Sir John Leigh, 1st Baronet (3 August 1884 – 28 July 1959)[1] was a British mill-owner, who used his fortune to buy a newspaper and launch his career as a Conservative politician.
Leigh, whose family resided for generations at Pennington was descended from a cadet branch of the Barons Leigh (of the first creation)[2] and was educated at Manchester Grammar School.
Leigh made his fortune in the Lancashire cotton industry. In February 1918, he was created a baronet of Altrincham in Cheshire, and around 1921 he purchased the Pall Mall Gazette.[3] Sir John was rumoured at the time to be worth fourteen million pounds.[4]
He was elected as Member of Parliament (MP) for the Clapham division of Wandsworth at a by-election in May 1922 after the resignation of the Conservative MP Sir Arthur du Cros, and held the seat until retiring at the 1945 general election.[5]