The constituency of Gloucestershire was a UK Parliamentary constituency. After it was abolished under the 1832 Electoral Reform Act, two new constituencies, West Gloucestershire and East Gloucestershire, were created. Gloucestershire was a

constituency An electoral district, also known as an election district, legislative district, voting district, constituency, riding, ward, division, or (election) precinct is a subdivision of a larger State (polity), state (a country, administrative region, ...

of the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. ...

of the

Parliament of England The Parliament of England was the legislature of the Kingdom of England from the 13th century until 1707 when it was replaced by the Parliament of Great Britain. Parliament evolved from the great council of bishops and peers that advised t ...

, then of the

Parliament of Great Britain The Parliament of Great Britain was formed in May 1707 following the ratification of the Acts of Union by both the Parliament of England and the Parliament of Scotland. The Acts ratified the treaty of Union which created a new unified Kingdo ...

from 1707 to 1800 and of the

Parliament of the United Kingdom The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of Westminster, London. It alone possesses legislative suprema ...

from 1801 to 1832. It was represented by two

Knights of the Shire Knight of the shire ( la, milites comitatus) was the formal title for a member of parliament (MP) representing a county constituency in the British House of Commons, from its origins in the medieval Parliament of England until the Redistribution ...

Boundaries

The constituency consisted of the historic county of

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( abbreviated Glos) is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn and the entire Forest of Dean. The county town is the city of Gl ...

, excluding the part of the city of

Bristol Bristol () is a city, ceremonial county and unitary authority in England. Situated on the River Avon, it is bordered by the ceremonial counties of Gloucestershire to the north and Somerset to the south. Bristol is the most populous city in ...

in the geographical county. Bristol had the status of a county of itself after 1373. Although Gloucestershire contained a number of other

parliamentary borough A borough is an administrative division in various English-speaking countries. In principle, the term ''borough'' designates a self-governing walled town, although in practice, official use of the term varies widely. History In the Middle Ag ...

s, each of which elected two MPs in its own right for part of the period when Gloucestershire was a constituency, these were not excluded from the county constituency. Owning property within such boroughs could confer a vote at the county election. This was not the case, though, for Bristol.

Members of Parliament

Roman numerals are used to differentiate MPs with the same name, who are not holders of a title with different succession numbers. It is not suggested that the people involved would have used Roman numerals in this way.

1290–1339

''Constituency created'' (1290)

1340–1385

1386–1421

(Source: Roskell, 1992)

1422–1508

1509–1558

''(Source: Bindoff (1982))''Bindoff S.T. (ed.) The History of Parliament: The House of Commons 1509-1558, London, 1982, pp. 91–92

1559–1639

1640–1832

Notes:- * ¹ Dutton was disabled from sitting for adhering to the King and joining the King's Oxford Parliament, c. 1644. * ² Seymour was excluded from Parliament by the Army, c. 1648. * ³ Father of the Baynham Throckmorton elected in 1656 and 1664. * ⁴ Stooks Smith classifies Bromley-Chester as Tory in the 1776 by-election, but gives no label in subsequent elections. * ⁵ Stooks Smith classifies Berkeley as Whig in the 1776 by-election (which he lost), but gives no label in subsequent elections before the general election of 1790. Both Berkeley and Master are classified by party from 1790.

Elections

Sources

*''Cobbett's Parliamentary history of England, from the Norman Conquest in 1066 to the year 1803'' (London: Thomas Hansard, 1808

* ''The House of Commons 1690-1715'', by Eveline Cruickshanks, Stuart Handley and D.W. Hayton (Cambridge University Press 2002) * ''The Parliaments of England'' by Henry Stooks Smith (1st edition published in three volumes 1844–50), second edition edited (in one volume) by F.W.S. Craig (Political Reference Publications 1973)) *{{Rayment-hc, g, 1, date=March 2012 *Roskell, J.S. (ed.), ''The History of Parliament; The House of Commons 1386-1421'', 4 vols., Stroud, 1992. Vol.1, p. 398
Williams, W.R., Parliamentary History of the County of Gloucester, Hereford, 1898

References

Constituencies of the Parliament of the United Kingdom established in 1290 Constituencies of the Parliament of the United Kingdom disestablished in 1832 Parliamentary constituencies in South West England (historic) Politics of Gloucestershire