Sir Ernest Craig, 1st Baronet (1859 – 9 April 1933) was a British Conservative Party politician. He was elected as

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with Bicameralism, bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house ...

(MP) for the Crewe division of Cheshire at a by-election in July 1912 after the death of his Liberal predecessor,

Walter McLaren Walter Stowe Bright McLaren (17 April 1853 – 29 June 1912) was a British Liberal Party politician who was Member of Parliament (MP) for the Crewe division of Cheshire for a total of 11 years between 1886 and 1912. He was the youngest child ...

. Craig did not stand for re-election in

1918 This year is noted for the end of the First World War, on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, as well as for the Spanish flu pandemic that killed 50–100 million people worldwide. Events Below, the events ...

, when the seat was won a

Coalition Liberal The Coalition Coupon was a letter sent to parliamentary candidates at the 1918 United Kingdom general election, endorsing them as official representatives of the Coalition Government. The 1918 election took place in the heady atmosphere of victor ...

, and his next candidacy was at the 1924 general election, when he won the seat in a straight contest with the sitting Labour Party MP

Edward Hemmerde Edward George Hemmerde, KC (13 November 1871 – 24 May 1948) was an English rower, barrister, politician, and Georgist. Education, the Law and family Hemmerde was born at Peckham, south London, the son of James Godfrey Hemmerde and his wife F ...

. He stepped down from the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. ...

at the 1929 general election. In the

King's Birthday Honours The Birthday Honours, in some Commonwealth realms, mark the reigning British monarch's official birthday by granting various individuals appointment into national or dynastic orders or the award of decorations and medals. The honours are pres ...

1927, he was made a

baronet A baronet ( or ; abbreviated Bart or Bt) or the female equivalent, a baronetess (, , or ; abbreviation Btss), is the holder of a baronetcy, a hereditary title awarded by the British Crown. The title of baronet is mentioned as early as the 14th ...

on 1 July 1927, of

Alsager Alsager ( ) is a town and civil parish in the unitary authority of Cheshire East in Cheshire, England. It is located to the north-west of Stoke-on-Trent and east of Crewe. The town's population was 13,389 at the 2021 census. ''The Mere'' is a ...

Cheshire Cheshire ( ) is a ceremonial and historic county in North West England, bordered by Wales to the west, Merseyside and Greater Manchester to the north, Derbyshire to the east, and Staffordshire and Shropshire to the south. Cheshire's coun ...

. Ernest Craig, before becoming a politician, along with many other Englishmen went west to the US and to New Mexico in particular. He owned the Last Chance Mine in Mogollon, Grant County, New Mexico, and a picture survives of him in 1908 seated in a motor vehicle at Hudson Springs (now Faywood Hot Springs). He introduced innovative methods of extracting gold. He also established a horse and buggy transport for mining company property movement between Mogollon and Silver City. His only child, Ernestine, later acquired the Mimbres Hot Springs, a few miles from Faywood. Her son Craig Wheaton-Smith managed the Mimbres Hot Springs ranch, and her grandson Simon Wheaton-Smith (Ernest Craig's great-grandson) also resides in Silver City, New Mexico.

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* 1859 births 1933 deaths Baronets in the Baronetage of the United Kingdom Conservative Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies UK MPs 1910–1918 UK MPs 1924–1929 {{England-Conservative-UK-MP-1850s-stub