A dissolution of Parliament being soon expected to take place,
I hasten to solicit a renewal of that important trust which,
in 1844, you kindly confided to me. During the period of my
service in Parliament, I have ever been most anxious to prove
my grateful sense of your generous confidence, by a diligent
and faithful discharge of the duties which it imposed. On
questions of national policy, which have been of more than
ordinary magnitude, I have honestly supported those measures
which the exigencies of the times, and the conflicting
claims of the various interests of our free but complicated
state seemed to me to demand; while in all that concerns
your local interests it has been my constant endeavours to
extend the trade and manufactures of your important town and
neighbourhood, and to advance the general improvement of
your borough. If by your suffrages I am again placed in the
distinguished situation as your representative, it shall be my
zealous aim to enhance your prosperity, and promote the welfare
of our common country.
I have the honour to be,
Gentlemen,
Your faithful and obliged servant,
JOHN BENBOW.
_July 6th, 1847._
Mr. Benbow, it was thought, was not going to have such an easy _walk
over_, as his admirers had anticipated, for a Mr. Joseph Linney, _an
out and out Chartist_, from Bilston, was trotted before admiring
reformers by our old friend Mr. Samuel Cook, with the evident intent of
embracing the opportunity of airing the Six Points of the Charter. On
July 24th, this Bilston Firebrand issued a long-winded address to the
Electors, embracing--
1. Universal Suffrage,
2. Vote by Ballot,
3. Annual Parliaments,
4. No Property Qualification,
5. Payment of Members,
6. Equal Electoral Districts.
In summing up his discourse, he says: "I have but to add in conclusion,
that, if returned, I shall lend my support to those measures
facilitating by Railroad and Cheap Postage the means of easy and rapid
transmission and intercourse; thus I shall oppose all Foreign Wars not
rendered necessary for self-defence or the purposes of humanity, and
that I shall feel it my duty annually to present myself before the
inhabitants of your Borough in public meeting assembled, and there
to resign my trust into their hands, should such be the will of the
majority."
Now it so happened that Mr. Linney was a voluminous talker, and his
free presence on the hustings with his friend, Samuel Cook, Mr. Wm.
Insull, and kindred spirits, was looked forward to with dismay by one
party, and hilarity by the other, for _a turn of local fun_ was sure
to arise in the public discussions. Another element of discord, also,
arose amongst some of Mr. Benbow's previous supporters, arising from
the galling political dictation now assumed by the Priory influence. It
was determined that if we were to be ridden by lordly influence that
we would elect a local man whom we could trust to represent us, and it
was at once determined to invite our own townsman, Mr. Thomas Badger,
a very large employer of labour both in Dudley and the neighbourhood,
to offer himself for the suffrages of the electors. Mr. Benbow and his
friends became now thoroughly alarmed, and aroused to immediate action;
for the old gentleman trudged down to Dudley to survey the situation,
and at once issued the following laconic address:--