BARROW, William Hodgson (1784-1876), of 35 Westbourne Terrace, London and Southwell, Nottinghamshire

Described by Disraeli as ‘a man of the people’, Barrow’s remarkable victory at the 1851 Nottinghamshire South by-election set the tone for a lengthy parliamentary career in which he consistently championed the tenant farmer and sought reform of the criminal justice system.1Benjamin Disraeli letters: 1860-1864 (2009), ed. M.G. Wiebe, M.S. Miller and A.P. Robson, viii. 152. Born in Southwell, Nottinghamshire, Barrow was the second son of Reverend Richard Barrow, who, for over fifty years, was the vicar choral of the collegiate church of Southwell.2Gent. Mag. (1838), i. 441. Barrow’s uncle, William, was archdeacon of Nottingham, 1830-32. From 1806 until his retirement in 1833, Barrow practised as an attorney in Nottinghamshire, ‘combining the sagacity of the lawyer, with financial and statistical abilities of no mean order’.3Nottinghamshire Guardian, 4 Feb. 1876. Thereafter he was an active magistrate, noted not only for his ‘strict probity and impartiality’, but also for the ‘kindness he always evinced towards those who were brought before him’.4Ibid. His staunch belief in the fair treatment of the accused was to become a hallmark of his contributions to parliamentary debate. Prior to entering the Commons, Barrow immersed himself in the local agricultural movement, chairing meetings of the Nottinghamshire Agricultural Protection Society and representing it in London.5J.R. Fisher, ‘Issues and influence: two by-elections in South Nottinghamshire in the mid-nineteenth century’, Historical Journal, 24 (1981), 160. He was also vice-chairman of the Southwell Poor Law Union. An ardent supporter of the volunteer movement, he was a captain in the Southwell militia, and in 1819 had marched to Nottingham with 200 men to suppress the Luddite riots.6Nottinghamshire Guardian, 4 Feb. 1876.

In February 1851 Barrow came forward as a protectionist for the vacancy at Nottinghamshire South caused by the death of the sitting member. His opponent, viscount Newark, was heir to a major magnate, and was backed by all but one of the region’s leading landowners.7For a detailed analysis of the by-election see: J.R. Fisher, ‘The limits of deference: agricultural communities in a mid-nineteenth century election campaign’, Journal of British Studies, 21 (1981), 90-105. As both men stood as avowed protectionists and staunch opponents of papal aggression, issues were largely unimportant. In Barrow’s words, the contest became solely about the ‘independence’ of South Nottinghamshire.8A full and impartial report of the proceedings connected with an election contest in South Nottinghamshire, February 1851 (1851), 3-4. Following a bitter campaign in which he portrayed himself as the champion of the tenant-farmer and repeatedly attacked the landowners for their sense of entitlement, he was narrowly elected by a margin of eleven votes.9Ibid., 3-9. Barrow wasted no time in cultivating the image of a man who had triumphed over the self-interested landowners. In one of his early speeches in the Commons, he argued that the ballot was unnecessary as:

The fact of his standing in the House of Commons at that moment was the best possible proof of the absence of intimidation.10Hansard, 30 Mar. 1852, vol. 120, c. 416.

In a later debate on free trade, he informed John Bright that:

He (Barrow) was not returned by the overwhelming power of great landowners to aid in keeping up their rents, but because he was known to have a strong opinion as to the injuries inflicted on the farming class.11Hansard, 25 Nov. 1852, vol. 123, c. 528.

Re-elected without opposition at the 1852 general election, Barrow, while acknowledging that his political principles aligned with the Derby ministry, insisted that he would not ‘offer any blind or slavish adherence to any leader’ and declared himself an ‘independent county member’.12Nottinghamshire Guardian, 15 July 1852. An assiduous attender in the Commons, he followed Disraeli into the division lobby on most major issues and maintained his unwavering support for protection by voting against Palmerston’s motion on free trade, 26 Nov. 1852.13In the 1853 session he was present for 136 out of 257 divisions; in 1856 he was present for 102 out of 198: Daily News, 21 Sept. 1853; J.P. Gassiot, Third letter to J.A. Roebuck: with a full analysis of the divisions of the House of Commons during the last session of Parliament (1857), 14. He was consistent in his opposition to the government’s handling of the Crimean War, and seconded Disraeli’s motion on the issue, 24 May 1855. He sat on a range of select committees, including those on the Waterford election petition, public houses and medical relief.14PP 1852-53 (348), xix. 330; PP 1852-53 (885), xxxvii. 4; PP 1854 (348), xii. 432. In later Parliaments he also sat on select committees on London’s gas supply, the irremovable poor, and metropolitan local taxation: PP 1857-58 (393), xi. 668; PP 1860 (520), xvii. 2; PP 1861 (372), viii. 136.

