Hackney_(UK_Parliament_constituency)
Hackney (UK Parliament constituency)
Parliamentary constituency in the United Kingdom, 1868–1885
Hackney was a two-seat constituency in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament created under the Representation of the People Act, 1867 (often termed Second Reform Act) from the former northern parishes of the Tower Hamlets constituency and abolished under the Redistribution of Seats Act, 1885 (often termed a twin Third Reform Act, with its enabling Reform Act 1884).
| Hackney | |
|---|---|
| Former Borough constituency for the House of Commons | |
| 1868–1885 | |
| Seats | two |
| Created from | Tower Hamlets (former north part of) |
| Replaced by | Bethnal Green North East, Bethnal Green South West, Hackney North, Hackney Central, Hackney South, Hoxton and Shoreditch Haggerston |
The constituency existed in its two-seat form for three general elections and returned two Liberal Party Members at each election until its abolition. At abolition it was noted intense house- and apartment (tenement block-) building had occurred within its boundaries and it was divided into seven single seats.
The vestry of the civil parish of Hackney became a local government authority in 1855.
The parliamentary borough of Hackney was established in 1868 and its area formed part of the east of the historic county of Middlesex. It comprised:
| Parishes included | Population in 1871 | Population in 1881 | Total electorate 7 Dec 1868 | Total electorate of 20 Nov 1884 |
| The Parish of St Leonard, Shoreditch[1] | not known | not known | 40,613[2] | 48,076[2] |
| The Parish of St Matthew, Bethnal Green[1] | non known | not known | ||
| The Parish of St John, Hackney[1] | 115,110[3] | 163,681[3] |
The area thus formed the northern rump of Shoreditch and rest of the north of the former parliamentary borough of Tower Hamlets (Hackney accounted for the northernmost of the Hamlets in the nineteenth century, see Tower Division). The area was to the east of Islington and Hornsey, south of Tottenham in its county and west of Walthamstow in Essex.
In 1885 the two-member constituency was abolished. In 1889 the former area, for administrative purposes, became part of the London County Council local authority. In 1900 the main civil vestry was dissolved and the Metropolitan Borough of Hackney was created (with the same boundaries as the Parliamentary Borough). Since 1965 it has been part of Greater London.
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Holms as caricatured by Spy (Leslie Ward) in Vanity Fair, February 1882
Stuart as caricatured by "Stuff" in Vanity Fair, October 1899
| Election | First member [4] | First party | Second member [4] | Second party | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1868 | Sir Charles Reed | Liberal | John Holms | Liberal | ||
| 1874 by-election | Henry Fawcett | Liberal | ||||
| 1884 by-election | James Stuart | Liberal | ||||
| 1885 | Constituency abolished. See Hackney North, Hackney Central and Hackney South | |||||
Turnout, in multi-member elections, is estimated by dividing the number of votes by two. To the extent that electors did not use both their votes, the figure given will be an underestimate.
Change is calculated for individual candidates, when a party had more than one candidate in an election or the previous one. When a party had only one candidate in an election and the previous one change is calculated for the party vote.
