No attempt was made in this period to seduce the corporation of Brackley from their patron Francis, 3rd Duke of Bridgwater, whose family the Egertons had been associated with the borough for nearly two centuries. The duke returned his cousin and coheir John William Egerton, and Samuel Haynes, the latter’s father-in-law, again in 1790: like him they were supporters of Pitt’s administration. Haynes retired late in 1802 in favour of the duke’s canal agent Bradshaw. In March 1803 the duke died unmarried, leaving part of his estate to John William Egerton, who took the title of Earl of Bridgwater, but the most substantial portion, including Brackley, to his nephew George Granville Leveson Gower, Lord Gower*, who in October of the same year succeeded his father as Marquess of Stafford.

Lady Sutherland, Lord Gower’s wife, wrote of the duke’s will to her mother-in-law, 12 Mar.:

The management of the navigation and of Brackley is left in trustees’ hands—the trustees are the Ch[ief] Baron, the B[ishop] of Carlisle and Mr Bradshaw, but the duke’s object being solely the prosperity of this canal of course he adopted what he thought the best means of securing that, and Mr Bradshaw had already put it on so good a footing and showed such talents for the management of it, that by the will that management is continued and secured as much as possible in his hands and also not only his own seat at Brackley, but a great preponderance in the choice of the other Member there, the duke meaning that these Members should be people of business able and attentive to the interests of this navigation which is so large a concern that it requires a great deal of attention and care. Lord Gower is not at all sorry to be exempted from the detail of management as he is to receive the profits.

She added that her husband had reason to be grateful to Bradshaw for reconciling the late duke to him after a quarrel between them had threatened his inheritance.1

The new patron and Bradshaw chose two barristers in turn to occupy the second seat. In November 1807 there was talk of the patron’s son Lord Gower being returned, but nothing came of this; the basis of it, no doubt, was that Lord Stafford was a Grenvillite and his Members inclined to support the government. When Stafford changed sides in 1815, his nominee Wrottesley did so too. The corporation was amenable; as John Woodman wrote in 1806: ‘we as usual had no opposition, the corporation was quite happy and in good humour: a very good dinner after the election but no treating before, and a ball given in the evening for the entertainment of the ladies’.2