Leeds Parliamentary Election Results

 

1922 - 15th November

Central
A. W. Willey (Conservative) 14,137 *
H. H. Slesser (Labour) 7,844
R. Armitage (Liberal) 6,260
[ * Died 1923. ]

North
H. M. Butler (Conservative) 13,771
E. O Dodgson (Liberal) 7,230
Revd D. Stewart (Labour) 5,836

North East
Major J. D. Birchall (Conservative) 12,343
R. F. Walker (Liberal) 7,891
J. Badlay (Labour) 6,525

South
H. C. Charleton (Labour) 13,210
Sir W. Middlebrook (Liberal) 11,380

South East
J. O’Grady (Labour) 13,676
M. P. Grant (Liberal) 9,554 *
[* First woman to stand as a candidate in a Parliamentary election in Leeds.]

West
J. Murray (Liberal) 13,391
T. W. Stamford (Labour) 12,487

 

This was a resounding victory for the Conservatives led by Bonar Law winning 344 seats. The Labour Party became the second largest party with 142 whilst the Liberals were divided between the National Liberals under Lloyd George with 53 seats and the Liberals led by Asquith with 62. In Leeds there was an exceptionally high turnout of 69.8%. The city followed the national trend with a sweeping triumph for the Conservatives winning Leeds Central, North and North East. The party may well have come to regret not fielding candidates in the other three constituencies where the Liberals only retained Leeds West and Labour winning Leeds South and retaining Leeds East.

Here O’Grady beat the Liberal candidate Miss Mary Grant, the first woman candidate to stand in a Parliamentary election in Leeds. She was Yorkshire’s only woman candidate and is said to have put up a staunch fight. The Yorkshire Evening Post went so far as to say she gave O’Grady ‘the fight of his life’. The Yorkshire Post even employed ‘Our Lady Correspondent’ to cover her campaign. She claimed that Grant’s largest support ‘has come from the women voters’. She also reported on the ‘Numberless women with shawls about their heads [who] tramped from morning till night ... fetching up their neighbours and their relatives ... to vote for Mary Grant.’ Many walls in the city were daubed with whitewashed slogans, with perhaps the most banal being in Leeds West, ‘Along the line the signal ran, Murray’s indeed a very good man.’