New Buildings, New Taxes, and Old Interests

“The country towns are grown poor,” declared Hugh Boscawen, member for Tregony, to his colleagues in the House of Commons in November 1670, “the inlands grow generally poor. The trading people abroad deal only with London.” Sir Robert Howard agreed: “It was ever said by the wisest men he could meet with that the greatness of London ... would be the ruin of the country.” But in 1670 the complaint was hardly new. For well over a century English men and monarchs alike had watched with an anxiety increasingly acute as London, already a giant among English towns, continued to add to her size and population. Many in the country had feared, as did Boscawen and Howard, the effects of such growth upon the rest of England, while those close by tended to be aware of the special economic, political, and social problems which the unhealthy and crowded conditions in the overgrown old city presented. On March 12, 1564, Queen Elizabeth had issued a proclamation stating “Rules to prevent crowding, in plague ridden Westminster, close by London.” And on July 7, 1580, she proclaimed from Nonsuch Palace that The city of London, aunciently termed [The Queen's] Chambre, is becoming too crowded with families in one house or small tenements, to the danger of Plague. Until order is taken by Parliament, no new building is to be erected within 3 miles of the gates of London. Not more than one family to inhabit any house.... Undersitters, Indwellers or Inmates [lodgers] must find new homes in other boroughs before All Saints next

Ancient history · Art · Economic history · Economics · Genealogy · Greatness · House of Commons · Order (exchange · Parliament · Plague (disease · Political science · Politics · Population · Proclamation · Queen (butterfly · Sociology · Demography · Historical Economic and Social Studies · History · Law

• Print Culture and the Rebuilding of London after the Fire

  Open Access•Mark S R Jenner, Mark Jenner•Journal of British Studies•2017

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• The Rebuilding of London After the Great Fire1

  Open Access•A H Thomas•History•1940

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• English Taxation, 1640-1799

  J H Clapham, William Kennedy et al.•The Economic Journal•1914

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• The Parliamentary Diary of Robert Bowyer, 1606-1607

  Witt Bowden, Robert Bowyer et al.•The American Historical Review•1932

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