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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 July 2014
John Tucker was a member of Parliament for the borough of Weymouth between 1735–47 and again between 1754–78. The relevant entries for him in the volumes of the History of Parliament are exiguous. He appears to have made only two interventions in Commons debates, on 27 February 1771 and 30 April 1772. In John Brooke's words, both were “slight and short.” According to the History of Parliament, Tucker's political stance was determined largely by his relationship with George Bubb Dodington, although the evidence is capable, as we shall see, of being read in a different way. Romney Sedgwick quotes from a letter Dodington wrote to Sir Robert Walpole in 1737, following the famous division on the Prince of Wales's allowance, that “the connexion between these gentlemen [those identified with his interest, including Tucker] and me was such that we should not have differed in opinion” even had he decided to vote for the motion. Tucker emerges from the History of Parliament volumes as a man without political views of his own and as an individual tightly caught up in a politics shaped principally by interest and management.
This article exploits a hitherto neglected source to reconstruct more fully John Tucker's political world and views, to present a different account of his political stance and importance, and thus to throw considerable light on politics in the mid-eighteenth century. This source is a manuscript collection that the Bodleian Library acquired in 1969 and 1970. The collection mostly comprises the papers of John Tucker's father, Edward, his brother, Richard, and John himself.
1 Sedgwick, Romney, ed., History of Parliament: The Commons 1715–54 2 vols. (London, 1970), 2:484–5Google Scholar; Namier, Lewis and Brooke, John, eds., History of Parliament: The Commons 1754–90 3 vols. (London, 1964), 3:565Google Scholar.
2 Namier, and Brooke, , eds., History of Parliament, 3:565Google Scholar.
3 Sedgwick, , ed., History of Parliament, 1:565Google Scholar.
4 The only other political historian to have used the Tucker manuscripts to date is Peter Luff (Luff, P. A., “The Noblemen's Regiments: Politics and the ‘Forty-Five,’” Historical Research, lxv (February, 1992): 54–73CrossRefGoogle Scholar).
5 Now Bodleian Library (hereafter cited as Bodl.), MSS Don a 10, fos. 1–3; Don b 16–28; Don c 101–34.
6 A good summary of scholarship from the 1970s on the early Hanoverian parties is Speck, W. A., “Whigs and Tories Dim their Glories: English Political Parties under the First Two Georges,” in The Whig Ascendancy: Colloquies on Hanoverian England, ed. Cannon, John (London, 1981), pp. 56–70Google Scholar.
7 Thomas, P.D.G., “Sir Roger Newdigate's Essays on Party, c. 1760,” English Historical Review, cii (April, 1987): 394–400CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Christie, I. R., “The Changing Nature of Parliamentary Politics 1742–1789,” in British Politics and Society from Walpole to Pitt, ed. Black, Jeremy (1990), esp. n. 60, p. 252Google Scholar.
8 Colley, Linda, In Defiance of Oligarchy: The Tory Party 1714–1760 (Cambridge, 1982)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The scarcity of Tory private papers from the early Hanoverian period has been attributed by Eveline Cruickshanks to the pervasiveness of Jacobitism among the Tory party. This proposition is speculation and not susceptible to proof (Sedgwick, , ed., History of Parliament, 1:xivGoogle Scholar).
9 Gerrard, Christine, The Patriot Opposition to Walpole: Politics, Poetry, and National Myth, 1725–1742 (Oxford, 1994), p. 21CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
10 Rogers, Nicholas, Whigs and Cities: Popular Politics in the Age of Walpole and Pitt (Oxford, 1989), p. 234Google Scholar.
11 We owe this information to the work in progress of the History of Parliament trust on the volumes for 1690–1715.
12 Bodl., MS Don b 18, fos. 98–9.
13 Sedgwick, , ed., History of Parliament, 1:565Google Scholar.
14 Letters in the Tucker collection make clear that John was in office in early June. Dodington's name was closely associated with attempts, following the collapse of the Devonshire-Pitt administration, to form a ministry led by Henry Fox and supported by the Duke of Cumberland.
