Old England (periodical)

Old England: or the Constitutional Journal was a London political weekly launched on 5 February 1743. Backed by opposition leaders George Bubb Dodington and Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield, and conducted chiefly by William Guthrie and James Ralph—often speaking in the house persona “Jeffrey Broadbottom”—it advanced a Country-Whig (“patriot”) critique of ministerial power, repeatedly attacking Britain's Hanoverian commitments and arguing for liberty of the press. Widely regarded as the most influential opposition paper of the early 1740s, it spurred rival weeklies and fed reprints in the magazines; several early issues were promptly republished as pamphlets.

Its prominence drew swift official notice. Renewed legal pressure followed the 1743 launch (including Guthrie's brief arrest), even as the paper's line helped to drive a wave of popular spin-offs. Allies praised its “truly British constitutional spirit” while ministerial voices denounced it as inflammatory. By early 1744 advertising filled much of each issue, an index of reach that later ebbed as fortunes shifted.

After many opposition backers entered office in late 1744, political support ceased and Guthrie and Ralph were pensioned and redirected to long-form histories. From a weakened base the journal in early 1745 offered only conditional reconciliation to the Broad Bottom ministry, then turned sharply critical in the spring—assailing Hanover-related subsidies and even the king's departure for Hanover—before rallying loyally after the Battle of Prestonpans and resuming opposition commentary in January 1746. By mid-1746 it castigated William Pitt’s support for Hanoverian troops and, from late that year, aligned with the Leicester House opposition; the suspension of Habeas corpus into 1747, the paper said, cramped its tone.

In early 1747 the journal adopted the house persona “Argus Centoculi” (after Argus Panoptes), under which it opposed a “shameful peace,” urged continuing the war to break French trade and colonial power, and framed politics as “ministerial” versus “patriot/opposition.” In 1749 it attacked proposed naval and military reforms during the Navy Bill controversy—warning, in the case of Admiral Edward Vernon, against elevating martial over common law. The “Argus Centoculi” byline disappears in January 1750, and the title continued under modified forms in the early 1750s amid a broader late-1740s shift toward a court–country divide and waning religious controversy.