Daniel Whittle Harvey

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Daniel Whittle Harvey (10 January 1786-24 February 1863) was a Radical English politician who founded The Sunday Times newspaper and was the first Commissioner of the City of London Police.

Harvey trained as a lawyer, and became a Fellow of the Inner Temple in 1818, but was twice refused admission to the bar. He first stood for Parliament in 1812 as Radical candidate for Colchester, and was defeated, but secured election for the same borough in 1818. At the 1820 election he was deprived of victory when his qualification proved defective, but he was re-elected in 1826 and for several elections thereafter; he subsequently also represented Southwark. He was a gifted orator and consistently took a moderate radical line, advocating limited reform both of Parliament and of the Church, and was at times bitterly at odds with the Whig government. In 1839 he was one of the MPs who took part in the conference with William Lovett's London Working Men's Association from which the Chartists emerged.

In 1821, Harvey founded a Sunday newspaper, The New Observer, which the following year adopted its present title, The Sunday Times. On one occasion he was imprisoned when the paper libelled the King, George IV.

In 1839, he was appointed Registrar of the Metropolitan Public Carriages, becoming the chief regulator of the taxi trade in London. Later the same year, the City of London Police was re-organised, and Harvey relinquished his seat in Parliament to become its first Commissioner; he retained the post until 1863.

[edit] References

• Concise Dictionary of National Biography
• F W S Craig, "British Parliamentary Election Results 1832-1885" (2nd edition, Aldershot: Parliamentary Research Services, 1989)
• Victoria County History of Essex, online at www.british-history.ac.uk
• Leigh Rayment's Peerage Page

[edit] External links

• Portraits of Daniel Whittle Harvey at the National Portrait Gallery, London

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by James Beckford Wildman Sir William Burroughs	Member of Parliament for Colchester with James Beckford Wildman 1818–1820	Succeeded by James Beckford Wildman Henry Baring
Preceded by James Beckford Wildman Henry Baring	Member of Parliament for Colchester with Sir George Henry Smyth 1826-1830 Andrew Spottiswoode 1830-1831 William Mayhew 1831-1832 Richard Sanderson1832-1835 1826–1835	Succeeded by Sir George Henry Smyth Richard Sanderson
Preceded by John Humphery William Brougham	Member of Parliament for Southwark with John Humphery 1835–1840	Succeeded by John Humphery Benjamin Wood