15 The letters to and from Wilmington are at Bodl., MS Don c 111, fos. 236, 242, 243, 246–7; MS Don c 101, fos. 64, 72.
16 Bodl., MS Don b 18, fos. 135–6.
17 Sedgwick, , ed., History of Parliament, 1:484Google Scholar.
18 The Tuckers's influence on the corporation is indicated by the fact that both brothers served as mayor throughout this period. John, for example, was mayor in 1726, 1732. 1738, 1754, 1763, and 1772.
19 The contest in Colchester is fully described in D'Cruze, Shani, “The Middling Sort in Provincial England: Politics and Social Relations in Colchester 1700–1800” (Ph.D. diss., Univ. of Essex, 1990), ch. 6Google Scholar.
20 British Library, Additional MS (Newcastle Papers) 32, 874, fo. 209.
21 Quoted in Clark, J.C.D., The Dynamics of Change: The Crisis of the 1750s and English Party Systems (Cambridge, 1982), p. 223CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
22 The events can be followed in the further report of the Secret Committee inquiry into the last ten years of Walpole's administration (The Journals of the House of Commons, 24, 292–5Google Scholar).
23 Moule, H. J., Descriptive Catalogue of the Charters, Minute Books & Other Documents of the Borough of Weymouth and Melcombe Regis an. 1250 to 1800 (Weymouth, 1883). p. 124Google Scholar; The Journals of the House of Lords, 26, 174–75Google Scholar.
24 See Carswell, John, ed., The Political Diary of George Bubb Dodington (London, 1962), p. 90Google Scholar.
25 Bodl., MS Don c 105, fo. 187.
26 See esp. Bodl., MS Don c 111, fo. 236; MS Don c 105, fos. 43–4.
27 See esp. Bodl., MS Don c 106, fos. 14–15.
28 See eg. Bodl., MS Don c 105, fo. 62.
29 Hancock, David, Citizens of the World: London Merchants and the Integration of the British Atlantic Community, 1735–1785 (Cambridge, 1995), n. 33, p. 154Google Scholar.
30 Bodl., MS Don c 112, fo. 77.
31 Namier, and Brooks, , eds., History of Parliament, 1:131Google Scholar.
32 See esp. Bodl., MS Don c 111, fo. 52.
33 Bodl., MS Don c 101, fo. 95.
34 See Bodl., MS Don b 18, fo. 36, 135–9, 147–8; Don c 111, fo. 236; Don c 111, fos. 87–8.
35 Bodl., MS Don b 18, fos. 135–6.
36 Bodl., MS Don b 18, fos. 153–4.
37 Bodl., MS Don c 112, fo. 198. The victorious “Country” candidates at Dorchester were Nathaniel Gundry, an opposition Whig, and John Browne, a Tory gentleman.
38 Bodl., MS Don c 112, fo. 200.
39 BL Add MS (Coxe Papers) 9175, fo. 117: Dodington, George Bubb, “Scheme for an Association to redress Grievances and the Tyranny of a Minister,” 29 May 1741Google Scholar.
40 The witnesses were Richard Jordan, mayor of Weymouth in 1740, and Ezekiel Pomeroy, chief clerk to the Clerk of the Cheque at Deptford. Both were local allies of the Tuckers.
41 The bill died in the Lords when the session ended. Its halting progress and demise can be tracked in The Journals of the House of Commons, vol. 24.
42 Bodl., MS Don c 105, fo. 55.
43 A list of attenders was published in the London Evening Post, 11–13 Feb. 1742.
44 Bodl., MS Don c 105, fos. 43–4.
45 Bodl., MS Don c 105, fo. 55.
46 Bodl., MS Don c 105, fo. 57.
47 Bodl., MS Don c 105, fo. 78.
48 Bodl., MS Don c 105, fo. 78.
49 Bodl., MS Don c 105, fo. 109.
50 There were nineteen instructions in late 1742 There were also three counter-instructions in favor of the ministry, from Bristol, Nottingham, and Worcester.
