A committee appointed to take steps for the City's defence, 18 Jan., 1682.
Notification of service of the writ was formally made to the Common Council on the 18th January. The council showed no signs of dismay; they scarcely realized, perhaps, at the outset the true significance of the writ or the consequence it was likely to entail. They had no cause to think that the mayor, commonalty and citizens had usurped any liberties, franchises or privileges without due warrant or had abused any to which they had lawful title. One thing was plain. It was their duty to maintain the rights of the City. They therefore appointed a committee to consult with counsel learned in the law, and prepare a defence such as they might be advised to make, and ordered the Chamberlain to[pg 478] disburse such sums of money as might be required for the purpose.[1488]
Rival factions touching election of sheriffs.
More than a twelvemonth was taken up in preparing the long and technical pleadings[1489] preliminary to trial, and in the meantime another severe struggle took place in assertion of the right claimed by the citizens to elect both their sheriffs. The citizens ranged themselves in separate factions, the Whig party under sheriff Pilkington, the Tories under the mayor. Each leader entertained his supporters at dinner.[1490] There was to have been a banquet held on the 21st April at Haberdashers' Hall, at which the Duke of Monmouth, Lord Shaftesbury and others of the Whig party were to have been present, but the proposal getting wind, the mayor was strictly enjoined by the Privy Council to prevent it as being a seditious meeting and tending to create factions among the king's subjects.[1491]
The Duke of York and Sheriff Pilkington, June, 1682.
The Duke of York, who had for some time past resided in Scotland, had not increased in favour with the citizens of London. It is true that the mayor and aldermen of the city paid their respects to his highness (10 April, 1682) at St. James's Palace, on his return from the north, after paying a similar visit to the king, who had recently returned to Whitehall from Newmarket;[1492] but a proposal to offer[pg 479] an address to the duke praying him to reside in London found but little response in the Court of Aldermen, and was allowed to drop.[1493] It was not so long ago that his picture hanging in the Guildhall was found to have been mutilated, an offer of £500 for the discovery of the perpetrator of the outrage being without effect.[1494] Just when Pilkington was about to lay down his office of sheriff the duke entered an action against him for slander, claiming damages to the extent of £50,000. For a time he managed to escape service of the writ,[1495] but if he was not served before, his presence in the Common Hall on Midsummer-day for the election of new sheriffs afforded ample opportunity to serve him then.
The election of sheriffs, 24 June, 1682.
This election is one of the most remarkable elections in the City's annals. The royalist mayor, Sir John Moore, having previously drunk to Dudley North at a banquet at the Bridge House (18 May), thereby intimating that he nominated North as one of the sheriffs for the year ensuing, according to custom, had issued his precept to the several companies (19 June) to meet in Common Hall for the purpose of confirming his nomination and electing another sheriff to serve with his nominee.[1496] This form of precept was objected to, and when the Common Cryer called upon the livery assembled in Common Hall to appear for the "confirmation" of North, he was met with cries of "No confirmation! No confirmation!"[pg 480] and the rest of his proclamation was drowned in uproar. "Thereupon," runs the City's Record,[1497] "Thomas Papillon, esq., mercer, John Du Bois, weaver, and Ralph Box, grocer, citizens of London (together with the said Dudley North, so as aforesaid elected by the lord mayor), were nominated by the commonalty, that two of them by the said commonalty might be chosen into the office of sheriffs of the city of London and county of Middlesex." The Common Sergeant having declared Papillon and Du Bois duly elected, a poll was demanded. This was granted and proceeded with until seven o'clock in the evening, when the meeting was adjourned by the mayor until the 27th. The outgoing sheriffs (Pilkington and Shute), however, disregarded the mayor's order for adjournment and continued the poll for some time longer, but at last adjourned the meeting to the day fixed by the mayor.
Pilkington and Shute committed to the Tower, 26 June, 1682.
A fresh question thus arose, namely, whether the right of adjourning a Common Hall was vested in the mayor for the time being or in the sheriffs. Sir John Moore reported the conduct of Pilkington and Shute to the king's council, with the result that before the 27th day of June arrived they were both committed to the Tower. They were afterwards admitted to bail.[1498]