You may think some people in politics today are corrupt and want only to enhance their own reputations and their pockets, but it is nothing compared to 200 years ago.
Two famous politicians who stayed at The Lion Hotel were John ‘Mad Jack’ Mytton and Benjamin Disraeli.
‘Mad Jack’, who was born on September 30, 1796, inherited the family seat of Halston Hall, near Oswestry, when he was 21.
As it was then worth about £60,000, the equivalent to nearly £5m today, with an income of £10,000 a year and equivalent to £716,000 today, there was little incentive for him to work hard.
‘Mad Jack’ (pictured below) was sent to Westminster School where, after one year, he was expelled for fighting a master and then to Harrow where he lasted just three days before he was thrown out again. Despite his educational record, he was still given a place at Cambridge where he arrived with 2,000 bottles of port to see him through his studies.
In 1819, he decided to continue the family tradition by becoming MP for Shrewsbury and was easily elected – helped no doubt by offering constituents £10 each if they would vote for him and spending £10,000 on bribes.
‘Mad Jack’ found the debates boring and attended Parliament only once – and that was for just 30 minutes. He preferred to spend his time horse racing, gambling and hunting and his horse Euphrates won The Gold Cup in 1825.
Meanwhile, Benjamin Disraeli (pictured below) was MP for Shrewsbury from 1841 until 1847 and later became prime minister twice in 1868 and 1874 before retiring from politics in 1880.
He was articled to a solicitor, but he didn’t enjoy law, preferring to spend his time as a philanderer, a dandy and gambling on the Stock Market where he lost heavily.
His past was seized upon by his political Liberal opponents who accused him of abusing Parliamentary privilege by standing for Shrewsbury to avoid bankruptcy and imprisonment.
Crowds in Shrewsbury taunted him with anti-Semitic cries of Shylock and waving pieces of roast pork on sticks at him. One heckler arrived with a cart telling Disraeli: “I have come to take you back to Jerusalem.”
The Shrewsbury Chronicle report in their edition of Friday, July 2, 1841, just days after the election on Tuesday, June 29, which Disraeli won, showed how bitter and violent the campaign had been.
It said: “A band of thieves and bullies from Birmingham, who had been specially hired for the occasion, and brought over by Wilding, a butcher, on the Sabbath, were instantly let loose on the crowd in Barker Street, Shrewsbury. An indiscriminate attack ensued; the friends of the Whigs and innocent lookers-on were immediately struck down by bludgeons and instruments nicknamed ‘life preservers’ and when their victims were on the ground, blows and kicks were inflicted without regard to life. The street became covered with blood, similar to a slaughterhouse, whilst from the adjacent windows raised the shrieks of agonised females who witnessed the sanguinary attack.”
The full stories of ‘Mad Jack’ Mytton and Benjamin Disraeli in Shrewsbury are told in Four Centuries at The Lion Hotel, price £6.99. Signed copies are available for £5 plus postage, email me at John@jbutterworth.plus.com
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