A HISTORY OF DORSET 



loyalty when he came to Dorset during the plague-scare of 1665,^ and 

 in 1683 there were loyal rejoicings over his escape from the Rye House 

 Plot.' Yet there was much sore feeling about the tampering with borough 

 charters which marked the last years of his reign. In 1662 Charles had 

 caused a Quo Warranto to be brought against Dorchester, which seems, 

 however, to have been successfully resisted.' In i 677 Charles granted a new 

 charter to Shaftesbury, as the result of a Quo Warranto brought concerning 

 the privileges of the borough.* It is more precisely worded than that of 

 1604, and contains two clauses ensuring the taking of the oaths of obedience 

 and supremacy by all members of the corporation and their officers, and the 

 reservation to the crown of power to declare void the election of any recorder 

 or town clerk, in which case the mayor and burgesses are to proceed to the 

 election of another in his stead. In 1684 Charles attempted to set aside 

 this charter, and issued letters patent providing a process for removal of the 

 mayor, recorder, town clerk, or any of the capital burgesses, by Orders in 

 Council, in return for substantial trading privileges. But the charter was 

 never surrendered, and James II, in dealing with the town, did not grant it a 

 new charter, but only acted under one of the clauses of the letters patent 

 of 1684.* 



Lyme had, at the Restoration, professed strong loyalist sentiments, but 

 shortly succumbed to nonconforming influences.* In 1684, warned by the 

 example of Shaftesbury, the corporation decided freely to surrender their 

 charter without waiting for a Quo Warranto. In December, only six weeks 

 before his death, Charles granted a new charter, but without calling in or 

 taking a surrender of any of the former charters.^ In 1687 James II brought 

 a Quo Warranto against Weymouth ; the town clerk was ordered to ride to 

 London and plead the charter, with apparent success." 



The ancient strongly Protestant feeling was still alive, encouraged no 

 doubt by the presence of Holies, who lived near Dorchester still, and was 

 very popular.' Monmouth, who had accompanied Charles II on his 

 visit in 1665, had been very well received in Dorset. He landed at Lyme 

 (11 June, 1685), and lingered there a fortnight, 'training and animating his 

 men,' ^^ instead of pushing on at once to Exeter or Bristol. The men of 

 Lyme received him with great rejoicings, and recruits poured in from all 

 sides. In his grateful enthusiasm, he was moved to write — 



Lyme, although a little place, 



I think it wondrous pretty ; 

 If 'tis my fate to wear the crown, 



I'll make of it a city.^^ 



The militia of Dorset and Somerset, hastily called out, assembled at Brid- 

 port, where on the 14th they were attacked by part of Monmouth's force. 

 This was defeated, and retired on Lyme. Meanwhile George Alford, mayor 

 of Lyme (who had been forward, as an ex-royalist, to avenge himself after 



' Hutchins, Dorset, i, 14 ; Weymouth Chart, v, 61. ' Weymouth Chart, v, 64. 



'Dorch. Corp. MSS. c. 15. 



' Hutchins, op. cit. iii, 104-12 ; Mayo, Shaston Records, 10, II. ' Mayo, Shaston Records, 12, 13. 



• Roberts, Hist. Lyme, 120-1. ' Ibid. 122. 



' Weymouth Chart, iii, 141, and p. 122. 



' Dorch. Corp. Minute Bk. 28 Oct. 1661 ; 19 June, 1668. '" Burnet, Hist. (ed. 1724), i, 641. 



" Quoted Roberts, Hist. Lyme, 152. 



166 



