1786: 26 George 3 c.29: An Act to enable His Majesty to license a Play House within the Town and Port of Margate, in the Isle of Thanet, in the County of Kent, under certain Restrictions therein limited.
‘WHEREAS the Town and Port of Margate, and several of the Villages within the Vicinity of the same, have of late Years greatly increased both in Buildings and Inhabitants, owing to the numerous Resort of Persons who frequent the same on account of the Convenience of Bathing and Salubrity of the Air: And whereas the Inhabitants of the said Town and Port, in order to contribute to the rational Amusement of the Company so resorting thereto, are desirous of having a licensed Playhouse there:’ May it therefore please Your Majesty that it may be enacted; and be it enacted by the King’s Most Excellent Majesty by and with the Advice and Consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the Authority of the same, That so much of an Act of Parliament which passed in the Tenth Year of His late Majesty’s Reign,
[10 G. 2. c. 28.]
intituled, An Act to explain and amend so much of an Act made in the Twelfth Year of the Reign of Queen Anne, intituled, An Act for reducing the Laws relating to Rogues, Vagabonds, study Beggars and Vagrants, into one Act of Parliament; and for the more effectual punishing such Rogues, Vagabonds, sturdy Beggars and Vagrants, and sending them whither they ought to be sent,
[§5.]
as relates to Players ofInterludes; whereby all Persons are discharged to represent any Entertainment of the Stage whatever, in virtue of Letters Patent from His Majesty, or by Licence of the Lord Chamberlain of His Majesty’s Household for the time being, except within the Liberties of Westminster, or where His Majesty is repealed. residing for the time being, be,
[repealed.]
and the same is hereby repealed with respect to the said Town and Port of Margate, insomuch that it shall and may be lawful for His Majesty, his Heirs and Successors, to grant Letters Patent for a limited time, for establishing a Theatre or Play House within the said Town and Port; that is to say, from the Fifteenth Day of June, to the last Day of October in every Year, and which Theatre or Play House during such Term shall be entitled to all the Privileges, and subject to all the Regulations to which any Theatre or Play House in Great Britain is intitled and subjected.
Source: Raithby, Statutes at Large (10 volume set), volume 8.