Saltash, sometimes called Essa, was a "rotten borough" in Cornwall which returned two Members of Parliament to the House of Commons in the English and later British Parliament from 1552 to 1832, when it was abolished by the Great Reform Act.
History The borough consisted of the town of Saltash, a market town facing Plymouth and Devonport across the Tamar estuary, and the inhabitants by 1831 were mainly fishermen or Devonport dockworkers. Like most of the Cornish boroughs enfranchised or re-enfranchised during the Tudor period, it was a rotten borough from the start.
Saltash was a burgage borough, meaning that the right to vote rested with the tenants of certain specified properties. For a long period in the 18th century, there was a contest for control of the borough between the government and the Buller family of Morval, depending partly on legal uncertainties over the precise number and identity of the burgage properties to which votes were attached. In the 1760s it was considered an entirely secure Admiralty borough, where the naval influence could sway all the voters,Page 302, Lewis Namier, "The Structure of Politics at the Accession of George III" (2nd edition - London: St Martin's Press, 1957) but by 1831 the Bullers owned all the tenancies and considered themselves the patrons.
In 1831, the borough had a population of 1,637, and 245 houses.
Members of Parliament
MPs 1547–1629 ParliamentFirst memberSecond memberParliament of 1547Christopher SmithHenry FisherParliament of 1553 (Mar)George KekewichEdward SaundersParliament of 1553 (Oct)Richard WestonThomas MartinParliament of 1554 (Apr)Peter St HillHumphrey CavellParliament of 1554 (Nov)Oliver DebettHumphrey CavellParliament of 1555Alexander NowellNicholas St John (?)Parliament of 1558Thomas WilliamsFrancis YaxleyParliament of 1559Richard ReynellRichard ForsettParliament of 1562Thomas CarewJames DaltonBy-election 1566Henry KillagrewParliament of 1571William PageParliament of 1572-1581Parliament of 1584Richard CarewDr William ClerkParliament of 1586-1587George CarewJohn AclandParliament of 1588-1589Arthur GorgeParliament of 1593Jerome HorseyParliament of 1597-1598Gregory DownhallEllis WynnParliament of 1601Sir Robert CrossAlexander NevillParliament of 1604-1611Sir Peter ManwoodThomas WyvellAddled Parliament (1614)Ranulph CreweSir Robert PhelipsParliament of 1621-1622Sir Thomas Trevor Sir Thomas Smith Happy Parliament (1624-1625)Francis BullerUseless Parliament (1625) Sir Richard BullerParliament of 1625-1626 Sir John HaywardParliament of 1628-1629 Sir Francis CottingtonNo Parliament summoned 1629-1640
MPs 1640–1832
YearFirst memberFirst partySecond memberSecond partyApril 1640 George Buller Parliamentarian Francis BullerParliamentarianNovember 1640 Edward Hyde Royalist August 1642Hyde disabled from sitting - seat vacant1646John ThynneHenry WillsDecember 1648Thynne and Wills excluded in Pride's Purge - both seats vacant1653Saltash was unrepresented in the Barebones Parliament and the First and Second Parliaments of the ProtectorateJanuary 1659 Edmund Prideaux (of Prideaux Place, Padstow)John BullerMay 1659Not represented in the restored RumpApril 1660 Francis Buller Anthony Buller 1661 John Buller February 1679 Bernard Granville Nicholas Courtney September 1679 William Jennens Sir John Davie 1681 Bernard Granville 1685 Sir Cyril Wyche Edmund Waller 1689 Bernard Granville John Waddon 1690 Sir John Carew Richard Carew 1691 Narcissus Luttrell 1692 Michael Hill 1695 Francis Buller Walter Moyle WhigMarch 1698 Francis Pengelly August 1698 John Specott John Morice 1699 James Buller January 1701 Alexander Pendarves ToryMarch 1701 Thomas Carew 1702 Benjamin Buller 1703 John Rolle 1705 James Buller Joseph Moyle May 1708 Alexander Pendarves ToryDecember 1708 Sir Cholmeley Dering, Bt Tory 1710 Jonathan Elford Tory 1711 Sir William Carew 1713 William Shippen Tory 1715Shilston Calmady John Francis Buller 1722 Thomas Swanton Edward Hughes 1723 Philip Lloyd 1727 Lord Glenorchy 1734 Thomas Corbett 1741 John Clevland 1743 Stamp Brooksbank July 1747 Edward Boscawen December 1747 Stamp Brooksbank 1751 George Brydges Rodney 1754 Viscount Duncannon George Clinton 1756 Charles Townshend Whig 1761 John Clevland George Adams Whig 1763 Hon. Augustus Hervey 1768 Martin Hawke Thomas Bradshaw 1772 John Williams 1772 Thomas Bradshaw 1774 Grey Cooper 1775 Sir Charles Whitworth 1778 Henry Strachey 1780 Paul Wentworth 1780 Charles Jenkinson 1784 Charles Ambler 1786 The Earl of Mornington 1787 John Lemon 1790 Edward Bearcroft Viscount Garlies 1795 William Stewart ToryMay 1796 The Lord Macdonald December 1796 Charles Smith 1802 Matthew Russell Robert Deverell 1806 Arthur Champernowne February 1807 Hon. Richard Griffin Whig William Henry Fremantle May 1807 Matthew Russell John Pedley 1809 Michael Prendergast 1818 James Blair March 1820 Michael Prendergast June 1820 John Fleming 1822 William Russell WhigJune 1826 Andrew Spottiswoode Henry Monteith December 1826 Colin Macaulay 1830 Earl of Darlington John Gregson February 1831 Philip Cecil Crampton May 1831 Frederick Villiers Whig Bethell Walrond 1832 Constituency abolished
References
Sources 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) Maija Jansson (ed.), Proceedings in Parliament, 1614 (House of Commons) (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1988) J Holladay Philbin, "Parliamentary Representation 1832 - England and Wales" (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1965)