Whitby was a

parliamentary constituency An electoral district, also known as an election district, legislative district, voting district, constituency, riding, ward, division, or (election) precinct is a subdivision of a larger state (a country, administrative region, or other poli ...

centred on the town of

Whitby Whitby is a seaside town, port and civil parish in the Scarborough borough of North Yorkshire, England. Situated on the east coast of Yorkshire at the mouth of the River Esk, Whitby has a maritime, mineral and tourist heritage. Its East Clif ...

North Yorkshire North Yorkshire is the largest ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county (lieutenancy area) in England, covering an area of . Around 40% of the county is covered by National parks of the United Kingdom, national parks, including most of ...

. It returned one

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 bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...

(MP) to 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. T ...

of the

Parliament of the United Kingdom The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of Westminster, London. It alone possesses legislative suprema ...

, elected by the

first past the post In a first-past-the-post electoral system (FPTP or FPP), formally called single-member plurality voting (SMP) when used in single-member districts or informally choose-one voting in contrast to ranked voting, or score voting, voters cast thei ...

system.

History

The constituency was created by the

Great Reform Act The Representation of the People Act 1832 (also known as the 1832 Reform Act, Great Reform Act or First Reform Act) was an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom (indexed as 2 & 3 Will. IV c. 45) that introduced major changes to the electo ...

for the 1832 general election as a parliamentary borough, Whitby being at that point one of the most prosperous towns in England which had not previously been represented. (Whitby had been summoned to send members to the Protectorate Parliaments during the

Civil War A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...

period, but never at any other time.) It consisted of Whitby itself and the adjoining townships of Ruswarp, Hawsker and Stainsacre, and had a population of just over 10,000. Whitby's shipbuilding industry had been in decline even before the new borough was established, and by 1885 a separate MP for the town could no longer be justified. However, when the borough was abolished the

county constituency In the United Kingdom (UK), each of the electoral areas or divisions called constituencies elects one member to the House of Commons. Within the United Kingdom there are five bodies with members elected by electoral districts called " constitue ...

which absorbed it was also named Whitby (strictly, ''the Whitby Division of the North Riding of Yorkshire''): it contained all the easternmost part of the Riding apart from

Scarborough Scarborough or Scarboro may refer to: People * Scarborough (surname) * Earl of Scarbrough Places Australia * Scarborough, Western Australia, suburb of Perth * Scarborough, New South Wales, suburb of Wollongong * Scarborough, Queensland, su ...

(which remained a separate borough), stretching south-west to Pickering which was the only other town in the constituency. The Whitby division was abolished for the 1918 general election, when it was partially replaced by the new Scarborough & Whitby constituency.

Members of Parliament

Election results

Elections in the 1830s

Elections in the 1840s

Elections in the 1850s

Stephenson's death caused a by-election.

Elections in the 1860s

Gladstone was appointed a

Lord Commissioner of the Treasury In the United Kingdom there are at least six Lords Commissioners of His Majesty's Treasury, serving as a commission for the ancient office of Treasurer of the Exchequer. The board consists of the First Lord of the Treasury, the Second Lord of the ...

, requiring a by-election.

Elections in the 1870s

Elections in the 1880s

At the 1885 election the constituency was redrawn to include Pickering and the hinterlands of Scarborough.

Elections in the 1890s

Elections in the 1900s

Elections in the 1910s

General Election 1914–15: Another General Election was required to take place before the end of 1915. The political parties had been making preparations for an election to take place and by July 1914, the following candidates had been selected; *Unionist: Gervase Beckett *Liberal:

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Whitby (Uk Parliament Constituency) Parliamentary constituencies in Yorkshire and the Humber (historic) Constituencies of the Parliament of the United Kingdom established in 1832 Constituencies of the Parliament of the United Kingdom disestablished in 1918