Barnet Kenyon

Barnet Kenyon (1853 – 20 February 1930) was a British colliery worker, trade union official and Lib-Lab, later Liberal politician.

Early career

Kenyon was born at South Anston in south Yorkshire. He does not appear to have received a formal education and went to work for the Staveley Colliery Company. From 1880-1906 he worked at the company’s Southgate Pit [Who was Who, OUP 2007] as a check-weighman, a representative elected by coal miners to check the findings of the mine owner's weighman where miners are paid by the weight of coal mined.

Private life

In 1878 he married Elizabeth Ramsden. It does not appear that they had any children. In religion Kenyon was a strict nonconformist, a Primitive Methodist and lay preacher in Chesterfield and in the nearby the village of Clown ["Methodism and the Struggle of the Working Classes: 1850-1900", Robert Featherstone Wearmouth; E.Backus, 1954 pp 198-199] .

Miners' Federation Official

Kenyon was clearly a popular figure with his fellow coal miners [James Eccles Williams, "The Derbyshire Miners: A Study in Industrial and Social History"; Allen and Unwin, 1962, p223] . From 1896 until 1906 he was President of the Derbyshire Miners’ Federation. He was afterwards Assistant Secretary, a paid position, and by January 1912 he had become the Federation’s Secretary. During unrest in the coal field during that month he called publicly for any industrial action the miners might take to be directed towards the coal owners who, Kenyon claimed, were making fabulous profits, and not aimed at the public or other industries who would resent indiscriminate strike action [The Times, 13.1.12] . By July 1913, Kenyon was Treasurer of the Federation [The Times,1.8.13] .

Politics

The best description of Kenyon’s politics is Lib-Lab. There had always been close ties between the Liberal Party and organised labour and much overlap between them in terms of beliefs, political thought and personnel. In the late 19th and early 20th century many candidates were described as Lib-Labs but it was hard for working men to get adopted as Liberal candidates by Liberal Associations dominated by middle-class and professional men and this was a principal reason for the founding in 1900 of the Labour Representation Committee, the organisation which later became the Labour Party. In 1913 Kenyon was selected by the Derbyshire Miners to succeed James Haslam, the Labour MP for Chesterfield since 1906, who died on 31 July 1913. Once selected however, Kenyon agreed to be adopted also by the local Liberal Association and the question of his party description and affiliation became a divisive issue in the Chesterfield constituency, the Derbyshire Miners’ Federation and nationally [The Times, 23.7.13] .

Chesterfield by-election, 1913

Haslam’s death resulted in a by-election in Chesterfield. The controversy over Kenyon’s party affiliation spilled over into the contest but in the end he won easily, topping the poll with a majority of 2,186 over the Unionist candidate Edward Christie while the socialist, John Scurr, received only 583 votes. The result was much better than Kenyon or other commentators had expected and despite all the furore his candidacy had created Kenyon seemed to have been able to appeal to all element of progressive opinion in the constituency, gaining working-class mining votes as well as middle-class Liberal ones [The Times, 22.8.13] .

Political career

On 25 November 1918 the Times noted that Barnet Kenyon had been selected to fight Chesterfield, describing him as Labour candidate. In the event Kenyon had no competition at the 1918 general election and was returned unopposed but his party affiliation was clearly shown as Liberal. It is not clear whether Kenyon received the (in)famous ‘Coupon’ at this general election but he probably did as his nomination papers included the signatures of some local Unionist officials and later press reports described him as a Coalition Liberal. Despite this, Kenyon lent his support to uncouponed candidates elsewhere in Derbyshire [Roy Douglas, "The History of the Liberal Party: 1895-1970"; Sidgwick & Jackson 1971, p124-5] , perhaps still hedging his party political bets in anticipation of future election contests. It served him well for the 1922 general election as he was again returned unopposed [The Times, 6.11.22] . However at the 1923 election Kenyon faced Labour and Conservative opponents [The Times, 27.11.23] but he held off the challenge with a comfortable majority of nearly 6,000 votes [The Times, 15.10.24] . At the general election of 1924 he faced only Labour opposition and again emerged as the clear winner with a majority of 4,765 votes [The Times, 9.5.29] .

Illness was the reason Kenyon gave for not contesting the 1929 general election [The Times, 5.9.28] but advancing age must also have been factor, as he was 76 years old by now.

In addition to being a Member of Parliament, Kenyon was a member of the Chesterfield Board of Guardians, the Old Age Pension Committee and the Derbyshire Insurance Committee. He was appointed a Trustee of the King’s Fund for the Disabled [The Times, 15.3.19] . He also served as a Justice of the Peace for the County of Derby and was a Member of the Lord Lieutenant’s Committee for the Appointment of Magistrates. He died in Chesterfield.

References

ee also

*List of Liberal Party (UK) MPs
*MPs elected in the United Kingdom general election, 1918
*MPs elected in the United Kingdom general election, 1922
*MPs elected in the United Kingdom general election, 1923