Charles James Mathew CBE

Order of the British Empire

The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...

 KC (24 October 1872 – 8 January 1923) was a British lawyer and Labour politician. He was elected as the Member of Parliament

Member of Parliament

A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...

 (MP) for Whitechapel and St Georges

Whitechapel and St Georges (UK Parliament constituency)

Whitechapel and St George's was a parliamentary constituency in east London, which returned one Member of Parliament to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom....

 in the 1922 general election

United Kingdom general election, 1922

The United Kingdom general election of 1922 was held on 15 November 1922. It was the first election held after most of the Irish counties left the United Kingdom to form the Irish Free State, and was won by Andrew Bonar Law's Conservatives, who gained an overall majority over Labour, led by John...

, but died 7 weeks later.

The second son of Sir James Charles Mathew LJ

Lord Justice of Appeal

A Lord Justice of Appeal is an ordinary judge of the Court of Appeal of England and Wales, the court that hears appeals from the High Court of Justice, and represents the second highest level of judge in the courts of England and Wales-Appointment:...

, Charles James Mathew was educated at the The Oratory School

The Oratory School

The Oratory School is a Roman Catholic, independent school for boys in Woodcote, Berkshire. It is the last Catholic all-boys boarding school remaining in Great Britain. It has approximately 420 pupils...

, Edgbaston, Birmingham and Trinity Hall, Cambridge

Trinity Hall, Cambridge

Trinity Hall is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England. It is the fifth-oldest college of the university, having been founded in 1350 by William Bateman, Bishop of Norwich.- Foundation :...

. He was called to the Bar at Lincoln's Inn

Lincoln's Inn

The Honourable Society of Lincoln's Inn is one of four Inns of Court in London to which barristers of England and Wales belong and where they are called to the Bar. The other three are Middle Temple, Inner Temple and Gray's Inn. Although Lincoln's Inn is able to trace its official records beyond...

 in 1897 and took silk in 1913, specialising in Chancery cases. He was also an expert in Trade Union law.

A member of the London County Council

London County Council

London County Council was the principal local government body for the County of London, throughout its 1889–1965 existence, and the first London-wide general municipal authority to be directly elected. It covered the area today known as Inner London and was replaced by the Greater London Council...

 since 1910, Mathew was also a member of the Statutory Committee on War Pensions and Chairman of the Special Grants Committee. He was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1917.

Mathew's political views had moved steadily closer to the Labour Party

Labour Party (UK)

The Labour Party is a centre-left democratic socialist party in the United Kingdom. It surpassed the Liberal Party in general elections during the early 1920s, forming minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929-1931. The party was in a wartime coalition from 1940 to 1945, after...

, and he was selected by the party to fight the Whitechapel and St. George's constituency at the 1922 General Election. At the poll, he defeated the incumbent Liberal MP, James Kiley by just 428 votes.

Mathew died, aged 50, after an operation, less than two months after his election, becoming one of the shortest-serving MPs in history. At the subsequent by-election Harry Gosling

Harry Gosling

Harry Gosling CH was a British Labour Party politician and trade union leader.-Early life:Gosling was born in 1861 at 57 York Street, Lambeth, London, on the southern bank of the River Thames. He was the second son of William Gosling, master lighterman, and his wife Sarah Louisa née Rowe, a...

 held the seat for Labour.

A Roman Catholic, he married in 1896, Anna, daughter of James Cassidy, of Monasterevin

Monasterevin

Situated 63 km from Dublin on the R445 road, Monasterevin has been relieved of much through traffic by the opening in 2004 of a new section of the M7 motorway bypassing the town on the N7 Dublin to Limerick route...

, County Kildare

County Kildare

County Kildare is a county in Ireland. It is part of the Mid-East Region and is also located in the province of Leinster. It is named after the town of Kildare. Kildare County Council is the local authority for the county...

. There were two sons and a daughter.

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