in whose pay the hired mob acted, are given in the Oxford Magazine:—

“Thursday, Dec. 8, 1768. This day being appointed for the Middlesex election, the candidates appeared on the hustings at ten minutes before nine. Notwithstanding this, the opening of the poll was delayed till near eleven. One of the narrow avenues leading to Brentford butts was occupied very early by a hired mob, with bludgeons, bearing favours in their hats, inscribed, ‘Proctor and Liberty.’ A much larger, but very compact body, armed as the former, and with the same distinctions, were placed near the hustings, on an eminence, and in a disposition which was evidently the arrangement of an experienced sergeant. The rest of these banditti were stationed in different quarters of the town, to strike a general terror into the honest part of the freeholders; there was besides a ‘corps de reserve’ which was to sally forth on a signal given.

“When these dispositions were secured, a chosen party of butchers, in the same interest, traversed the town, and insulted the hustings with marrow-bones and cleavers. When Sir William Beauchamp Proctor’s numbers were nearly exhausted, and the course of the Poll declared decisively for Mr. Serjeant Glynn, who had still great multitudes unpolled, the signal was given. An instantaneous and furious, but regular attack, was made on the hustings. The sheriffs, the candidates (Glynn declares himself as having been the last to depart), the clerks, and the poll-books, all vanished in a moment.

“The whole town was presently a scene of blood. It was not enough to knock down an unhappy man; the blow was followed till he was utterly disabled. Those who have been exposed to riots declare they never saw such cruelty. All doors and windows were barricaded. There was no shelter, nothing was safe; nor can anything equal the consternation of the frightened people but the abhorrence and execration with which every tongue repeats the name of Proctor.

“It appears from every account of the above proceedings, that the people who began the riot there were the friends of the court candidate; and, in particular, it is affirmed that when the Irish chairmen, and the professed bruisers at their head, had proceeded so far in their cruel and villainous intention of murdering and wounding the people, that the gentlemen upon the hustings began to be in danger of their lives,—one gentleman went up to the court candidate, and expostulated with him on the base conduct of his mob. ‘My mob!’ replied the courtier. ‘Yes, sir, your mob!’ and the gentleman added, ‘Sir, I insist upon your speaking to those fellows who are knocking down the people there.’ But the courtier refused to say anything to appease their fury; upon which the gentleman who had spoken to him, finding himself in danger of his life, seized him by the greatcoat, and showed his star to the armed ruffians, who instantly took off their hats and huzza’d him; while the ruffians were thus huzzaing, the gentleman escaped.”

When the mob had cleared the hustings, they went into the town of Brentford, and attacked the Castle Inn, which was one of the candidate’s houses of entertainment, and did considerable damage to it. The inhabitants of the town, observing this mischief, and beginning to fear their own houses would next be destroyed,—

“a general indignation took place: they sallied forth, attacked the rioters with great spirit, and drove them out of the town; and some of the voters vented their rage upon one or two of the houses opened for the other candidate. A number of persons with Proctor’s cockades in their hats assembled about ‘The Angel Inn’ at Islington in a riotous manner, armed with bludgeons.”

These well-paid hirelings were the worse for their potations, and, with the ringleader, were taken into custody.

It seems to have been a generally recognized stratagem imported into election tactics, where, as in war, nothing was considered “unfair,” to get freeholders locked up on some fictitious pretence, such as false writs, actions, summonses, or impounded as witnesses at trials, etc.; where the principal never appeared, and the hearing never came on, while the victims “to error” were detained in durance until after the poll was finished. On the occasion under consideration, it appeared that a number of freeholders were particularly summoned as jurymen, to prevent their voting for the popular candidate; this manœuvre was defeated, as concerned the Old Bailey, where the lord mayor, Turner, behaved in a truly patriotic manner.

“When the jury was called, his Lordship asked them, upon their honour, if any of them were freeholders of Middlesex; it appeared that about eighteen of them were so (specially called in order that their votes might be lost), on which his Lordship immediately dismissed them, that they might not be hindered from discharging their duty at Brentford.”

“Richard Dingham maketh oath that ‘the morning after the meeting of Sir William Beauchamp Proctor, at St. Giles’s, he saw four link-lighters named Welch, Hinton, Brady, and Quinn, disputing about some money they had received from Sir William, and they said that they had signed an agreement to go down, with several others, to Brentford on the day of Election to head a mob, and to put an end to the said Election, when they should receive orders, etc.’”

