Find of the Week (8)

Whilst listening to and reading about the debates surrounding the forthcoming General Election, I thought I’d travel back to the 1910 elections. My interest stems from being the local history librarian and a constituent. The first election of 1910 was held from January 15th to February 10th, the votes counted, a hung parliament was announced with both the Liberals and Conservatives sharing the spoils. The conservatives racked in the most votes however Asquith’s Liberals has 2 additional seats. To resolve this situation an additional election was held in December between the 3rd and 19th , at which the Liberals formed a Parliament with the aid of the Irish Nationals. You knew that already, right?!

In West Dunbartonshire the contest was between the Liberal candidate Mr. James Dundas White and Colonel Henry Brock, Conservative. At previous elections in the county, the Conservatives had taken the seat. This was not to happen in 1910, when the liberals snatched a victory by 1033 votes. The second election in December had two new candidates, but a similar result. Standing for the Liberal Party, Mr. Arthur Acland Allen and for the Conservatives Mr.William Thomas Shaw. The Liberals again won the seat by 1312 votes.
I spent some time trawling though the local newspapers during the election months and I found that the local papers were favouring the Liberal candidate. Comparing the characters of both men in the run up to the polling days. However the funniest thing I found during my search was the following advertisement.

The advertisement is self explanatory; however my interest was on the word ‘patriotic’. Did the owner of the store call the corset the ‘patriotic corset’? If so, was he/she a Liberal or Conservative supporter? If the owner was a Liberal supporter then he/she must have known that Mr.Asquith was apposed to the women’s suffragette movement. How could any decent young woman of her time have bought a corset from a man who supported the Liberals? They might not have had the vote but they could have voted with their wallets.  However, to be fair,other political parties were apposed to women gaining the vote and not many women had their own wallets let alone a disposable income. Maybe I’m just thinking a little too much about a simple advertisement campaign.