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

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Other verses appear in a version with a woodcut heading of a party of jolly citizens toping and toasting healths:—

A second ballad bears a strong resemblance to the foregoing; one or two verses only are selected:—

“THE INDEPENDENT WESTMINSTER CHOICE, OR, PERCEVAL AND EDWIN.
To the Tune of ‘The Free Masons.’

Another spirited ballad, on the same theme, and also to the tune of “Come, let us prepare,” appeared as “A New Song,” with a woodcut heading of a maiden and matron drinking tea at the sign of the Crown and Orange-Tree. A second version of the same ballad was published as:—

“THE TRUE ENGLISH-BOYS’ SONG TO VERNON’S GLORY.
OCCASIONED BY THE BIRTHDAY OF THAT BRAVE ADMIRAL.
To be sung round the Bonfires of London and Westminster.

The managers of what was called the “Country party” consisted of those who entitled themselves “patriots,” and were active in promoting the “good cause.” The victory which in 1741 unseated Wager and Sundon, and moreover inflicted so heavy a blow upon Walpole’s influence that he lost his corrupt majority, and subsequently retired from the struggle, was annually commemorated by an association of members of the constituency which had been the first to assert its independence. An invitation was issued to the voters to meet together to celebrate this anniversary; a copperplate, neatly engraved, surmounted by an allegorical design, and surrounded by an elegant frame or border, formed the ticket:—

“The Independent Electors of Westminster
Are desired to meet at Vintners’ Hall, Thames Street,
On Friday, the 15 Feb. 1744,

At 3 o’clock, to Dine together, in order to Commemorate their Success on the 22nd of December, 1741, and further to promote the same Public Spirit.

The design which heads this dinner-ticket represents Hercules and Britannia driving away the Harpies presumed to have been preying upon corruption; the Goddess of Liberty, with the British lion by her side, is trampling on prostrate venality,—two figures, with bags of money and a heap of gold, cast down ignominiously.

“The Body of Independent Electors of Westminster” was evidently constituted into a society, at first exclusively for the furtherance of patriotic views, but, as the Court party alleged in 1745, to spread Jacobite sentiments. The excitement evoked by the rising of the Scottish clans and proclamation of the Young Pretender in 1745 was still at its height; the gaols were filled with Scotch rebels, and the famous trial of Lord Lovat, which only commenced on the 9th of March, was absorbing popular attention to the extinction of everything but Jacobite plots, both real and feigned. As the patriotic party had long been in antagonism with the Court, whose ministers had been defeated through this influence, and the dissolution of Parliament was impending, those in office neglected no opportunity of bringing the so-called “friends of the people” into evil repute. On the assumption that all weapons are lawful in electioneering warfare, much political capital was manufactured out of the Pretender’s fiasco; and the Scottish Rebellion was seized as an opportunity to stigmatize all persons of integrity, and those who were declared enemies of the corrupt Administration then in power, as Jacobites and sympathizers with the rebels.

“The Independent Electors of the City and Liberty of Westminster” held their anniversary festival at Vintners’ Hall, on the 19th of March, 1747. The Stewards were the Earl of Lichfield, Earl of Orrery, Viscount Andover, Sir R. Bamfylde, George Heathcote, and Thomas Carew. On this occasion the stewards for the ensuing year were chosen; they were Lord Ward, Lord Windsor, Sir James Dashwood, Sir Charles Tynte, Sir Thomas Clarges, and George Cooke (who was then canvassing Middlesex). On the conclusion of the business of the afternoon, and after the festivities, toasts, as was customary, began to be proposed. The London Evening Post gives a list of these healths, beginning with “The King;” but, as an implication of Jacobite proclivities, it is added in another paper that the royal health was honoured in the recognized Jacobite fashion—to “Charley over the Water:”—“Each man having a glass of water on the left hand, and waving the glass of wine over the water,”—but this accusation was probably a bold electioneering ruse. The succeeding toasts were as follows:—“The Prince;” “The Duke;” “Prosperity to the independent electors of Westminster;” “Prosperity to the city of London and the trade thereof;” “Thanks to the Worshipful Company of Vintners’ for the use of their Hall;” “The Lord Mayor of London;” “Success to the arms of Great Britain by sea and land;” “To the annexing Cape Breton to the Crown of Great Britain;” “That the spirit of independency may diffuse itself through the nation;” “That the enemies of Great Britain may never eat the bread nor drink the drink thereof;” “That the Naturalization Bill may be kicked out of the House, and the foreigners out of the kingdom;” “That the darkening our windows may enlighten our understanding” (tax upon light); “To all those that dare—be honest;” “The stewards elect;” “The late stewards, with thanks for the trouble they have taken;” “Our old Friend ——.”

