St Mawes was a

rotten borough A rotten or pocket borough, also known as a nomination borough or proprietorial borough, was a parliamentary borough or Electoral district, constituency in Kingdom of England, England, Kingdom of Great Britain, Great Britain, or the United Kin ...

Cornwall Cornwall (; or ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is also one of the Celtic nations and the homeland of the Cornish people. The county is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

. It returned two Members of Parliament (MPs) to the

House of Commons of England The House of Commons of England was the lower house of the Parliament of England (which Laws in Wales Acts 1535 and 1542, incorporated Wales) from its development in the 14th century to the union of England and Scotland in 1707, when it was re ...

from 1562 to 1707, to the

House of Commons of Great Britain The House of Commons of Great Britain was the lower house of the Parliament of Great Britain between 1707 and 1801. In 1707, as a result of the Acts of Union 1707, Acts of Union of that year, it replaced the House of Commons of England and the Pa ...

from 1707 to 1800, and to the

House of Commons of the United Kingdom The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the upper house, the House of Lords, it meets in the Palace of Westminster in London, England. The House of Commons is an elected body consisting of 650 memb ...

until it was abolished by the

Great Reform Act The Representation of the People Act 1832 (also known as the Reform Act 1832, Great Reform Act or First Reform Act) was an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom (indexed as 2 & 3 Will. 4. c. 45), enacted by the Whig government of Pri ...

in 1832.

History

The borough consisted of the manor of

St Mawes St Mawes () is a village on the end of the Roseland Peninsula, in the eastern side of Falmouth, Cornwall, Falmouth harbour, on the south coast of Cornwall, England. The village, formerly two separate hamlets, lies on the east bank of the Carri ...

, a decayed fishing port and market town in the west of Cornwall. Like most of the Cornish boroughs enfranchised or re-enfranchised during the

Tudor period In England and Wales, the Tudor period occurred between 1485 and 1603, including the Elizabethan era during the reign of Elizabeth I (1558–1603). The Tudor period coincides with the dynasty of the House of Tudor in England, which began with ...

, it was a rotten borough from the start. The right to vote rested with the

portreeve A portreeve (, sometimes spelt Port-reeve) or port warden is the title of a historical official in England and Wales possessing authority (political, administrative, or fiscal) over a town. The details of the office have fluctuated and evolved co ...

and "resident burgesses or free tenants", making it essentially a

scot and lot Scot and lot is a phrase common in the records of English, Welsh and Irish medieval boroughs, referring to local rights and obligations. The term ''scot'' comes from the Old English word '' sceat'', an ordinary coin in Anglo-Saxon times, eq ...

borough (there were 87 voters in 1831), but the control of the "patron" was entirely secure. In practice the patron always worked in close collusion with the Crown, and the members returned were generally court nominees throughout the borough's existence. In the 1760s the Boscawen family ( the Viscounts Falmouth) were considered to have the main influence over the choice of one member and Robert Nugent over the other;Page 147,

Lewis Namier Sir Lewis Bernstein Namier (; 27 June 1888 – 19 August 1960) was a British historian of Polish-Jewish background. His best-known works were '' The Structure of Politics at the Accession of George III'' (1929), ''England in the Age of the Ame ...

, ''

The Structure of Politics at the Accession of George III ''The Structure of Politics at the Accession of George III'' is the title of a book written by Lewis Namier. At the time of its first publication in 1929, it caused a historiographical revolution in understanding the 18th century by challenging t ...

'' (2nd edition – London: St Martin's Press, 1957) by the time of the

, the patronage had passed to the

Marquess of Buckingham Marquess of Buckingham was a title that has been created two times in the peerages of England and Great Britain. The first creation of the marquessate was in 1618 for George Villiers, a favourite of James I of England. He had previously been ...

. In 1831, the borough had a population of 459, and 95 houses.

Members of Parliament

1562–1629

1640–1832

Notes

References

*Robert Beatson, ''A Chronological Register of Both Houses of Parliament'' (London: Longman, Hurst, Res & Orme, 1807

*D. Brunton &

D. H. Pennington Donald Henshaw Pennington (15 June 1919 – 28 December 2007) was a historian of 17th-century England. He taught at Manchester and Oxford universities, becoming a tutor at Balliol College, Oxford in 1965. Donald was born in Marple, Greater Manche ...

, ''Members of the Long Parliament'' (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1954) *''Cobbett's Parliamentary history of England, from the Norman Conquest in 1066 to the year 1803'' (London: Thomas Hansard, 1808

* Maija Jansson (ed.), ''Proceedings in Parliament, 1614 (House of Commons)'' (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1988) *

J. E. Neale Sir John Ernest Neale (7 December 1890 – 2 September 1975) was an English historian who specialised in Elizabethan and Parliamentary history. From 1927 to 1956, he was the Astor Professor of English History at University College London. Acad ...

, ''The Elizabethan House of Commons'' (London: Jonathan Cape, 1949) *J. Holladay Philbin, ''Parliamentary Representation 1832 – England and Wales'' (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1965) * Henry Stooks Smith, ''The Parliaments of England from 1715 to 1847'', Volume 3 (London: Simpkin, Marshall & Co, 1850)

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Mawes UK Parliament constituency Constituencies of the Parliament of the United Kingdom established in 1562 Constituencies of the Parliament of the United Kingdom disestablished in 1832 Parliamentary constituencies in Cornwall (historic) Rotten boroughs St Mawes