| Election Name: | 1914 Wycombe by-election |
| Type: | presidential |
| Country: | United Kingdom |
| Previous Election: | Wycombe (UK Parliament constituency)#Elections in the 1910s |
| Previous Year: | 1910 |
| Next Election: | Wycombe (UK Parliament constituency)#Elections in the 1910s |
| Next Year: | 1918 |
| Election Date: | 18 February 1914 |
| Candidate1: | William Baring du Pré |
| Party1: | Unionist Party (UK) |
| Popular Vote1: | 9,044 |
| Percentage1: | 57.4% |
| Candidate2: | Tonman Mosley |
| Party2: | Liberal Party (UK) |
| Popular Vote2: | 6,713 |
| Percentage2: | 42.6% |
| Map Size: | 250px |
| MP | |
| Posttitle: | Subsequent MP |
| Before Election: | Cripps |
| Before Party: | Conservative Party (UK) |
| After Election: | William Baring du Pré |
| After Party: | Unionist Party (UK) |
The 1914 Wycombe by-election was a Parliamentary by-election held on 18 February 1914.[1] The constituency returned one Member of Parliament (MP) to the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, elected by the first past the post voting system.
Sir Charles Cripps KC was elected for Wycombe in 1910. He received a peerage from the Liberal government in 1914 and took the title Baron Parmoor of Frieth in the County of Buckingham.
The Liberal Party had gained the seat from the Conservatives in the 1906 landslide before losing it back in January 1910. The Liberals did not contest the seat in December 1910 when the Conservative candidate was elected unopposed.In January 1910 the Conservative majority was 2,556.
Polling Day was set for 18 February 1914. Given that the out-going MP had been awarded a barony on 16 January, this left only about 4 weeks for campaigning.
The new Great Western and Central railway line to Marylebone Station, opened in 1906, had brought a flood of commuters into the seat around Gerards Cross and Beaconsfield. The rise of 1,800 in the electorate in 1910-14 was largely attributable to this phenomenon, and most of these new voters were reckoned to be Unionists.[7]
The core of the Liberal vote was the working class of High Wycombe, mainly engaged in chairmaking. Since November 1913, the whole town had been riven by a lock-out in the chairmaking industry. By February 1914 some 2 to 3,000 men were idle and there had been a number of riots in which factories and the metropolitan police had been stoned. The chairmakers were estimated to be 75-80% Liberal and the dispute deprived the Liberals of the help of some of their keenest supporters. The strike leader, Cllr Forward, advised his followers to abstain. Efforts at mediation could not solve the dispute before polling day.
The Liberal government's National Insurance Act was still thought to be unpopular with many voters.
The Liberal campaign was run by the Marquess of Lincolnshire who, as Earl Carrington, had been President of the Board of Agriculture from 1905 to 1911. He had started his own career in politics by becoming Liberal MP for Wycombe in 1865 and had maintained strong ties with the area. He was a leading advocate in the Liberal party of the Rural Land Campaign which sought to reform land ownership, land taxation, abolish plural voting and improve agricultural wages.Lincolnshire launched the local Liberal land campaign at a meeting on 2 February.[8] There was an intensive Liberal campaign in the rural villages. A specially imported staff of lecturers was reported to be 'scouring the countryside' pressing the land policy.[9]
The local press reported 'light' voting in Wycombe, while the Unionists were able to poll successfully the commuters at the eastern end of the seat.[10] An increased Unionist majority of over 3,000 was confidently predicted.[11] Yet, instead of a humiliating reverse, the Liberals achieved a small pro-government swing of 1.2% from the January 1910 result;The relative success of the Liberal campaign was attributed to the rural land campaign.[12]
The Wycombe result was a boost to Liberal moral and helped convince the party of the importance in placing the Rural Land Campaign at the centre of their platform at a General Election expected to take place later in the year.It demonstrated that the campaign could save the 30 English rural seats won by the party in December 1910 and assuming the 1.2% swing could be repeated, would see the Liberals gain 9 rural seats. If the election were to be delayed long enough to allow for the passage of the Plural Voting Bill, a further 8 English rural seats would be gained by the Liberals.[8]
Due to the outbreak of war, the election never took place and when it finally did, much had changed.