According to the Gentleman’s Magazine, “amidst this mirth, one Mr. Williams, Master of the ‘White Horse’ in Piccadilly, being observed to make memorandums with a pencil, gave such offence that he was severely cuffed and kicked out of the company.” It appears that a Jacobite complexion was given to the rather forcible expression of public contempt bestowed upon the Ministerial notetaker, who was branded as “the Spy.” A spirited version of this incident, executed closely in the manner of Hogarth, if not by that master, to whose portrait of Lord Lovat it in style approximates (the artist was himself one of the free electors of Westminster), exhibits the ignominious ejectment of “the Spy,” whose detection is further indicated by the paper he has dropped on the ground, marked “List of the persons, etc.” The pictorial view of an episode to which undue importance was attached, owing to the excited relation of parties at the time, is accompanied by a quotation from “Hudibras” appropriate to the subject:—

A few days later a second entry shows that it was seriously entertained at that emergency to carry the matter farther; in any case—although they do not seem to have eventually made anything of it—the complaint was taken up by the Commons, and referred to the managers of Lord Lovat’s trial, then just concluded. On the 24th of March—

“Complaint being made to the House that John Williams, keeper of the ‘White Horse Inn’ in Piccadilly, was on Thursday last, in a public assembly, assaulted and severely treated, upon a public assertion made by some persons in that assembly—‘that, Fraser, said by them, to be one of the principal witnesses against the Lord Lovat, was in his custody’ ORDER’D. That a committee be appointed to enquire into the matter of this complaint, and examine persons in the most solemn manner; that this committee be the managers against Lord Lovat.”

The whole matter is obscured by party misrepresentations. One James Fraser, who was pronounced a Jacobite, was active against the Ministerial candidates at the Westminster contest of 1749, where all opponents of the Court were denounced as Jacobites, while the “patriots,” “country party,” and “independent electors of Westminster,”—as they indiscriminately christened themselves—retorted upon Earl Gower, through his son, Lord Trentham, the Ministerial candidate for that city, the accusation of Jacobite leanings:—“Ask Lord Trentham who had his foot in the stirrup in the year 1715.”

The parliamentary dissolution followed in June, 1747, when the favourite manœuvre of those in power was to recklessly accuse their opponents of belonging to the Stuart faction. The odium attaching to the suspicion of Jacobite tendencies was sufficiently strong to place the “Independent party” in a smaller minority than at the previous election, and thus the outbreak in favour of the Pretender served to recruit the strength of the Court party, which had been jeopardized at the 1741 election, and had shown signs of declension before the rising in 1745. The Government candidates for Westminster, Admiral Sir Peter Warren and Lord Trentham, were again chosen from the Admiralty. Lord Trentham was the son of that Earl Gower who was for some time the head of the Opposition, and at this juncture was one of the recent recruits of the Court party.

