POLITICAL HISTORY 



In 1650 and 1651 he obtained two Acts from the Long Parliament for 

 canalizing the river Wey between Guildford and the Thames. The 

 work was begun in 1650 and finished in 1653. There were many 

 disputes about the rights of various owners subsequently, and Sir Richard, 

 who died in 1652, like many inventors reaped no gain for himself and 

 little for his family. But his enterprise no doubt benefited the county 

 and Guildford in particular. As we have seen, the town was probably 

 somewhat decayed owing to the failure of the cloth trade, but the canal- 

 ized Wey made it a centre of agricultural and other produce for the 

 London market. When in Charles the Second's time a quarrel among 

 riparian owners had caused a suspension of traffic for some weeks, it was 

 complained that 500 or 600 quarters of corn and meal, and timber for 

 the king's ships had been stopped. Gunpowder from the Chilworth 

 mills, probably some iron from the Weald, also found its way to London 

 by barge from Guildford. 



The Commonwealth and Protectorate did not end without further 

 attempts at disturbance in Surrey. The state of affairs after the fall of 

 Richard Cromwell in 1659 encouraged impatient Royalists to plan a 

 rising for August i in that year. Lancashire and Cheshire were the 

 only counties where they really rose in force, but a general insurrection 

 was prepared. Red Hill Common was fixed as a rendezvous for the 

 discontented in Surrey and Kent. On July 30 Whitelocke wrote to 

 Audeley, who had so distinguished himself in 1648, to unite his own 

 troop with other soldiers from Croydon and Epsom at Reigate. On 

 July 3 1 he was specifically warned to look to Red Hill, which he occu- 

 pied. The projected insurrection was nipped in the bud. The soldiers 

 intercepted men coming to Red Hill singly or in small parties, a 

 brother to Penruddock, who had headed the rising of 1655, and Captain 

 Elsmere, late of Colonel Ingoldsby's regiment, among them. 1 Elsmere 

 offered to turn informer.* On August i from thirty to sixty persons 

 appeared in arms in the neighbourhood, but they were immediately 

 overawed by an overwhelming force, and fled to Shelwood, where they 

 dispersed with apparently no fighting. 3 About a dozen prisoners were 

 taken, and one, a deserter, was condemned to death.* 



When Monk had allowed popular opinion to declare itself for the 

 old constitution of king and Parliament, supporters of different sides in 

 the late troubles assumed a political lead in Surrey as elsewhere. The 

 county members in the Convention Parliament of 1660 were Francis 

 Lord Longford, whose aunt was an Onslow, and Daniel Hervey of 

 Combe. 



In 1 66 1 Henry Weston of Ockham was sheriff* for Surrey alone 



1 Mereurius Politicus, August 3, 1659. 



Tanner MSS. 51, f. 107. 3 Ibid. 51, f. 107 and St. P. Dam. July 30, 31, August I, 1659. 

 Shelwood is a few miles south-west of Red Hill. 



* Mereurius Politicus, August 3, 1659. 



8 Loseley MSS. March, 1660-1, ii. 109. His wife was niece to General Ireton, and he had been 

 employed under the Long Parliament as a commissioner for Surrey in 1645. He was not of the recu- 

 sant family of Sutton. 



423 



