Horatio Myer

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Horatio Myer (1850 – 1 January 1916) was a British businessman, iron trades manufacturer and later, Liberal politician^[1].

Myer was born in 1850 at Hereford, the son of a German Jewish immigrant, Abraham Myer, who was a jeweller, silversmith and watchmaker. Horatio Myer’s precise date of birth is not certain but he appeared on the census of 31 March 1851 when his age was given as 10 months.

At the age of nineteen Myer went to work in the wool trade. He then moved to London and in 1876 set up a business in Vauxhall producing iron and brass bedsteads, iron cots and bed chairs. By 1914 the company employed over 200 workers. Myer also expanded his business interests over the years to include corn and forage and wine merchandising.

Myer married Esther Joseph on 28 November 1877. They had four sons and by 1891 they were well off enough to have a house in Paddington with a visiting German governess, a cook and a housemaid.

Politically, Myer may have been influenced by his father, who naturalised as a British citizen and became a town councillor. In 1889 Myer was elected to the London County Council for Kennington and served until 1904. At the general election of 1906, he was elected as Liberal MP for North Lambeth, a Liberal gain from the Unionists. He had won the Liberal nomination against some opposition, including a campaign to have former Liberal MP for Finsbury Central, Dadabhai Naoroji, the first non-white person to sit in the House of Commons, selected as candidate^[2]. In fact Naoroji decided to stand in Lambeth North as an independent Liberal but did not split the vote badly enough to cost Myer the seat. Despite heading the poll in Lambeth North in 1906, Myer was unable to hold the seat at the United Kingdom general election, January 1910. This was despite having acquired a reputation for clever electioneering^[3], assistance during the campaign from his former LCC colleague John Burns, by then the MP for Battersea, the first working man to gain full cabinet rank and some disruptive tactics by Liberals at Unionist meetings^[4].

Myer took an interest in fiscal policy, publishing a pamphlet on 'Taxation of Landlords’ but it is known that that fiscal reform was an issue taken up by his Conservative opponent in the 1906 election^[5]. One of the questions Myer raised early in the new Parliament was the treatment of Zulu prisoners in Natal and whether they were to be forced to work as diamond miners^[6]. He was also interested in employment issues, co-authoring a letter to the Times on 4 May 1907 suggesting new ways of reducing unemployment.

Myer took an interest in Jewish affairs. He supported the activities of the Jewish Historical Society^[7] and was one time warden of Bayswater Synagogue^[8]. At some point after 1901 he was appointed a Justice of the Peace. He died on 1 January 1916.