More generally, Allgood was a member of a family against whom many in Hexham held a grudge arising out of their failure to follow the Jacobinism of the Earl of Derwentwater.

[3] Lancelot Allgood was Sheriff of Northumberland in 1746, the year in which Bonnie Prince Charlie's Jacobite rising of 1745 was put down by the Duke of Cumberland.

[3] A vacancy occurred in the Parliamentary representation of Northumberland by the death of John Fenwick on 19 December 1747, and Allgood became a candidate for the seat.

Allgood being a Tory, the Whigs put forward Lord Ossulston, son and heir of Charles Bennet, 2nd Earl of Tankerville, to oppose him.

However Henry Carr, a Whig elector, commented in a letter that "considering Mr. Allgood’s good character and his zealous behaviour in the late rebellion, I cannot bring myself to vote against him."

[13] In 1777 Allgood inherited from his great-aunt land at Netherwitton, including Colt Park, East Ritton, Birkheads and Coldrife.

[16] In 1745 the Cooks appear to have sought to move away from Hexham to pastures anew in Morpeth, but, unfortunately, took a tenancy on the Queen's Head there, owned by Thomas Pye, a cousin of Allgood and, so the story goes, this enabled Allgood to put pressure on Pye to pursue the Cooks for the peremptory repayment of a bond they had entered into for the Queen's Head, and which they had insufficient liquidity to repay.

[19] In 1754 Cook had published Professed Cookery, a recipe and household management book prefaced by 66 pages of "appalling doggerel"[20] constituting a "violent onslaught"[21] on her three related enemies, Allgood taking the name 'Esquire Flash' in her writings.

The rebellion of 1745 brought the great roadmaker, Marshal Wade, to Newcastle, and inspired the freeholders of Northumberland to "mend their ways" in emulation of his achievements in Scotland.

"[23][f] In 1757 a Militia Act, which provided for the compulsory enrolment of men, was passed with a view of raising forces against the risks arising from conflicts which came to be known as the Seven Years' War.

Although military authorities experienced little difficulty drafting troops in Newcastle and training them in Berwick, they met with severe resistance in Hexham, where the populace petitioned against the Act and made death threats against the Deputy-Lieutenants responsible for its enforcement, one of whom was Allgood.

This led, on 9 March 1761, to a riot in which 45 people were killed and hundreds wounded by members of the Yorkshire Militia, employed by the Deputy-Lieutenants.

In a notorious pamphlet, published shortly afterwards, entitled The Will of a certain Northern Vicar, this assumed escapade is satirised in halting rhyme:[25] I give the corpulent Kitt Reed My lecture upon gingerbread.

And leave him too (tho' not for Fun), For fear of Harm — a Wooden Gun ; At the same time (in case of Riot), A Cockloft, for to keep him quiet : A Ladder too (Fame do not tattle).

She also effectively ordered Allgood to return, pointing out that if he did not, the rioters would fancy that they'd banished him from his own county; and offering to come and collect him in her carriage "for I am under no more apprehension travelling ... than I ever was".

[23] More generally Honeyman identifies that many in Hexham held a grudge against the Allgood family arising from their cleaving from Derwentwater and Jaconinism.