In the interval, and during the progress of the election, several men were committed to prison, including a chairman recognized as having acted as a leader, who was known as the “Infant,” being, in fact, a Hercules over six feet high; the true facts of the case came out upon examination, and, before the close of the poll, four affidavits were published in the papers, the tenour of which went to prove criminal complicity.

“Atkinson Bush maketh oath that he was at Brentford on the day of the election, and seeing a large body of men with labels in their hats, whereon was written, ‘Proctor and Liberty,’ this deponent asked them whether they were all voters for Proctor? upon which they declared they had no votes, but had in their hands what was as good, and showed him their bludgeons; and being asked who they supposed would get the election, they replied Proctor, swearing, if Glynn got the advantage, ‘By G——, we will have his blood!”

Broughton, the notorious pugilist, happened to find congenial occupation, having been selected as a temporary generalissimo of the forces, with special recruiting powers as to the enlistment of his desperadoes.

“William Wheeler, Joyce, Davis, and other chairmen made oath that they, with about forty of their order, were engaged by Broughton, on the promise of a guinea a day each, for the like purpose of putting an end to the election when the signal should be given, and, according to the account of the deponents, all the parties mentioned appeared at Brentford.”

On the next day (December 14), the poll for the election of a knight of the shire for the county of Middlesex was peacefully concluded in the presence of the sheriffs and the justices of the peace of the county, attended by the constables to suppress any further demonstrations. At the close, the numbers stood, for Serjeant Glynn, 1542; Sir W. B. Proctor, 1278. It was said, “that the number polled on this occasion exceeded by forty-two the greatest number ever known to poll at any previous election.”

The contest had been an expensive one; it was declared that Proctor and his party had been canvassing for six months; and, as an instance of the cost attending the election of a knight of the shire, it is set down as worthy of remark that the ribbons for hats alone, i.e. “favours,” to distinguish Glynn’s friends, cost four hundred pounds; the outlay of the Court candidate must have been excessively heavy.

“The populace in general, and the people of Brentford in particular, were very desirous to chair Mr. Serjeant Glynn after the sheriffs had declared his election; but he very politely entreated them to decline it, which, after much solicitation, they complied with.”

In the letter of acknowledgment addressed to his supporters in the county of Middlesex, the serjeant declares—

“As my private advantage and honour were by no means the motives of your exertions in my behalf, so neither shall they be the objects of my actions. I consider the choice you have made of me for your representative as the most authentic declaration of your abhorrence of those arbitrary and oppressive measures which have too long disgraced the administration of these kingdoms, and which, if pursued, cannot fail to destroy our most excellent constitution.

“I hope that your example will lead other counties also to assert their independence, and that the sacred flame of liberty, which always ascends, will reach at length the higher orders of this nation, and warm them likewise to a disdain of offering or accepting the wages of corruption.”

John Horne Tooke was only second to the successful candidate in the eulogiums showered on his name and conduct at this emergency. A portrait of “the parson of Brentford” was published, representing him in his clerical guise, at full length, seated in his study at a table, with his right arm resting on his “Treatise on Enclosing Commons, addressed to Sir Jno. Gibbins,” an essay which brought him an unusually handsome acknowledgment; in his other hand is a reference to his late correspondence with the defeated ministerial candidate—a paper inscribed, “Mobs made after the Court Fashion, by B. Proctor, Milliner of Brentford.”

Parson Horne wears a singular wig, with the sides in what has been described as a “cornuted”[52] roll,—as peculiar as that affected by his friend Wilkes, to whom he bears a further resemblance from the obliquity of his eyes, his right eye having been blind, and fixed in its orbit.

The “Parson of Brentford” appears in the Oxford Magazine; it is evident that Horne’s parliamentary aspirations were talked of at this time, for opposite to the portrait is printed an “Extempore,—on the report that a certain Clergyman has a view on a seat in the House of Commons.”

“And is it true, and can it be?
Does Freedom so inflame him?
Exalt the Horne of Liberty;
No minister shall tame him.
Grant Heaven, we see it prove no jest,
But find, ere next November,
The man who makes a Patriot priest,
Become a Righteous Member.”

A copy of verses, with a quotation, “Templum Libertatis,” due to the pen of Phileleutheros Oxoniensis, confronts the copperplate portrait of Parson Horne:—