WILLIAM III. (1650–1702)

After an engraving of the painting by Sir Godfrey Kneller.

So that those who were not Freemen of the City had no right to vote at all. This limitation of the vote was confirmed in 1711, 1712, in 1714, and by an Act of Parliament of 11 George I.

There were scares in the City, first after the defeat of the Dutch fleet on June 30, 1691, by the French, when the latter were expected to attempt a landing up the Thames; and next when a report was raised that King James was at the head of a powerful French army. On both occasions the City put on a bold front, called out and equipped 10,000 men, and invited the Queen to appoint officers. It will be remembered that on the scare of the Spanish Armada, doubts were cast on the efficiency of the London contingent because the men would only obey their own officers, who were notoriously incompetent. Here we see a change. The City now recognises the fact that an officer cannot be made out of a merchant in a single day.

MARY II. (1662–1694)

After an engraving of the painting by Sir Godfrey Kneller.

The City next had to go before Parliament in the humiliating position of a trustee who has lost trust money. The case was this. It had long been the custom of the City to take care of orphans, being children of Freemen, their fortunes or portions being received by the Chamber and administered for them. The Mayor now declared that this money had so grievously diminished that they simply could not pay the orphans on coming of age their own estates. Several reasons were alleged for this loss: the stoppage of the Exchequer, Charles’s act of robbery; a large part of the fund had been lent to the Exchequer; other sums had been lost in various ways, and the City now found itself in debt to orphans for £500,000, and £247,500 in other ways, the whole being far more than it could pay. A committee was appointed to investigate the case, and on their report an Act was passed, of which the following are the heads:—

“That towards settling a perpetual Fund for paying the yearly Interest of four Pounds, for every hundred Pound due by the City to their Creditors, all the Manors, Messuages, Lands, Markets, Fairs, and other Hereditaments, Revenues and Income whatsoever, belonging to the Mayor, Commonalty, and Citizens, in Possession or Reversion, and all Improvements that shall be made thereof (excepting the Estates and Possessions belonging to Christ’s, St. Bartholomew’s, St. Thomas’s, Bridewell, Bethlehem, or any other of the City Hospitals, and the Estates appropriated for the repair of London Bridge), are for ever charged, from the twenty-fourth of June in the present Year, for raising annually the sum of eight thousand Pounds, clear of all Deductions.

2. That all the Profits arising from the several Aqueducts belonging to the City be applied towards the Payment of the said Interest.

3. Towards the Support of the said Fund, the Lord Mayor and Common Council are impowered annually to raise the Sum of two Thousand Pounds, by an equal Assessment upon the personal Estates of the Citizens.

4. Towards the Support of the said Fund, be paid the annual Sum of six hundred Pounds, being the Fine or Rent paid by certain Persons for the Privilege of illuminating the Streets of the City with Convex Lamps. This tended very much to the Dishonour of the City, to make a pecuniary advantage of a publick Benefit; but the same being removed, to the no small honour of the Gentlemen in the present Direction of the City Affairs, I shall say no more on that Head.

5. That every Apprentice, at the Time of his being bound, shall pay towards the said Fund two shillings and six Pence.

6. That every Person, upon his being admitted a Freeman of the City, shall pay towards the Support of the said Fund five Shillings.

7. That every Ton of Wine imported into the Port of London, shall pay towards the support of the said Fund five Shillings.

8. That, towards the increase of the said Fund, all Coals imported into the Port of London shall pay four Pence the Chaldron Metage above what was formerly paid.

9. And, as a further Increase to the said Fund, all Coals imported into the Port of London after the twenty-ninth of September, Anno 1770, the Measurable to pay six Pence the Chaldron, and the Weighable six Pence the Ton, for the term of Fifty Years. And to the Intent that the said Fund may be perpetual, it is enacted, That, after the Expiration of the said Term of fifty Years, when the said six Pence per Cauldron and Ton upon Coals shall cease, then all the Manors, Messuages, Lands, Tenements, Markets, Fairs, and the Duties thereof, and other Hereditaments, Revenues and Income whatsoever, belonging to the City either in Possession or Reversion, shall stand charged with the yearly Sum of six thousand Pounds, over and above the already named Sum of eight Thousand Pounds per Ann.”

Dissensions over elections and the mode of elections, scares about plots and the rumours of plots, rejoicings over victory, make up the history of London during the next few years. The losses of the Turkey merchants when, for want of a sufficient convoy, their ships were taken or burned by the French, were a national disaster. The merchant fleet was valued at many millions; the convoy forwarded the merchantmen safely as far as the Land’s End, when it left them to a smaller convoy of seventeen ships under Rooke. They found their way barred by the French fleet; in the fight that followed some of the merchantmen escaped, but the greater number were lost. “Never within the memory of man,” Macaulay says, “had there been in the City a day of more gloom and agitation than that on which the news of the encounter arrived. Money-lenders, an eye-witness said, went away from the Exchange as pale as if they had received sentence of death.” The Queen expressed her sorrow and sympathy and promised an inquiry. The probable cause of the desertion of the merchantmen by the main convoy was that it was not safe to leave the Channel unguarded so long.