Aldborough is a village located in the West Riding of Yorkshire, and lies within the Borough of Harrogate in North Yorkshire. It was built on the site of a major Roman garrison town, Isurium Brigantum, which marked the crossing of Dere Street (the Roman Road running north out of York) over the River Ure. Isurium was the base of the Ninth Legion, and was also the administrative centre of the Brigantes, the most populous British tribe in the area at the time of the Roman occupation.The Aldborough Roman Site museum, run by English Heritage, contains a number of relics of the Roman town, including some colourful tesselated pavements. The West Riding as an administrative county prior to its abolition in 1974. ... The White Yorkshire rose. ... Map sources for Harrogate at grid reference SE3055 Harrogate is a town in North Yorkshire, England, with a population of 70,000. ... North Yorkshire is a county within the region of Yorkshire and the Humber in England. ... Ancient Rome was a civilization that existed in Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East between 753 BC and its downfall in AD 476. ... York is a city in northern England, at the confluence of the Rivers Ouse and Foss. ... The Brigantes were a British Celtic tribe which lived between Tyne and Humber. ...

Aldborough lost much of its importance when the river crossing was moved to nearby Boroughbridge in Norman times. Nevertheless, in the middle ages it was made a Parliamentary Borough, and returned two Members of Parliament until it was abolished in the great reform act of 1832. Map sources for Boroughbridge at grid reference SE3966 Boroughbridge is a small town 13 miles northwest of York in North Yorkshire in England. ... A Member of Parliament, or MP, is a representative elected by the voters of an electoral district to a parliament; in the Westminster system, specifically to the lower house. ... The British Reform Act of 1832 (2 & 3 Will. ... 1832 was a leap year starting on Sunday (see link for calendar). ...

Aldborough was a "scot and lot" borough, meaning that any man paying the poor rate was eligible to vote. Nevertheless, it was a small borough (not even including the whole parish of Aldborough, since Boroughbridge, also within the boundaries, was also a borough with its own two MPs), and by the time of the reform act it had an electorate of less than 100. This made it a pocket borough, easy for the local landowner to dominate. The term rotten borough (or pocket borough, as they were seen as being in the pocket of a patron) refers to a parliamentary borough or constituency in the Kingdom of England (pre-1707), the Kingdom of Great Britain (1707-1801), the Kingdom of Ireland (1536-1801) and the United Kingdom...

In the 18th century, Aldborough was controlled by the Duke of Newcastle. In April 1754 Newcastle, who had just become Prime Minister, selected his junior colleague and future Prime Minister, William Pitt (Pitt the Elder), to sit as its MP. Pitt represented Aldborough for two-and-a-half years, but having fallen out with Newcastle and been dismissed from his ministry, he was forced to find a new constituency when he next needed to be re-elected to the Commons in 1756. Thomas Pelham-Holles, 1st Duke of Newcastle-upon-Tyne and 1st Duke of Newcastle-under-Lyme (July 21, 1693 - November 17, 1768) was a Whig statesman, whose official life extended throughout the Whig supremacy of the 18th century. ... The Right Honourable William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham (15 November 1708–11 May 1778) was a British Whig statesman who achieved his greatest fame as war minister during the French and Indian War and who was later Prime Minister of Great Britain. ...

See also

• Aldborough (UK Parliament constituency)

Aldborough is a former parliamentary borough located in the West Riding of Yorkshire, abolished in the great reform act of 1832. ...

References

• D Englefield, J Seaton & I White, Facts About the British Prime Ministers (London: Mansell, 1995)
• Michael Brock, The Great Reform Act (London: Hutchinson, 1973).
• Frederic A Youngs, Jr, Guide to the Local Administrative Units of England, Volume I (London: Offices of the Royal Historical Society, 1979)