Lord Trentham’s selection as a lord of the admiralty occurred somewhat later (1749). The second candidate was Admiral Sir Peter Warren, who, as usual, was supported by a mob of Jack Tars, or of ruffians dressed in sailors’ clothes for the occasion, a common party subterfuge at the Westminster elections. The candidates put forward for the suffrages of the “Independent Electors,” and who came out of the contest ingloriously, were, as first announced, Sir Thomas Clarges (one of the stewards of the association) and Sir John Phillips (who was a steward in 1744); after a ten-days’ canvass the latter declined to proceed in his candidature, on the plea of ill health, and Sir Thomas Dyke was put up in his stead. Early in the contest a well-executed caricature, in the manner of Boitard or Gravelot, both artists being contemporary with Hogarth, was offered to the public under the title of “The Two-Shilling Butcher.” It was at this election that the highest personages canvassed. The Duke of Cumberland and the Prince of Wales appeared in support of the rival factions. In the pictorial view of this situation, Lord Trentham, a dandified person dressed in the extreme of French taste, is in conference with his “backer” the “Two-Shilling Butcher,” who has been supposed by Thomas Wright and other authorities to represent the “Culloden Butcher,” i.e. the Duke of Cumberland. Mr. F. G. Stephens, who has described all the early caricatures in the Hawkins Collections with the utmost pains and minutiæ, sets down this personage as Mr. Butcher, the agent to the Duke of Bedford, whose residence is introduced in the rear. However, the figure in the present version corresponds with similar representations of the stout Cumberland Butcher; moreover, an allusion to cattle put into the mouth of this personage strongly indicates, by analogy with other caricatures on “horned cattle,” that none other than the duke is meant. The results of the election were at this time uncertain. The affected lordling, also satirized as Sir Silkington, is drawling, “Curs me! you’d buy me, ye Brutes, at 2s. p. Head Bona fide?” to which the figure travestied as a butcher, with apron, knife, and steel, is responding, “My Lord, there being a Fatality in ye Cattle, that there is 3000 above my Cut, tho’ I offered handsome.” The “3000” presumably refers to the Association of Independent Electors, who, at the previous poll (1741), registered for the “patriot” candidates (Vernon and Edwin), but were found wanting in 1747, as the figures at the close of the poll demonstrated. The Duke of Bedford’s residence is introduced to recall the circumstance that he and the candidate were close matrimonial connections, the duke having married the eldest daughter of John, Earl Gower. In front of this building, with the “bustos” of sphinxes above the posts of the gateway, is another important personage, who is bribing rival canvassers with gold openly filched from the pockets of Britannia, who is highly indignant at the proceeding; she is made to exclaim, with reason, “Ye Gods, what pickpockets!” The people seen in the dark transaction of being bribed were defectors from “Phillips and Clarges,” demoralized by the spell of gold; another voter is hastening away, denouncing the venality of these persons. One of the sphinxes is exclaiming—“We can’t decoy them in!” while labels, carried through the air by pigeons, record “The Independent has it,” and “For Yorkshire.” On the opposite side is shown the front of St. Paul’s, Covent Garden, with its dial and the motto “So passes ye glory of ye world.” Before its portals stand the rival candidates, Sir Thomas Clarges and Sir Thomas Dyke; they are showing their contempt for mere “placemen representatives” by trampling upon government bribes: “Places in Exchequer we tread on,” and “No lucrative Employment.” Near them are the poll clerks, and the returning officer, with the poll-book under his charge. Beside the “independent” candidates are shown their supporters: one of these, bearing in his hand the cap of liberty, is pressing the latter on the acceptance of the electors, and assuring them, “Those candidates will serve you!” while a scroll, borne above the heads of the voters, carries the warning, “No Trentham!”

