Rutland

County

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1558-1603, ed. P.W. Hasler, 1981
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Elections

DateCandidate
1558/9JAMES HARINGTON I 1
 KENELM DIGBY 2
1562/3ANTHONY COLLY
 JOHN FLOWER
1571KENELM DIGBY
 JOHN HARINGTON II
17 Apr. 1572(SIR) JAMES HARINGTON I
 KENELM DIGBY
1584KENELM DIGBY 3
 ANDREW NOEL 4
13 Oct. 1586(SIR) JAMES HARINGTON I
 (SIR) ANDREW NOEL
10 Oct. 1588(SIR) JAMES HARINGTON I
 (SIR) ANDREW NOEL
1593(SIR) JOHN HARINGTON II
 (SIR) ANDREW NOEL
1597WILLIAM CECIL 5
 JAMES HARINGTON II 6
22 Oct. 1601(SIR) JOHN HARINGTON II
 (SIR) ANDREW NOEL
  Noel's election declared void, 4 Nov. 1601
19 Nov. 1601EDWARD NOEL

Main Article

The leading Rutland family was that of the Haringtons of Exton, one of whom was in every Elizabethan Parliament except those of 1563 and 1584. James Harington I was by any standards a large landowner, noted in his later days as a ‘knight of great possessions’, fit to be made a baron. Second in importance in Rutland were the Noels of Dalby, Leicestershire and of Brooke, Rutland. Andrew Noel married a daughter of James Harington I, and father-in-law and son-in-law together represented the county in 1586 and 1589. Relations between the families were poisoned, however, by the election of 1601, for by this time the head of the Harington family was (Sir) John Harington II, who was less amenable than his father to Noel’s pre-emption of one county seat. Noel had allowed, and probably supported, the candidature of his relative William Cecil in 1597, but may now have become worried lest his family should lose its grip on the seat. At the time of the 1601 election Noel was himself debarred from it by his shrievalty. He therefore attempted to promote the candidature of his 19 year-old son Edward, to his brother-in-law’s expressed disapproval. On polling day Noel, though as Harington admitted, ‘very unwilling’,7 gave way and accepted his own election, which he knew to be illegal. Quite properly the House quashed the return, and Edward Noel was returned at the ensuing by-election against strong Harington opposition, his father declaring that he would obtain Edward’s return or ‘lie in the dust’.

Rutland had a shortage of well-qualified country gentlemen, and the authorities were therefore lenient about such matters as suspect religion. Kenelm Digby of Stoke Dry was a survivor from another period. Though a friend of Sir William Cecil’s father he was ‘notably touched’ by Catholicism, and classed as of ‘indifferent’ religion in 1564. This did not prevent his remaining on the commission of the peace, repeatedly serving as sheriff and representing the county in four Elizabethan Parliaments. Altogether there were only two Parliaments in 40 years which did not have him a knight of the shire for Rutland, and for one of the two he was precluded from election because he was sheriff. John Flower of Whitewell was another Catholic sympathizer who nevertheless retained local county office and (in 1563 but not later) knight of the shire status. Both Digby and Flower came from families long established in Rutland, but in decline, Flower’s probably through recusancy fines. Flower’s fellow-knight of the shire in 1563 was his father-in-law Anthony Colly of Glaston, formerly a servant of the 1st Earl of Rutland, but of sufficient standing in the county to continue to serve as sheriff and j.p. (though not as MP after the 1563 Parliament) despite being ‘a great hinderer’ in religion.

Author: P. W. Hasler

Notes

  • 1. E371/402(1).
  • 2. Ibid.
  • 3. Bodl. Willis 9.
  • 4. Ibid.
  • 5. Folger V. b. 298.
  • 6. Ibid.
  • 7. D’Ewes, 625.