Wendover was a borough constituency 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 ...

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 based on the borough of

Wendover Wendover is a market town and civil parish at the foot of the Chiltern Hills in Buckinghamshire, England. It is situated at the point where the main road across the Chilterns between London and Aylesbury intersects with the once important road a ...

, was represented by two Members of Parliament, and was considered a classic example of a pocket borough.

History

Wendover first sent members to Parliament in 1300, but after 1308, elected no burgesses for more than 300 years. However, in the 17th century a solicitor named

William Hakewill William Hakewill (1574–1655) was an English legal antiquarian and M.P. Life Born in Exeter, Devon, son of John Hakewill and his wife Thomasine (née Periam). Educated, according to Anthony Wood at Exeter College, Oxford (though he did no ...

, of

Lincoln's Inn The Honourable Society of Lincoln's Inn is one of the four Inns of Court in London to which barristers of England and Wales belong and where they are called to the Bar. (The other three are Middle Temple, Inner Temple and Gray's Inn.) Lincoln ...

, rediscovered ancient writs confirming that Amersham,

Great Marlow Great Marlow is a civil parish within Wycombe district in the English county of Buckinghamshire, lying north of the town of Marlow and south of High Wycombe. The parish includes the hamlets of Bovingdon Green, Burroughs Grove, Chisbridge Cro ...

, and Wendover had all sent members to Parliament in the past, and succeeded in re-establishing their privileges (despite the opposition of

James I James I may refer to: People *James I of Aragon (1208–1276) *James I of Sicily or James II of Aragon (1267–1327) *James I, Count of La Marche (1319–1362), Count of Ponthieu *James I, Count of Urgell (1321–1347) *James I of Cyprus (1334–13 ...

), so that they resumed electing members from the Parliament of 1624. Hakewill himself was elected for Amersham in 1624. The borough consisted of most of the market town of

in Buckinghamshire. It was one of the smallest boroughs in England: in 1831, the population of the borough was approximately 802, and contained 171 houses. (The whole town contained 198 houses.) The right to vote was exercised by all inhabitant householders not receiving alms, which amounted to about 130 voters in 1831. Although this was a relatively large electorate for the time based on apparently democratic franchise, the borough and inhabitants were totally dependent on the

Lord of the Manor Lord of the Manor is a title that, in Anglo-Saxon England, referred to the landholder of a rural estate. The lord enjoyed manorial rights (the rights to establish and occupy a residence, known as the manor house and demesne) as well as seig ...

, who was able to exercise considerable influence and sometimes total control over the choice of MPs. In the 17th century, this patronage lay with the Hampden family, but in 1720

Richard Hampden Richard Hampden (baptized 13 October 1631 – 15 December 1695) was an English Whig politician and son of Ship money tax protester John Hampden. He was sworn a Privy Counsellor in 1689 and was Chancellor of the Exchequer from 18 March 1690 unt ...

apparently attempted to sell his interest in the borough to the government after losing £80,000 in the South Sea Bubble; what price he received for it, or whether the sale ever took place, is not recorded. By the 1750s, Wendover had passed to Earl Verney, and Namier lists his power as only being one of influence rather than total control;Page 148,

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 Ameri ...

, ''

The Structure of Politics at the Accession of George III ''The Structure of Politics at the Accession of George III'' was 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 the Whig view ...

'' (2nd edition; London: St Martin's Press, 1957) but by 1832 the Smith family (headed by

Lord Carrington Peter Alexander Rupert Carington, 6th Baron Carrington, Baron Carington of Upton, (6 June 1919 – 9July 2018), was a British Conservative Party politician and hereditary peer who served as Defence Secretary from 1970 to 1974, Foreign Secret ...

) seem to have been able to regard it as an absolutely secure pocket borough. Wendover was abolished as a constituency by the

Great Reform Act The Representation of the People Act 1832 (also known as the 1832 Reform Act, Great Reform Act or First Reform Act) was an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom (indexed as 2 & 3 Will. IV c. 45) that introduced major changes to the electo ...

in 1832, those of its inhabitants who were qualified to vote under the new franchise doing so in the

Buckinghamshire Buckinghamshire (), abbreviated Bucks, is a ceremonial county in South East England that borders Greater London to the south-east, Berkshire to the south, Oxfordshire to the west, Northamptonshire to the north, Bedfordshire to the north-ea ...

county constituency In the United Kingdom (UK), each of the electoral areas or divisions called constituencies elects one member to the House of Commons. Within the United Kingdom there are five bodies with members elected by electoral districts called " constitue ...

Members of Parliament

*''Constituency disenfranchised'' (1309) *''Constituency re-enfranchised'' (1624)

Notes

References

*
GENUKI
* 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 Manch ...

, ''Members of the Long Parliament'' (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1954) * J. Holladay Philbin, ''Parliamentary Representation 1832: England and Wales'' (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1965) * Edward Porritt and Annie G. Porritt, ''The Unreformed House of Commons'' (Cambridge University Press, 1903) {{DEFAULTSORT:Wendover (Uk Parliament Constituency) Constituencies of the Parliament of the United Kingdom established in 1300 Parliamentary constituencies in Buckinghamshire (historic) Rotten boroughs Constituencies of the Parliament of the United Kingdom disestablished in 1832