Other caricatures appeared on the same subject, which excited, as usual, the largest share of public interest during the elections throughout the country. One of these first appeared, in compliment to the Scottish Rebellion, the latest novelty of the time, as “The Jaco-Independo-Rebello-Plaido.” In this version the business of the election is represented to take place before Westminster Hall, as a further allusion to the Jacobites and Lord Lovat’s trial there. The two parties and their respective head-quarters, established at taverns, are represented, and above all hovers the power of Destruction, always pictured as an important agent of “the other side,” according to the respective allegations of the contending parties. The Devil, in the present instance, is made “to take care of his own,” and has a stock of halters and axes for the rebels. “I have the Fee in my hands,” saith the Evil One. One side is appropriated to Ministerialists at the sign of Jolly Bacchus and the (Rabbit) Warren. Two persons are leaning from the first-floor window, and exhorting those with votes to “Give the Devil his due”—i.e. the Jacobites. The most prominent figure is a butcher; and no doubt, according to Mr. F. G. Stephens’s suggestion, the person thus implied is Mr. Butcher, the Duke of Bedford’s agent, and a less distinguished person than the “Cumberland Duke” pictured in the “Two-Shilling Butcher.” He is waving a scroll endorsed, “Trentham and Warren.” The butcher agent is surrounded by partisans; Admiral Sir Peter Warren’s sailors (a Lascar among them) are asserting “bludgeon law;” the people are pushing to the Governmental head-quarters, crying “No independency” and “No Pretender,” as if the terms were synonymous; a Frenchman may be identified in the crowd; and a person is offering the butcher a paper, “They squeak.” The head-quarters of the opposite party is shown as a Jacobite house. The flag displayed is adorned with the figure of an owl dressed in a full wig and a counsellor’s bands, and indicates “Morgan’s Ghost,” the Morgan thus favoured having been a Jacobite barrister who had the misfortune to be implicated in the abortive rising of 1745 in the interests of the Pretender, which cost Morgan his life. The adherents rallying round this questionable house, intended as a reflection upon the Association of Independent Electors of Westminster, who were stigmatized as friends of the Jacobites, are dressed for the most part in plaids, and wear Scotch bonnets, to imply their Jacobite sympathies. This caricature was republished, with the hustings at Covent Garden substituted for Westminster Hall, and the Devil very civilly giving place to the figure of an angel, with the legend “Faithful to King and country.” The title was changed to “The Humours of the Westminster Election; or, the Scald Miserable Independent Electors in the Suds,” 1747, with the following lines:—

Strong Jacobite imputations are farther conveyed in the pictorial version of “Great Britain’s Union; or, the Litchfield Races, 1747.” Both Whig and Tory parties, not content with the legitimate and recognized contests of the hustings, and their ultimate goal, the senate, carried their partisan proclivities on to the racecourse, and ministerial and opposition stakes were alternately put into competition on the same turf. Thus, at Lichfield were held Tory race weeks, succeeded by similar gatherings on the part of their opponents. Some rather extraordinary doings occurred there, the general description of which is conveyed by the caricature; the two factions by some means came into collision, and his Grace of Bedford received a sound hiding with a horsewhip as an acknowledgment of his services to the House of Hanover and his antagonism to the Patriotic party, denounced as Jacobites by their Hanoverian rivals; Earl Gower, and his modish son, Lord Trentham, were also roughly handled. Various freaks of an extravagant nature were performed, ladies and gentlemen of the Patriotic faction appearing dressed in Scottish plaids. In the design this circumstance is specially embodied: a party of enthusiasts, assembled in a booth on the course, are toasting the Pretender, whose sun is seen in the distance, falsely depicted as in the ascendant. A despondent grenadier outside the Jacobite head-quarters, is grumbling, “We are rode by Germans;” a cradle, a Gallic cock, and a fleur-de-lis allude to the Chevalier and the French assistance lent to his pretensions; overhead several hands are seen clasped, with the suggestive legend, “A-greed.” A Frenchified person, pointing to a gamecock fighting his own shadow, is denouncing the Duke (of Bedford) in no measured terms; under his right arm is the whip with which the duke was castigated, and in the left hand of this valorous bravo is a paper, “We have courage.” As usual, the Devil is present, and this time he is flying off with “Information,” possibly to be laid before his dear friends in office. A sort of zany, seated beneath a flag marked, “And curse upon denial” (alluding to equivocation on the part of several), is giving the starting signal. The Scotch plaid-clad jockey riding for the Chevalier is beating the Hanoverian jockey on the traditional “White Horse.” This highly fanciful conception, the reverse of actual experience, is hailed with extravagant delight by the excited assembly; the occupants of the Grand Stand are described as “Don Juan and his friends at the place of Desert.” Various ballads and satirical productions were evoked upon the transaction related.

Lord Trentham, his father, Earl Gower, and their great relative, the Duke of Bedford, are, with various references to the late election for Westminster, introduced into several caricatures which followed, and notably in “Great Britain’s Union; or, Litchfield Races transposed,” “A Sight of the Banging Bout at Litchfield,” and “An Exact Representation” of the same occurrence. The circumstances to which these pictorial satires refer are traceable to the national ferment succeeding the suppression of the Rebellion, when, as recapitulated, various eccentricities were committed by those who favoured the Pretender’s cause; among others, certain Staffordshire sportsmen made themselves conspicuous. Smollett, in his “History of England,” describes these vagaries: the Stuart partisans—

“appeared in the Highland taste of variegated drapery, and, their zeal descending to a very extraordinary exhibition of practical ridicule, they hunted with hounds clothed in plaid, a fox dressed in red uniform. Even the females at their assembly and the gentlemen at the races affected to wear the chequered stuff by which the prince-pretender and his followers had been distinguished. Divers noblemen on the course were insulted as apostates; and one personage of high rank is said to have undergone a very disagreeable flagellation.”

