Vera Woodhouse, Lady Terrington

Vera Terrington in 1921

Vera Florence Annie Woodhouse, Lady Terrington (née Bousher) (1889 – 19 May 1973) was a British Liberal Party politician, and one of the first women Members of Parliament (MP).

Background

She married firstly in 1907 to Ivo Sebright who died in 1912. In 1918 she married Harold Woodhouse, 2nd Baron Terrington, whom she divorced in 1926. Finally she married Max Lensveld in 1949.

Political career

She joined the Liberal party and took an active interest in the affairs of South Buckinghamshire. She served as Vice-President of the Buckinghamshire Lace Association. She was a Member of the Grand Council of Our Dumb Friends League.^[1] At the 1922 general election, she stood as a Liberal candidate in the Wycombe division of Buckinghamshire but the Conservative MP Colonel W. B. du Pré held the seat with a majority of 4,473.

She stood again at the December 1923 general election, and was elected to the House of Commons with a majority of 1,682 votes.

Vera Terrington

In Parliament, she supported the abolition of the means test for old-age pensions, and supported the Guardianship of Infants Bill which would have given both parents equal rights to custody. She also campaigned against cruelty to animals. She lost her seat a year later, at the 1924 general election.

After 1949 she moved to South Africa. She did not enter public life in South Africa. She died on 19 May 1973, cremated at Eastbourne on 30 May 1973; and her ashes were interred in East Hoathly Churchyard, East Sussex on 1 August 1973. At the time of her death she was living at Monks Cottage, Graywood, East Hoathly. Her age was given as 84.

References

• Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
• Lady Terrington (Vera Woodhouse) at the Centre for the Advancement of Women in Politics
• Vera Terrington at Spartacus Educational
• Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs – Constituencies beginning with "W" (part 5)

External links

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Lady Vera Terrington