Elections in the 1860s
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | Charles Reed | 14,785 | 36.0 | ||
| Liberal | John Holms | 12,243 | 29.8 | ||
| Liberal | Charles Salisbury Butler | 6,825 | 16.6 | ||
| Conservative | Charles Locock Webb[6] | 2,633 | 6.4 | ||
| Liberal | Lothian Sheffield Dickson | 2,575 | 6.3 | ||
| Liberal | John James Homer[7] | 2,021 | 4.9 | ||
| Majority | 5,418 | 13.2 | |||
| Turnout | 21,858 (est) | 53.8 (est) | |||
| Registered electors | 40,613 | ||||
| Liberal win (new seat) | |||||
| Liberal win (new seat) | |||||
Elections in the 1870s
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | John Holms | 6,968 | 34.5 | +4.7 | |
| Liberal | Charles Reed | 6,893 | 34.2 | −1.8 | |
| Conservative | William Gill[8] | 6,310 | 31.3 | +24.9 | |
| Majority | 583 | 2.9 | −10.3 | ||
| Turnout | 13,241 (est) | 32.4 (est) | −21.4 | ||
| Registered electors | 40,870 | ||||
| Liberal hold | Swing | −3.9 | |||
| Liberal hold | Swing | −8.1 | |||
- Election declared void on petition
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | John Holms | 10,905 | 35.9 | +1.4 | |
| Liberal | Henry Fawcett | 10,476 | 34.5 | +0.3 | |
| Conservative | William Gill[8] | 8,994 | 29.6 | −1.7 | |
| Majority | 1,482 | 4.9 | +2.0 | ||
| Turnout | 19,685 (est) | 48.2 (est) | +15.8 | ||
| Registered electors | 40,870 | ||||
| Liberal hold | Swing | +1.1 | |||
| Liberal hold | Swing | +0.6 | |||
Elections in the 1880s
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | Henry Fawcett | 18,366 | 40.2 | +6.0 | |
| Liberal | John Holms | 16,997 | 37.2 | +2.7 | |
| Conservative | George Trout Bartley | 10,332 | 22.6 | −8.7 | |
| Majority | 6,675 | 14.6 | +11.7 | ||
| Turnout | 28,688 (est) | 65.5 (est) | +33.1 | ||
| Registered electors | 43,773 | ||||
| Liberal hold | Swing | +5.2 | |||
| Liberal hold | Swing | +3.5 | |||
The appointment of Fawcett as Postmaster General and Holms as a Lord Commissioner of the Treasury caused a by-election for both seats.
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | Henry Fawcett | Unopposed | |||
| Liberal | John Holms | Unopposed | |||
| Liberal hold | |||||
| Liberal hold | |||||
The death of Fawcett caused a by-election.
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | James Stuart | 14,540 | 63.0 | −14.4 | |
| Conservative | Alexander MacAlister[9] | 8,543 | 37.0 | +14.4 | |
| Majority | 5,997 | 26.0 | +11.4 | ||
| Turnout | 23,083 | 48.0 | −17.5 (est) | ||
| Registered electors | 48,076 | ||||
| Liberal hold | Swing | −14.4 | |||
- Reform Act 1867, Sch C. Legislation.gov.uk, publisher; UK Government
- F.W.S. Craig (ed.), British Parliamentary Election Results 1832-1885 (London: The Macmillan Press Ltd, 1977)
- 1881 Census of England and Wales, Population tables 2, Table 4 , 'Area, Houses, and Population of Civil Parishes in the several Registration Sub-Districts in 1871 and 1881'
- Craig, F. W. S., ed. (1977). British Parliamentary Election Results 1832-1885 (e-book) (1st ed.). London: Macmillan Press. p. 11. ISBN 978-1-349-02349-3.
- "The General Election". London Evening Standard. 17 November 1868. pp. 2–3. Retrieved 15 February 2018 – via British Newspaper Archive.
- "Hackney". Morning Advertiser. 3 September 1868. p. 3. Retrieved 15 February 2018 – via British Newspaper Archive.
- "Hackney Election". Cheltenham Chronicle. 28 April 1874. p. 3. Retrieved 31 December 2017.
- "The Hackney Election". The Morning Post. 17 November 1884. p. 3. Retrieved 20 December 2017 – via British Newspaper Archive.
- Boundaries of Parliamentary Constituencies 1885-1972, compiled and edited by F.W.S. Craig (Parliamentary Reference Publications 1972)
- British Parliamentary Election Results 1832-1885, compiled and edited by F.W.S. Craig (Macmillan Press 1977)
- Social Geography of British Elections 1885-1910. by Henry Pelling (Macmillan 1967)
- Who's Who of British Members of Parliament: Volume I 1832-1885, edited by M. Stenton (The Harvester Press 1976)
- Who's Who of British Members of Parliament, Volume II 1886-1918, edited by M. Stenton and S. Lees (Harvester Press 1978)