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MALMESBUBY ELECTION PETITION, 1807. 

 By E. 0. P. Bouverie, F.S.A. 



[Read at the Wilton Meeting of the Society, July \%th, 1906.] 



This paper is on the Malmesbury Election Petition of 1807, 

 consequent on a polling which took place on 31st October, 1806. 

 It is founded on a pamphlet entitled " Petition of C. H. Bouverie, 

 Esq., against the Malmesbury Election Return, 1807," which con- 

 tains the proceedings of the Committee of the House of Commons 

 on February 26th, 27th, 28th, and March 2nd, 1807, and was 

 printed at Salisbury by J. Easton, High Street, 1807. It may be 

 of interest here to note that Malmesbury was one of sixteen 

 boroughs within the area of Wiltshire which each returned two 

 members to Parliament, the others being Great Bedwyn, *Calne, 

 *Chippenham, Cricklade, *Devizes,Downton, Heytesbury, Hindon, 

 Ludgershall, *Marlborough, *New Sarum, Old Sarum, *Westbury, 

 *Wilton, and Wootton Bassett. Of these Malmesbury and those 

 marked with an asterisk preserved separate representation with at 

 least one member down to the last Beform Bill, while Cricklade was 

 enlarged by the addition of the voters in adjacent places. It will 

 thus be seen that at the date in question Wiltshire with its county 

 members had thirty-four parliamentary representatives. I will 

 not say before this audience that our county was over-represented, 

 but about j- of the House of Commons was returned from this 

 area against about -ft at the present time. What they represented 

 is another matter, and doubtless a subject of interest, but it is 

 with the intricacies of the representation of Malmesbury alone 

 that we are concerned upon this occasion. 



Mr. Bouverie, the petitioner, was a nephew of the then Lord 

 Radnor, who was the owner of considerable property in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Malmesbury, and it was probably due to this 

 connexion that he put himself forward as candidate for this place. 

 He was at the time of the election a man of twenty-four, and from 



