ABSTRACT
The mob,” says the Gentleman’s Magazine, “which has constantly surrounded the King’s Bench Prison in St. George’s-fields, ever since the imprisonment of Mr. Wilkes grew outrageous. What interpretations, harmful to Grafton and his brother-ministers, could be put upon the Lord Chatham resignation of October 15th, those worthies were to learn while wrestling with Wilkes’s opening manoeuvres to dominate the Parliamentary Session begun on November 8th. The very atmosphere had been created allowing Wilkes to be elected a City Alderman in January 1769 and thus presented with improved opportunities of stimulating the City against the Court. Wilkes, confident of mob support, could hardly have asked for more favourable circumstances in which to fight out the quarrel he had forced on Ministers, some of whom had, like Grafton, been anxious to avoid the expulsion from Parliament on which the King was set.
