1500 Allan Bright

Constituency : Oswestry  1904-06

Allan  took  Oswestry, a  Tory  seat  since  its  inception  in  1885. Churchill  came  up  to  speak  for  him  in  a  heated  campaign.

Allan  was  from  Liverpool. His  father  was a  Unitarian  poet. He  was  educated  at  Malvern  School  and  Harrow. He  worked  in  a  firm  of  tinplate  merchants  and  shipping  agents. He  was  one  of  Liverpool's  leading  Liberals. He  contested  a  by-election  at  Exeter  in  1899  which  he  felt  he  would  have  won  but  for  his  pro-Boer  views. Before  the  1900  election  he  joined  the  South  Africa  Conciliation  Committee. He  stood  again  at  Exeter  and  was  heavily  defeated. In  1901  he  contested  a  by-election  at  Oswestry  but  was  unsuccessful  blaming  "landlordism"  and  "shortness  of  time"  for  his  defeat. The  Tory  victor  succeeded  to  a  title  in  1904 . He  was  married  to  Edith  Turner  a  prominent  suffragist.

In  1906  Allan  lost  his  seat  to  a  Tory. He  claimed  that  intimidation   had  taken  place  during  the  campaign.

In  1910  Allan  contested  Styalybridge  but  lost  by  57  votes. He  was  unsuccessful  in  December  as  well. He  attributed  these  defeats  to  the   personal  popularity  of  his  Tory  opponent, a  local  employer.

Allan  became  deputy  chairman  of  the  Union  Bank  of  Manchester. He lived  in  Herefordshire  and  wrote  books  on  Middle  English  literature. He  was  interested  in  psychic  research.

He  died  in  1941  aged  79.