Croydon South (historic UK Parliament constituency)

This seat should not be confused with the current Croydon South constituency

Croydon South
Former Borough constituency for the House of Commons
County	Surrey until 1965, then Greater London
1955–1974 (1974)
Number of members	One
Replaced by	Croydon Central
Created from	Croydon East and Croydon West
1918–1950
Number of members	One
Type of constituency	Borough constituency
Replaced by	Croydon East and Croydon West
Created from	Croydon

Croydon South was a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elected one Member of Parliament (MP) by the first past the post system of election.

It was created for the 1918 general election when the County Borough of Croydon had grown and was split into two parliamentary seats.

In 1974 the seat was renamed Croydon Central, following the 1965 addition of Purley and Coulsdon to the London Borough of Croydon, and a new seat of Croydon South was created to the south, with little overlap.

Boundaries

1918-1950: The County Borough of Croydon wards of Central, East, South, and West.

1955-1974: The County Borough of Croydon wards of Addington, Broad Green, Central, Shirley, South, and Waddon.

Members of Parliament

MPs 1918–1950

	Name	Party	Notes
1918	Ian Malcolm	Conservative	previously MP for Croydon
1919 by-election	Allan Macgregor Smith	Conservative
1923	William Mitchell-Thomson	Conservative
1932 by-election	Herbert Williams	Conservative
1945	David Rees-Williams	Labour
1950	constituency abolished

From 1950 to 1955 the seat was divided into Croydon East and Croydon West.

MPs 1955–1974

	Name	Party
1955	Richard Thompson	Conservative
1966	David Winnick	Labour
1970	Richard Thompson	Conservative
Feb 1974	constituency abolished

Election results

Elections in the 1910s

1918 General Election^[1]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±
	Unionist	Ian Zachary Malcolm	17,813	71.8	n/a
	Labour	Henry Thomas Muggeridge^[2]	7,006	28.2	n/a
Majority			10,807	43.6	n/a
Turnout				55.0	n/a
	Unionist win

endorsed by the Coalition Government

Croydon South by-election, 1919 ^[3]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±
	Unionist	Sir Allan Macgregor Smith	11,777	55.2	-16.6
	Liberal	Howard Houlder	9,573	44.8	n/a
Majority			2,204	10.4	-33.2
Turnout				45.5	-9.5
	Unionist hold		Swing	n/a

Elections in the 1920s

1922 General Election ^[4]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±
	Unionist	Allan Macgregor Smith	15,356	47.3
	Labour	Henry Thomas Muggeridge	8,942	27.5	n/a
	Liberal	Thomas William Dobson	8,183	25.2
Majority			6,414	19.8
Turnout				66.4
	Unionist hold		Swing

1923 General Election ^[5]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±
	Unionist	Sir William Lowson Mitchell-Thomson	14,310	45.5	-1.8
	Labour	Henry Thomas Muggeridge	9,926	31.6	+4.1
	Liberal	Elias Wynne Cemlyn-Jones	7,208	25.2	-2.3
Majority			4,384	13.9	-5.9
Turnout				63.4	-3.0
	Unionist hold		Swing	-3.0

General Election 1929: Croydon South ^[6]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±
	Unionist	Sir William Lowson Mitchell-Thomson	23,258	49.2
	Labour	E.W. Wilton	13,793	29.2
	Liberal	Albert Sigismund Elwell-Sutton	10,218	21.6	n/a
Majority			9,465	20.0
Turnout
	Unionist hold		Swing

Elections in 1930s

General Election 1931: Croydon South
Party		Candidate	Votes	%
	Conservative	Sir William Lowson Mitchell-Thomson	40,672	80.34
	Labour	T Crawford	9,950	19.66
Majority			30,722	60.69
Turnout				68.33
	Conservative hold		Swing

