William Saunders (Liberal politician)
William Saunders (20 November 1823 – 1 May 1895)[1][2] was a British newspaper publisher and Liberal Party politician who sat in the House of Commons between 1885 and 1895.
Biography
[edit]Saunders was born in 1823 in Market Lavington, the youngest son of Mary and Amram Saunders. He went to school in Devizes.[3] His elder sister was the temperance campaigner Mary Bayly[4] and Alfred Saunders (1820–1905) was an elder brother. Alfred's child Sarah Page was his niece.[5][6]
Saunders, who was a member of The Plymouth Institution (now The Plymouth Athenaeum),[7] founded several newspapers. He established the Western Morning News at Plymouth in 1860 with Edward Spender.[8] The Eastern Morning News was established at Hull and the first number appeared in January 1864.[9] Saunders also established the Central News Agency, and was vice-president of the United Kingdom Alliance, a temperance society.[10]
In the 1885 general election, Saunders was elected Member of Parliament for Kingston upon Hull East but lost the seat in the 1886 general election.[1][11]
In January 1889, he was elected to the newly created London County Council as a councillor representing the Walworth division of Newington. Nominated by the local Liberal and Radical Association, he took his seat as a member of the majority Progressive Party, allied to the parliamentary Liberals.[12] He was re-elected in 1892 and held his seat until 1895.[13]
He returned to the House of Commons at the 1892 general election when he won Walworth from the sitting Conservative MP. He died in office in May 1895, triggering a by-election on 14 May in which the seat was regained by the Conservatives.[2][11]
Saunders married Caroline Spender and was great uncle of the poet Stephen Spender.[14]
References
[edit]- ^ a b "House of Commons constituencies beginning with "H" (part 4)". Leigh Rayment's House of Commons pages. Archived from the original on 10 August 2009. Retrieved 6 May 2009.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) - ^ a b "House of Commons constituencies beginning with "W" (part 1)". Leigh Rayment's House of Commons pages. Archived from the original on 10 August 2009. Retrieved 6 May 2009.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) - ^ "William Saunders – political firebrand". Market Lavington Museum. Retrieved 1 February 2021.
- ^ Cale, Michelle (23 September 2004), "Bayly [née Saunders], Mary (1816–1899), temperance activist and writer", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/50730, ISBN 978-0-19-861412-8, retrieved 19 May 2023
- ^ McGibbon, Ian. "Saunders, Alfred". Dictionary of New Zealand Biography. Ministry for Culture and Heritage. Retrieved 1 February 2021.
- ^ Bohan, Edmund. "Page, Sarah". Dictionary of New Zealand Biography. Ministry for Culture and Heritage. Retrieved 1 February 2021.
- ^ "Historic People". Plymouth Athenaeum. Retrieved 17 November 2014.
- ^ Moseley, Brian (23 May 2011). "Western Morning News". The Encyclopaedia of Plymouth History. Archived from the original on 3 December 2013. Retrieved 12 February 2015.
- ^ Social institutions, A History of the County of York East Riding: Volume 1: The City of Kingston upon Hull (1969), pp. 418–432. Date accessed: 5 May 2009
- ^ Debretts Guide to the House of Commons 1886
- ^ a b Craig, F. W. S. (1989) [1974]. British parliamentary election results 1885–1918 (2nd ed.). Chichester: Parliamentary Research Services. pp. 36, 129. ISBN 0-900178-27-2.
- ^ "The London County Council". Morning Post. 20 December 1888. p. 2.
- ^ Jackson, W Eric (1965). Achievement. A Short History of the London County Council. London: Longmans. p. 279.
- ^ John Sutherland (2005). Stephen Spender: A Literary Life. Oxford University Press. p. 10. ISBN 978-0-19-534638-1.
External links
[edit]| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| People | |