The sequel of this adventure is related in the Gentleman’s Magazine (1748):—

“Before Mr. Justice Burnett, took place the trial of the information against Toll (a dancing-master) and others, for insulting and striking the Duke of Bedford, and other gentlemen, upon Whittington Heath, at the late Litchfield horse-races; when it was likewise proposed by the counsel for the defendants, that the several rioters, to the number of thirteen, should submit to be found guilty: if the counsel for the crown would consent to withdraw the information against several other persons concerned in that riot.”

The circumstances of the fracas are also alluded to in the “Letters of Junius” (xxii.):—

“Mr. Heston Humphrey, a country attorney, horsewhipped the duke with equal justice, severity, and perseverance on the course at Litchfield. Rigby and Lord Trentham were also cudgelled in a most exemplary manner.”

These incidents gave rise to various ballads as well as caricatures; a parody on “Chevy Chase” offers the liveliest version of the affair:—

“THE LORDS’ LAMENTATION; OR, THE WHITTINGTON DEFEAT.

In 1749, Lord Trentham, having been appointed one of the lords of the admiralty, had to vacate his seat, and every exertion was made by the Opposition to hinder his re-election.

“With this view they held consultations, agreed to resolutions, and set up a private gentleman named Sir George Vandeput as the competitor of Lord Trentham, declaring that they would support his pretensions at their own expense; being the more encouraged to this enterprise by the countenance and assistance of the Prince of Wales and his adherents. They accordingly opened houses of entertainment for their partisans, solicited votes, circulated remonstrances, and propagated abuse; in a word, they canvassed with surprising spirit and perseverance against the whole interest of St. James’s. Mobs were hired, and processions made on both sides, and the city of Westminster was filled with tumult and uproar.”

This election occurred in the midst of a violent popular anti-Gallican feeling, which had been shown particularly against a company of French players who were performing at the Haymarket, and who were spoken of by the mob as the “French vagrants.” An attempt had been made to hinder them from acting, and they had been protected only by a mob hired by Lord Trentham, who appears to have affected Gallic manners, and to have been vain of his proficiency in the French language. The night after his ministerial appointment there was a great riot at the French theatre, in which Lord Trentham was accused of being personally active, although he denied it to the electors. This was made the most of by his opponents, who stigmatized him in ballads and squibs as “the champion of the French strollers;” and common people said that learning to talk French was only a step towards the introduction of French tyranny.

An “Elector” writes, by way of warning to others:—

“Being the other evening at the French Theatre, who should I see at the head of a mob of foreign varlets, cooks, etc., signalizing himself in a laudable attack upon his fellow-citizens, but this very young man, whom they had so lately made choice of as the defender of their rights and privileges. I was indeed amazed to see, at so critical a juncture, that sword, which had hitherto kept peaceful possession of its scabbard, brandished over the heads and planted at the hearts of several of his own electors, and that in support of a parcel of foreign vagabonds, who, from being a nuisance in their own nation, are now come to be the disgrace of ours. Certain I am this fit of Gallic valour could never be communicated by the touch of that Royal British hand he had but that very morning kissed for his employment. Perhaps an impatient desire to prove himself qualified for the warlike Board to which he was appointed might induce him to seize the first opportunity of displaying his prowess; being willing to convince the public, that how deficient soever the sea may have been, the land is, at least, able to produce a fighting Admiral. However, I cannot help concluding him a very unfit person to defend me against the French in one House, who is ready to cut my throat for them in another.”

A flight of satirical ballads appeared upon these events. The best of these compositions, which were remarkable for point and spirit, was entitled:—

“PEG TRIM TRAM IN THE SUDS; OR, NO FRENCH STROLLERS.