In the Commons, Barrow spoke regularly on a range of issues, though his strongest interventions came in debates on agriculture and the criminal justice system. It was later noted that ‘though he never aspired to the rank of a first-class orator, his enunciations were always sound and to the point’.15Nottinghamshire Guardian, 4 Feb. 1876. He contributed frequently to the debates on the aggravated assaults bill, warning of the dangers of offenders being tried before just two magistrates, 6 Apr. 1853, and insisted that corporal punishment should only be inflicted after a trial by jury, 7 Mar. 1856. His concern for the accused was clear during a debate on the criminal justice bill when he stated his belief that ‘no persons should be made an inmate of a gaol before his conviction’, and that it was wrong to separate prisoners before trial from convicted prisoners by placing the former in solitary confinement, 6 Aug. 1855.

At the 1857 general election Barrow explained that he had voted for Cobden’s censure motion on Canton because commerce could not be carried out ‘at the point of the bayonet’. He also spoke of his interest in reforming the diets of prisoners and insisted that if crime was to be diminished by education, it must be based on religion.16Ibid., 2 Apr. 1857. Returned unopposed, he focused his energies on opposing the industrial schools bill. For Barrow, the proposal to keep children at these schools until the age of fifteen interfered with parental authority and ‘ought not to be tolerated in any free country’, 11 May 1857. However his attempt to lower the age at which children could leave to twelve was defeated, 8 July 1857, and his subsequent protests against the compulsory sections of the bill came to nothing, 9 July 1857. He also took a keen interest in corrupt practices legislation and repeatedly opposed attempts to prevent the paid conveyance of voters to the poll, arguing that the ‘poor or infirm voter’ had just as much right to express his opinion at the polling booth as ‘his richer neighbour’, 15 July 1858, 2 Mar. 1859.

Barrow backed the Derby ministry’s defeated reform bill, 31 Mar. 1859, and, following his unopposed return at the subsequent general election, insisted that he would vehemently oppose any extension of the county franchise that would swamp the forty shilling freeholders.17Nottinghamshire Guardian, 5 May 1859. True to his word, he spoke out against Locke King’s county franchise bill, arguing that the forty shilling freehold franchise ‘tempted the labouring man to exercise the greatest possible frugality and led him to an honourable ambition to share in the representation’, 13 Mar. 1861. Thereafter, he consistently voted against all attempts to extend both the country and borough franchises. He also remained committed to the reform of the criminal justice system, declaring his ‘very strong objection’ to long imprisonments as they rendered criminals ‘still more vicious’, 18 Apr. 1864, and he seconded Charles Newdegate’s motion against the gaols bill, protesting that it represented the centralisation of authority, as the measure would put the ratepayers at the mercy of the state, 20 June 1864.18S. McConville, English local prisons, 1860-1900: next only to death (1994), 133.

Re-elected without opposition at the 1865 general election, Barrow reiterated his claim to be ‘an independent representative’, declaring that ‘measures, not men, would be the guide of my conduct’. He called for the abolition of the malt tax but was noticeably ambiguous on the subject of reform, stating that ‘I do not like change of its own sake’, but arguing that ‘I do not think that any class of the community should have privileges accorded to them which another class do not possess’.19Nottinghamshire Guardian, 14 July 1865. He took an independent line on the major clauses of the Derby ministry’s representation of the people bill. He voted with Disraeli against the enfranchisement of compound ratepayers, 12 Apr. 1867, but criticised the government for opposing the reduction of the copyhold franchise to £5, 20 May 1867. He also voted for the enfranchisement of women, 20 May 1867. Overall, he felt that the Derby ministry’s bill contained ‘too many anomalies and inequalities’ to have any chance of permanency, and was particularly dismayed by the reduction of the qualification for county occupiers, fearing that it would remove the inducement for agricultural labourers to acquire a freehold, 15 July 1867.

Throughout his parliamentary career, Barrow devoted a great portion of his speeches to championing the tenant farmer and, more generally, the political rights of the poor. For example, he had pressed for the continuation of paying for the conveyance of voters to the poll because while ‘it was all very well for rich farmers, who might have friends to give them dinners after they had gone to the poll, it was not so with the poorer class of constituents’, 10 July 1854. However, he had little time for trade unions, and spoke out against the associations of workmen bill, 8 Feb. 1867, 10 Apr. 1867.

At the age of eighty-four, Barrow was re-elected as Conservative member for Nottinghamshire South in 1868, and sat until his retirement at the 1874 dissolution, by when he was the oldest member of the Commons.20Ibid., 4 Feb. 1876. He died, unmarried and without issue, at his Southwell residence in January 1876, leaving effects valued at under £50,000.21England and Wales, National Probate Calendar, Index of wills and administration, 1861-1941, 12 Feb 1876.