POLITICAL HISTORY 



was summoned by writ as Lord Hussey of Betchworth in 1348. The 

 baronies of St. John of Lagham and Hussey of Betchworth became 

 extinct in 1353 and in 1361 respectively, the holder of the latter dying 

 of the Black Death in its second great visitation. Reginald de Cobham, 

 summoned to Parliament as Lord Cobham of Sterborough (in Lingfield) 

 in 1342, left a son who sat in 1370 and 1372 and survived till 1403, 

 but was never summoned after I372. 1 He and his representatives 

 furnish an exception to the alleged rule that a writ of summons furnished 

 always a right to a summons in perpetuity. There were also represen- 

 tatives of the first baron St. John of Lagham alive after 1349 who were 

 never summoned. 



Of the spiritual lords of Surrey the Bishop of Winchester ranked 

 alone as always a lord of Parliament. The Abbot of Chertsey, the Abbot 

 of Waverley and the Prior of Merton all sat in de Montfort's Parliament 

 in 1265, when the clergy were very fully represented. The Abbots of 

 Chertsey were summoned at intervals down to the reign of Edward III., 

 when they ceased to attend. It is probable that the Abbot of Waverley, 

 the chief in dignity of the Cistercian abbots in England, might have 

 kept his place if he had cared to do so ; but the spirituality preferred 

 their own convocations to Parliament, and the Cistercians had also 

 assemblies of their own order to attend. 8 The heads of Benedictine 

 abbeys of royal foundation usually continued to be summoned to Parlia- 

 ment after Edward III., but the Benedictine house of Chertsey, though 

 a royal foundation in fact, was founded by a king of the Mercians and 

 by an under king of Surrey, not by a king of all England. It had been 

 refounded by Edgar, but preferred to date back to Wulfhere and 

 Frithwald. As a county Surrey sent knights of the shire to Parliament 

 from the time probably when county representation first began in the 

 reign of Henry III. The earliest names extant of those returned are 

 Roland de Acstede and William Ambesac in the Parliament at West- 

 minster of 1 8 Edward I. 3 



The elections were in the County Court, which was undoubtedly 

 held at Guildford. Who exercised the franchise is a question of very 

 considerable uncertainty. To the County Court came originally free 

 landholders and the reeve and four men from each township who might 

 not be free men, and there were certainly men whose tenure included 

 the obligation of attendance at the County Court, so that we must infer 

 that there were others who were not bound to attend and who probably 

 would not attend as a rule. Taking part in county government as in 



1 Two Reginalds de Cobham of Sterborough, father and son, were summoned to Parliament from 

 1 6 to 46 Edw. III. See Prynne's Registers of Parliamentary Writs, where however the two Reginalds 

 are treated as one. The elder died in 1361, a year of the Black Death. 



8 The Abbot of Chertsey was summoned to the Parliaments of 49 Hen. III. ; 23, 27 Edw. I. ; 

 22, 23 Edw. III. The Abbot of Waverley was summoned to those of 49 Hen. III. ; 28, 30, 32 

 Edw. I. See Prynne's Rfgiiters of Parliamentary Writs. 



8 See Original Writs and Returns Printed by Order of the House of Commons, 1878. Manning and 

 Bray give wrongly Henry Hussee and William de Echingham. Their lists are incomplete and 

 incorrect. 



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