51 Bodl., MS Don c 105, fo. 145.
52 Bodl., MS Don c 105, fo. 200.
53 For this outcry, see Harris, Robert Bob, A Patriot Press: National Politics and the London Press in the 1740s (Oxford, 1993), esp. pp. 122–77CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
54 Owen, J.B., The Rise of the Pelhams (London, 1957), esp. pp. 191–99Google Scholar.
55 Bodl., MS Don c 106, fo. 118.
56 Bodl., MS Don c 106, fo. 122.
57 For these divisions, see Owen, , Rise of the Pelhams, pp. 204–06Google Scholar.
58 Bodl., MS Don c 106, fos. 146, 149, 154. These accounts of major parliamentary debates are important sources for the historian given the general unreliability of the reports printed in the monthly magazines at this time (see Ransome, Mary, “The Reliability of Contemporary Reporting of the Debates of the House of Commons, 1727–41,” Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research, xix [1942–1943]: 67–79)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. In addition to the debates of 18 and 19 January 1744 on the Hanoverian troops, major debates described by Tucker include: (1) William Pulteney's motion to introduce a place bill, 7 Apr. 1742; (2) the address of thanks on the King's speech, 18 Nov. 1742; (3) Edmund Waller's motion to address the King to discontinue the service of the Hanoverian troops in British pay, 6 Dec. 1743; (4) the debate in the Committee of Supply on grants for subsidies to foreign powers, 18 Feb. 1745; (5) William Pitt's motion to address the King to recall all remaining British troops from Flanders, 23 Oct. 1745; (6) the debate in the Committee of Supply on a proposal for prominent noblemen to raise regiments, 1 Nov. 1745.
59 Bodl., MS Don c 106, fo. 172.
60 Bodl., MS Don c 106, fo. 198.
61 Bodl., MS Don c 106, fo. 221.
62 Bodl., MS Don c 107, fo. 36.
63 See esp. Rogers, , Whigs and Cities, pp. 81–5Google ScholarPubMed.
64 Bodl., MS Don c 107, fo. 71.
65 See eg. Bodl., MS Don c 107, fos. 73, 84.
66 Bodl., MS Don, c 107, fos. 99–100.
67 Bodl., MS Don c 107, fo. 141.
68 Bodl., MS Don c 101, fo. 137.
69 See Luff, “The Noblemen's Regiments.”
70 Bodl., MS Don c 107, fo. 186.
71 In 1743, Olmius lent the Prince £2,800 at 5 percent interest.
72 Bodl., MS Don c 106, fos. 14, 20–21.
73 Bodl., MS Don c 106, fo. 149.
74 Bodl., MS Don c 106, fo. 179.
75 Bodl., MS Don c 107, fo. 55.
76 See esp. Wilson, Kathleen, “Inventing Revolution: 1688 and Eighteenth-Century Popular Politics,” Journal of British Studies 28 (October 1989): 349–86CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Rogers, , Whigs and Cities, esp. pp. 240–46Google ScholarPubMed.
77 The claim is made by Linda Colley in “Eighteenth-Century Radicalism Before Wilkes,” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 5th ser., 31 (1981): 1–19CrossRefGoogle Scholar. A major problem with her claim is that many of the polemical sources she uses to support it are not Tory in origin, but instead are country or even Whig. A good example is the essay paper the Westminster Journal, or New Weekly Miscellany. Although Colley labels this Tory, it had no party connections (see Harris, , A Patriot Press, pp. 50, 52, 54–55Google Scholar).
