Tories & Circuses

West Derbyshire (pronounced Darby-shuh) had everything: a young Lord and Coldstream Guards officer, up for the House of Commons against a village cobbler's son whose father had once beaten the young Lord's father for the same seat; a Russian heckler, complete with astrakhan coat; babies to be patted, mud to be slung and dodged, an issue for the nation.

Last week West Derbyshire chose the cobbler's son, gave Winston Churchill and his Coalition Government a resounding sock in the eye. The vote: for slim 26-year-old Lieut. William John Robert Cavendish, Marquess of Hartington, 11,775; for paunchy, greying (52) independent socialist Charlie White, 16,336.

Symbolic Temper. Through all but five of the last 210 years a Cavendish, or a relative of one, has represented West Derbyshire. In 1918 the family lost the seat to White's father. In 1923 Lord Hartington's father, now the Duke of Devonshire, regained it for the Cavendishes. In last week's contest, Churchill intervened with an explosive plea for Cavendishes & Coalition: "It would indeed be a disaster if Britain, after the great things she has done, went to pieces and fell into petty squabbles. . . . These by-elections are . . . symbolic and electors by their votes can prove the heroic temper of our island in these tremendous days." Campaigner Hartington bounded from hall to marketplace in the division's 128 towns and villages. He pumped the hands of village mothers, tweaked the noses of their babes in prams, left a wake of amazed comment: "Blimey! Imagine shaking hands with a Lord." He spoke briefly and snappily, closed by hoisting his hands overhead and shouting, "Don't let the old side down." His attractive mother, the Duchess, followed him to explain that, really, her boy was deeply interested in serious things like pensions for veterans.

Lord Hartington's agent toured the constituency astride Paddy, five-year-old son of famed Derby winner Papyrus, drumming up votes.

Charlie White made the most of an old speech by Churchill, delivered in 1924 when Winnie was an "out" trying to get back in. Said Churchill then: "It isn't right that the . . . division [district] should be passed from hand to hand as is the case with a piece of furniture being handed on from father to son, or from uncle to nephew."

Mud, Marriages, Muck. One of White's helpers lugged along a pot of honey, wherewith to soothe the voluble candidate's rasped throat. White reminded the voters that Fascist Sir Oswald Mosley is vaguely related to His Lordship. Lord Hartington countered with the statement that White had himself actually been a follower of Mosley (when Sir Oswald was a Socialist).

A farmer, Robert Goodall, also ran. He wanted to know if Lord Hartington could milk a cow. The Marquess replied: "Yes, and I can spread muck [manure]." He thereupon ignored Goodall, challenged White to a muck-spreading contest for a -L-5 bet, winnings to the Red Cross. White was too busy making speeches.

The Russian heckler, a Mrs. Barbara Pataleeva, had a habit of rising in meetings to ask if the Marquess had ever done a day's work in his life. He said he'd been in the Army since finishing at Cambridge. Having been in France as a soldier once during this war, he said he expected to go again. That made the voters wonder where he would find the time for both statecraft and fighting, especially since his uncle-in-law, Lieut. Colonel Henry Hunloke, resigned the seat because of the pressure of war duties. They asked: "Can a Hartington do what a Hunloke cannot?"

Dogs without Love. After the voting put an end to the fofarraw, Britain's political leaders and press soberly took stock of this and other recent Government setbacks. Britons had not lost faith in Churchill's war leadership, but they were getting fed up with coalition hackery. New Statesman and Nation's Sagittarius sang:

Poodles with a letter,

Prize dogs from the show,

Will maybe do not better

Than dogs few judges know.

Dog fanciers will not swallow Direction from above, Their leader they will follow, His dog they cannot love.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.