1065 Caleb Wright

Constituency : Leigh  1885-95

Caleb  won  the  new  seat  of  Leigh. He  was  75  at  the  time.

Caleb  was  a  self-made man, one  of  thirteen  children   who  started  work  as  a  piecer  in  a  cotton  mill  at  9. He  rose  to  become  manager  of  the  mill  at  20. In  1845  he  entered  into  a  cotton-spinning  partnership  then  ten  years  later  started  his  own  firm  in  Tyldesley.  He  was  a  Unitarian  who  played  the  organ  at  his  chapel. He  was  president  of  the  local  Mechanics  Institute.

Caleb  supported  Home  Rule  and  female  suffrage. He  was  a  member  of  the  Liberation Society.
In  1887  he  protested  at  the  size  of  the  military  and  naval  estimates.

Caleb  stood  down  in  1895.

He  died  in  1898  aged  87.