78 Bodl., MS Don c 105, fo. 59.
79 Bodl., MS Don c 105, fo. 68.
80 Bodl., MS Don c 105, fo. 72.
81 Hume called the controversy “frivolous.” As he noted, the way in which the debate had been conducted had obscured areas of agreement between the ministry and the opposition. The crucial area of disagreement was the weight that should be given to the opinions of constituents. This was a matter of degree not of rigidly opposed positions (Hume, David, Essays: Moral, Political, and Literary [Oxford, 1963], pp. 33–34Google Scholar).
82 On this point, see Peters, Marie, “The ‘Monitor’ on the Constitution, 1755–1765: New Light on the Ideological Origins of English Radicalism,” English Historical Review, 82 (October, 1971): 715Google Scholar.
83 Bodl., MS Don c 111, fos. 127–8.
84 See eg. Bodl., MS Don c 105, fo. 56; Don c 107, fos. 94, 205.
85 See Christie, I.R., “The Changing Nature of Parliamentary Politics,” pp. 101–22Google Scholar.
86 Bodl., MS Don c 106, fo. 44.
87 Bodl., MS Don c 107, fo. 22.
88 Bodl., MS Don c 111, fo. 158.
89 Rogers, , Whigs and Cities, pp. 278–86Google ScholarPubMed.
90 Avon Central Library, Bristol (hereafter cited as Avon), Southwell Papers, vol 5.
91 Avon, Southwell Papers, vol. 5.
92 For Burke and Bristol, see Sutherland, Lucy, “Edmund Burke and Relations between Members of Parliament and their Constituents,” in Politics and Finance in the Eighteenth Century: Lucy Sutherland, ed. Newman, Aubrey (Hambledon, 1984), pp. 281–97Google Scholar.
93 See e.g., Avon, Southwell Papers, vol. 7: Samuel Pye to Southwell, 19 Feb. 1742; John Brickdale to Southwell, 21 Feb. 1742.
94 Avon, Southwell Papers, vol. 7: Southwell to Joseph Smith, 24 Feb. 1741.
95 Avon, Southwell Papers, vol. 7: Southwell to Joseph Lewis, 26 Feb. 1741.
96 Avon, Southwell Papers, vol. 7: Southwell to Robert Smith, 20 Feb. 1742.
97 Bodl., MS Don b 18, fo. 71.
98 Jordan was once described by Tucker as “having been bred in the Customs from his youth” (Bodl., MS Don b 18, fo. 236).
99 On one occasion in the spring of 1742, Richard wrote, “As Examination in ye most solemn manner are on oath how comes it that Paxton [Nicholas Paxton, Solicitor to the Treasury] refused to answer [questions put to him by the Commons Secret Committee]—twas this puzzled our club when we disputed about it” (Bodl., MS Don c 105, fo. 92).
100 See eg. Handley, Stuart, “Local Legislative Initiatives for Economic and Social Development in Lancashire, 1689–1731,” Parliamentary History, 9:1 (1990): 14–37CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Langford, Paul, “Property and ‘Virtual Representation’ in Eighteenth-Century England,” Historical Journal 31, 1 (1988): 83–115CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
101 Bodl., MS Don c 106, fo. 130. For the Old England Journal, see Harris, , A Patriot Press, esp.131–4Google Scholar.
102 Owen, , Rise of the Pelhams, pp. 67, 246Google Scholar.
103 Bodl., MS Don b 18, fos. 147–8.
104 See Colley, , In Defiance of Oligarchy, pp. 46, 48Google Scholar.
105 Bodl., MS Don c 112, fo. 45.
106 This is the position that Linda Colley appears to adopt, although she does also acknowledge that the country tradition was able to appeal to both Tories and Whigs, albiet sometimes for different, partisan reasons (In Defiance of Oligarchy, ch. 4).
107 Rogers, , Whigs and Cities, pp. 232–4Google ScholarPubMed. For comment on the significance of the language of politics in this period, see Harris, Bob, “The London Evening Post and Mid-Eighteenth-Century British Politics,” English Historical Review, 110 (November, 1995): 1155–56Google Scholar.
108 Bodl., MS Don b 18, fo. 185.