St Mawes

Coordinates: 50°09′29″N 5°01′05″W / 50.158°N 5.018°W / 50.158; -5.018

St Mawes (Cornish: Lannvowsedh) is a small town opposite Falmouth, on the Roseland Peninsula on the south coast of Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It lies on the east bank of the Carrick Roads, a large waterway created after the Ice Age from an ancient valley which flooded as the melt waters caused the sea level to rise dramatically, creating an immense natural harbour, often claimed to be the third largest in the world. It was once a busy fishing port, but the trade declined during the 20th century and it now serves as a popular tourist location, with many properties in the town functioning as holiday accommodation. The town is in the civil parish of St Just in Roseland.

A year-round ferry provides a service to Falmouth, which is less than a mile away by boat, but due to its proximity to the Fal estuary it is some 30 miles away by road. The Place Ferry links the South West Coast Path and operates from Good Friday to the end of October.

St Mawes (UK Parliament constituency)

St Mawes was a rotten borough in Cornwall, England. It returned two Members of Parliament (MPs) to the House of Commons of England from 1562 to 1707, to the House of Commons of Great Britain from 1707 to 1800, and to the House of Commons of the United Kingdom until it was abolished by the Great Reform Act in 1832.

History

The borough consisted of the manor of St Mawes, a decayed fishing port and market town in the west of Cornwall. Like most of the Cornish boroughs enfranchised or re-enfranchised during the Tudor period, it was a rotten borough from the start.

The right to vote rested with the portreeve and "resident burgesses or free tenants", making it essentially a scot and lot borough (there were 87 voters in 1831), but the control of the "patron" was entirely secure. In practice the patron always worked in close collusion with the Crown, and the members returned were generally court nominees throughout the borough's existence. In the 1760s the Boscawen family (the Viscounts Falmouth) were considered to have the main influence over the choice of one member and Robert Nugent over the other; by the time of the Great Reform Act, the patronage had passed to the Marquess of Buckingham.