EAST RETFORD (UK PARLIAMENT CONSTITUENCY)

'East Retford' was a parliamentary constituency in Nottinghamshire, which elected two Members of Parliament (MPs) to the House of Commons for the first time in 1316, and continuously from 1572 until 1885, when the constituency was abolished. Although East Retford was technically a parliamentary borough for the whole of its existence, in 1830 its franchise had been widened and its boundaries had been extended to include the whole Wapentake of Bassetlaw as a remedy for corruption among the voters, and from that point onward it resembled a county constituency in most respects.

Contents

History

Members of Parliament

1572-1640

1640-1885

Election results

References

History

Members of Parliament

1572-1640

★ 1584-1587: Denzel Holles

★ 1604-1611: Sir John Thornhagh

★ 1604-1611: Sir Thomas Darrel

★ 1621-1622: Sir Nathaniel Rich

★ 1621-1622: Edward Wortley

★ 1623-1626: John Holles ^[1]

★ 1624-1626: Sir Francis Wortley

★ 1628-1629: Sir Edward Osborne

1640-1885

Year		First member	First party		Second member	Second party
November 1640		Viscount Mansfield	Royalist		Sir Gervase Clifton	Royalist
1644	''Mansfield and Clifton disabled from sitting - both seats vacant''
1646		Francis Thornhagh			Sir William Lister
November 1648	''Thornhaugh died - seat vacant''
December 1648		Edward Nevill		''Lister excluded in Pride's Purge - seat vacant''
1653	''East Retford was unrepresented in the Barebones Parliament and the First and Second Parliaments of the Protectorate''
January 1659		Edward Nevill			Thomas Bristow
May 1659	''Not represented in the restored Rump''
1660		Sir William Hickman			The Earl of Kildare
1661					Clifford Clifton
1670					Sir Edward Dering
1679					Sir Edward Nevill
1685		John Millington
1689		Hon. Evelyn Pierrepont			John Thornhagh
1690		Richard Taylor
1698		Sir Willoughby Hickman
January 1701		Thomas White
April 1701		Sir Willoughby Hickman
December 1701		Thomas White
1702		Sir Willoughby Hickman			William Levinz
1706		Sir Hardolph Wastneys			Robert Molesworth
1708		William Levinz			Thomas White
1710 [2]		Thomas Westby
1711		Willoughby Hickman			Bryan Cooke
April 1713		Francis Lewis
August 1713					John Digby
1715		Thomas White
1722					Patrick Chaworth
1727					Sir Robert Clifton
1733		John White
1741					William Mellish
1751					John Shelley
1768		Sir Cecil Wray			John Offley
1774					Lord Thomas Pelham-Clinton [3]
1775					William Hanger
1778					Lord John Pelham-Clinton
1780		Wharton Amcotts
1781					Earl of Lincoln
1790		Sir John Ingilby
1794					Lt Colonel William Henry Clinton
1796		William Petrie			Sir Wharton Amcotts
1802		Lt Colonel Robert Craufurd			John Jaffray
1806		Major General Charles Craufurd			Thomas Hughan
1807					William Ingilby
1812		George Osbaldston			Charles Marsh
1818		William Evans			Samuel Crompton
1826		William Battie-Wrightson			Sir Robert Dundas
1830		Viscount Newark	Whig		Arthur Duncombe	Tory
1831					Granville Harcourt Vernon	Whig
1835		Arthur Duncombe	Conservative
1837						Conservative
1847					The Viscount Galway	Conservative
1852		Hon. William Duncombe	Conservative
1857		Francis John Savile Foljambe	Liberal
1876					William Beckett Denison	Conservative
1880					Frederick Thorpe Mappin	Liberal
1885	''Constituency abolished''

'Notes'
1. Bore the courtesy title Lord Haughton from 1624
2. At the election of 1710 Westby and White were initially declared elected, but on petition (in a dispute over the franchise) they were both declared not to have been duly elected
3. Pelham-Clinton was also elected for Westminster, which he chose to represent, and did not sit for East Retford in this Parliament

Election results

References

★ Robert Beatson, "A Chronological Register of Both Houses of Parliament" (London: Longman, Hurst, Res & Orme, 1807) [1]

★ D Brunton & D H Pennington, ''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) d&cl=CL1

★ F W S Craig, ''British Parliamentary Election Results 1832-1885'' (2nd edition, Aldershot: Parliamentary Research Services, 1989)

★ J E Neale, ''The Elizabethan House of Commons'' (London: Jonathan Cape, 1949)

★ J Holladay Philbin, ''Parliamentary Representation 1832 - England and Wales'' (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1965)

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