Beverley (UK Parliament constituency)
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Beverley has been the name of a parliamentary constituency in the East Riding of Yorkshire for three separate periods. From medieval times until 1869, it was a parliamentary borough, consisting solely of the market town of Beverley, which returned two Members of Parliament to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. The name was revived for a single-member county constituency created in 1950, but abolished at the next election in 1955, and again between the 1983 and 1997 general elections, after which the Beverley constituency was largely incorporated into the new Beverley and Holderness constituency.
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[edit] The Parliamentary Borough
Beverley was first represented in the Model Parliament of 1295, but after 1306 it did not elect members again until 1563. Thereafter it maintained two members continuously until being disfranchised in 1870. The borough consisted of the three parishes of the town of Beverley, and by 1831 had a population of 7,432 and 1,928 houses. The right of election was vested not in the population as a whole, but in the freemen of the borough, whether resident or not; at the contested election of 1826, 2,276 votes were cast. The town was of a sufficient size for the borough to retain its two members in the Great Reform Act of 1832, although its boundaries were slightly extended to include some outlying fringes, increasing the population by roughly 800.
In the mid 19th century, elections in Beverley became notorious for their corruption. Between 1857 and 1868 six petitions were lodged against election results, of which three succeeded in voiding the election and unseating one or more of the victors. After the 1868 election, the writ for the borough was suspended and a Royal Commission appointed to inquire into the conduct of elections in Beverley; when it reported that it had found proof of extensive bribery, an Act of Parliament was passed permanently depriving Beverley of the right to return Members of Parliament, abolishing the constituency and incorporating it within the East Riding constituency.
[edit] The modern county constituencies
The Beverley constituency which existed from 1950 to 1955 was a predominantly rural one. Under the boundary revisions introduced by the Representation of the People Act 1948, which came into effect at the 1950 general election, the three existing county constituencies of the East Riding were abolished, and the county was divided into two new constituencies, each named after their biggest towns - Bridlington and Beverley. The new Beverley constituency comprised the western half of the Riding, including in addition to the borough of Beverley itself the town of Norton and the rural districts of Beverley, Derwent, Howden, Norton and Pocklington. This encompassed parts of all three of the county's previously existing constituencies (Buckrose, Holderness and Howdenshire).
The Beverley constituency was abolished in further boundary changes implemented at the 1955 general election, being divided between the new Haltemprice and Howden seats.
Beverley again became a constituency name in 1983, this time for a constituency mostly suburban in character. The new constituency replaced, and strongly resembled, the Haltemprice constituency which had been introduced in 1955: its main components apart from Beverley were the prosperous suburbs to the north and west of Hull, such as Cottingham, Anlaby and Kirk Ella.
The Beverley constituency was abolished in 1997 general election, Beverley itself moving to the new Beverley and Holderness constituency.
[edit] Members of Parliament
| Year | First member | First party | Second member | Second party | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| April 1660 | Hugh Bethell | Sir John Hotham, Bt | ||||
| June 1660 | Michael Warton | |||||
| 1685 | Sir Ralph Warton | |||||
| 1689 | Sir Michael Warton | Sir John Hotham, Bt | ||||
| 1689 | Sir John Hotham, Bt | |||||
| 1690 | William Gee | |||||
| 1695 | Ralph Warton | |||||
| 1701 | William Gee | |||||
| 1702 | Sir Charles Hotham, Bt | |||||
| 1705 | John Moyser | |||||
| 1708 | Sir Michael Warton | |||||
| 1722 | Michael Newton | |||||
| 1723 | Sir Charles Hotham, Bt | |||||
| 1727 | Ellerker Bradshaw | Charles Pelham | ||||
| 1729 | Sir Charles Hotham, Bt | |||||
| 1734 | Ellerker Bradshaw | |||||
| 1738 | Charles Pelham | |||||
| 1741 | William Strickland | |||||
| 1747 | Sir William Codrington, Bt | |||||
| 1754 | John Tufnell | |||||
| 1761 | Michael Newton (d. 1803) | George Tufnell | ||||
| 1768 | Hugh Bethell | Charles Anderson-Pelham | ||||
| 1772 | Sir Griffith Boynton, Bt | |||||
| 1774 | George Tufnell | Sir James Pennyman, Bt | ||||
| 1780 | Francis Evelyn Anderson | |||||
| 1784 | Sir Christopher Sykes, Bt | |||||
| 1790 | John Wharton | |||||
| 1796 | William Tatton | Napier Christie-Burton | ||||
| 1799 | John Morritt | |||||
| 1802 | John Wharton | |||||
| 1806 | Richard Vyse | |||||
| 1807 | Richard William Howard Vyse | |||||
| 1812 | Charles Forbes | |||||
| 1818 | Robert Christie-Burton | |||||
| 1820 | George Lane Fox | |||||
| 1826 | John Stewart | Charles Harrison Batley | ||||
| 1830 | Daniel Sykes | Henry Burton-Peters | Whig | |||
| 1831 | William Marshall | |||||
| 1832 | Hon Charles Langdale | Whig | ||||
| 1835 | James Weir Hogg | Conservative | ||||
| 1837 | George Lane Fox | Conservative | ||||
| 1840 | Sackville Walter Lane Fox | Conservative | ||||
| 1841 | John Towneley | Whig | ||||
| 1847 | Sackville Walter Lane Fox | Conservative | ||||
| 1852 | Hon Francis Charles Lawley | Liberal | William Wells | Liberal | ||
| 1854 | Hon Arthur Hamilton-Gordon | Liberal | ||||
| 1857 | Edward Auchmuty Glover | Liberal | Hon William Denison | Liberal | ||
| (Glover’s election was declared void on petition and a by-election held) | ||||||
| 1857 | Henry (later Sir Henry) Edwards | Conservative | ||||
| 1859 | Ralph Walters | Liberal | ||||
| (Walters' election was declared void on petition and a by-election held) | ||||||
| 1860 | James Robert Walker | Conservative | ||||
| 1865 | Christopher Sykes | Conservative | ||||
| 1869 | Edmund Hegan Kennard | Conservative | ||||
Writ suspended 1869, constituency abolished 1870, revived 1950
- 1950 – 1955: George William Odey (Conservative)
Constituency abolished 1955, revived 1983
- 1983 – 1987: Sir Patrick Wall (Conservative)
- 1987 – 1997: James Cran (Conservative)
[edit] References
- F W S Craig, "British Parliamentary Election Results 1832-1885" (2nd edition, Aldershot: Parliamentary Research Services, 1989)
- Michael Kinnear, "The British Voter" (London: Batsford, 1968)
- J Holladay Philbin, "Parliamentary Representation 1832 - England and Wales" (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1965)
- Robert Waller, "The Almanac of British Politics" (3rd edition, London: Croom Helm, 1987)
- Frederic A Youngs, jr, "Guide to the Local Administrative Units of England, Vol II" (London: Royal Historical Society, 1991)
This page incorporates information from Leigh Rayment's Peerage Page.
