Rotherhithe (UK Parliament constituency)

Rotherhithe
Former Borough constituency for the House of Commons
1885–1950
Number of members	one
Replaced by	Bermondsey
Created from	Southwark

Rotherhithe was a parliamentary constituency centred on the Rotherhithe district of South London. It returned one Member of Parliament to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, elected by the first past the post system.

The constituency was created for the 1885 general election, and abolished for the 1950 general election when it became part of the revived Bermondsey constituency.

Boundaries

Rotherhithe in the Metropolitan Board of Works area 1885-1918

Rotherhithe in the Parliamentary County of London 1918-49

A map showing the wards of Bermondsey Metropolitan Borough as they appeared in 1916

1918-1950: The Metropolitan Borough of Bermondsey wards of St John, St Olave, Bermondsey five and six, and Rotherhithe one, two and three.

Members of Parliament

Election		Member	Party
	1885	Charles Hamilton	Conservative
	1892	John Cumming Macdona	Conservative
	1906	Hubert Carr-Gomm	Liberal
	1918	John Lort-Williams	Unionist
	1923	Ben Smith	Labour
	1931	Norah Runge	Conservative
	1935	Ben Smith	Labour
	1946 b-e	Bob Mellish	Labour
1950		Constituency abolished: see Bermondsey

Election results

Election in the 1910s

General Election January 1910: Rotherhithe

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Liberal	Hubert William Culling Carr-Gomm
	Conservative
Majority
Turnout
	Liberal hold		Swing

H. Carr-Gomm

General Election December 1910: Rotherhithe

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Liberal	Hubert William Culling Carr-Gomm	4,030	57.1
	Conservative	Assheton Pownall	3,026	42.9
Majority			1,004	14.2
Turnout			7,056	70.6
	Liberal hold		Swing

General Election 14 December 1918: Rotherhithe

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Unionist	John Rolleston Lort-Williams	5,639	50.0
	Liberal	Hubert William Culling Carr-Gomm	3,889	34.5
	Labour	Will Godfrey	1,750
Majority			1,750	15.5
Turnout			25,088	45.1
	Unionist gain from Liberal		Swing

• endorsed by Coalition Government

Election in the 1920s

General Election 15 November 1922: Rotherhithe

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Unionist	John Rolleston Lort-Williams	6,749	36.5
	Labour	Charles Diamond	6,703	36.3
	Liberal	Hubert William Culling Carr-Gomm	5,034	27.2
Majority			46	0.2
Turnout			29,166	63.4
	Unionist hold		Swing

File:Richard Hazleton.jpg

Richard Hazleton

General Election 6 December 1923: Rotherhithe

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Labour	Benjamin Smith	9,019	48.0	+11.7
	Unionist	John Rolleston Lort-Williams	5,741	30.5	-6.0
	Liberal	Richard Hazleton	4,035	21.5	-5.7
Majority			3,278	17.5	17.7
Turnout			29,457	63.8	+0.4
	Labour gain from Unionist		Swing	+8.8

General Election 29 October 1924: Rotherhithe

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Labour	Benjamin Smith	12,703	60.3
	Unionist	C.G.L. du Cann	8,375	39.7
Majority			4,328	20.6
Turnout			29,906	70.5
	Labour hold		Swing

General Election 30 May 1929: Rotherhithe

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Labour	Benjamin Smith	14,664	61.6	+1.3
	Unionist	Joseph Gurney Braithwaite	4,594	19.3	-20.4
	Liberal	Dora West	4,556	19.1	n/a
Majority			10,070	42.3	+21.7
Turnout			36,133	65.9	-0.6
	Labour hold		Swing	+10.8

Election in the 1930s

General Election 27 October 1931: Rotherhithe

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	Norah Cecil Runge	11,666	50.3
	Labour	Benjamin Smith	11,536	49.7
Majority			130	0.6
Turnout			36,111	64.3
	Conservative gain from Labour		Swing

General Election 14 November 1935: Rotherhithe

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Labour	Benjamin Smith	14,416	59.7
	Conservative	Norah Cecil Runge	9,751	40.3
Majority			4,665	19.4
Turnout			33,899	71.3
	Labour gain from Conservative		Swing

Election in the 1940s

General Election 5 July 1945: Rotherhithe

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Labour	Rt. Hon. Sir Benjamin Smith	9,741	79.1
	Conservative	Norah Cecil Runge	2,577	20.9
Majority			7,164	58.2
Turnout			18,098	68.1
	Labour hold		Swing

Rotherhithe by-election, 1946

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Labour	Robert Joseph Mellish	7,365	65.0
	Liberal	Edward Drewett Martell	2,821	25.3
	Conservative	Frederick Frank Arthur Burden	1,084	9.7
Majority			4,444	39.7
Turnout			21,952	50.9
	Labour hold		Swing

In Fiction

The constituency is portrayed in an episode (A Place in the World) of TV drama series Upstairs, Downstairs as the safe Docklands Labour seat of "Rotherhithe East" that is unsuccessfully contested by James Bellamy for the Conservatives in a by-election in 1920. Location scenes were actually shot in Rotherhithe in January 1975 during the making of the episode. (In real life through 1920 Rotherhithe was a Conservative seat.)

External links

• Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs – Constituencies beginning with "R" (part 2)