Croydon South by-election, 1932
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±
	Conservative	Herbert Williams	19,126	67.5	−12.8
	Labour	R. P. Messel	9,189	32.5	+12.8
Majority			9,937	35.0	−25.6
Turnout			28,315	38.2	−30.1
	Conservative hold		Swing	−12.8

General Election 1935: Croydon South
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±
	Conservative	Herbert Williams	31971	62.3%	-18.0%
	Labour	T Crawford	14,900	29.0%	+9.3%
	Liberal	David William Alun Llewellyn	4,440	8.7%	+8.7%
Majority			17,071	33.3%
Turnout			45,860	65.2%
	Conservative hold		Swing

Elections in 1940s

General Election 1945: Croydon South
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±
	Labour	Lt. Col. David Rees Rees-Williams	27,650	53.4	24.4
	Conservative	Sir Herbert Williams	24,147	46.6	−15.7
Majority			3,503	6.8
Turnout			51,797	70.1
	Labour gain from Conservative		Swing

Elections in 1950s

General Election 1955: Croydon South
Party		Candidate	Votes	%
	Conservative	Richard Hilton Marler Thompson	27,359	56.98
	Labour	A Carr	20,659	43.02
Majority			6,700	13.95
Turnout				77.23
	Conservative hold		Swing

General Election 1959: Croydon South
Party		Candidate	Votes	%
	Conservative	Richard Hilton Marler Thompson	29,284	58.16
	Labour	FA Messer	22,069	41.84
Majority			8,215	16.31
Turnout				79.13
	Conservative hold		Swing

Elections in 1960s

General Election 1964: Croydon South
Party		Candidate	Votes	%
	Conservative	Sir Richard Hilton Marler Thompson	24,854	52.75
	Labour	Tyrell Burgess	22,265	47.25
Majority			2,589	5.49
Turnout				74.27
	Conservative hold		Swing

General Election 1966: Croydon South
Party		Candidate	Votes	%
	Labour	David Julian Winnick	21,496	44.73
	Conservative	Sir Richard Hilton Marler Thompson	21,415	44.56
	Liberal	W Edward P Babbs	5,146	10.71
Majority			81	0.17
Turnout				76.10
	Labour gain from Conservative		Swing

Elections in 1970s

General Election 1970: Croydon South
Party		Candidate	Votes	%
	Conservative	Sir Richard Hilton Marler Thompson	25,986	49.74
	Labour	David Julian Winnick	22,283	42.65
	Liberal	Michael R Lane	3,673	7.03
	Independent	C Thornton	303	0.58
Majority			3,703	7.09
Turnout				71.29
	Conservative hold		Swing

Politics and history of the constituency

The seat was created in 1918 and the first MP was Ian Malcolm, who had been the MP for all of Croydon. H.T. Muggeridge, father of Malcolm Muggeridge, fought the seat for Labour four times from 1918, later becoming MP for Romford. The seat saw a by-election in 1932, won by Herbert Williams.

Croydon South had twice seen Croydon's only Labour MPs before the 1990s. David Rees-Williams held the seat from the 1945 Labour landslide until unfavourable boundary changes in 1950. David Winnick won the seat in 1966 before losing in 1970. Otherwise the seat, and indeed the rest of Croydon, had always been firm Conservative territory.

From 1950 until 1955 the seat was divided into east and west, represented by Conservatives Herbert Williams and Richard Thompson respectively.

References

↑ F W S Craig, British Parliamentary Election Results 1918-1949; Political Reference Publications, Glasgow 1949
↑ Debrett's House of Commons 1922
↑ F W S Craig, British Parliamentary Election Results 1918-1949; Political Reference Publications, Glasgow 1949
↑ F W S Craig, British Parliamentary Election Results 1918-1949; Political Reference Publications, Glasgow 1949
↑ F W S Craig, British Parliamentary Election Results 1918-1949; Political Reference Publications, Glasgow 1949
↑ British Parliamentary Election Results 1918-1949, FWS Craig

Sources

Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs – Constituencies beginning with "C" (part 6)

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