UK Prime Minsters and their Constituencies I Quiz

Answer: King's Lynn

Robert Walpole began his political career when he was elected as a Whig in the general election of January 1701 to represent Castle Rising, before in the subsequent 1702 election moving to the neighbouring seat of King's Lynn, which at the time elected two MPs. Upon his election, Walpole served as a member of the opposition, rapidly rising in the ranks of the Whigs. The accession of George I in 1714 saw the Whigs return to power thanks to the patronage of the new king, with Walpole becoming a key figure in the new government.

In 1721, Walpole was appointed as First Lord of the Treasury and Chancellor of the Exchequer, becoming what was termed as the "prime minister", although no such position existed officially. Walpole served as the head of the government until 1742, the longest tenure of any Prime Minister, and was MP for King's Lynn, aside from a brief period between 1712 and 1713, for forty years. Following the fall of his government, Walpole stepped down as an MP, and was granted a seat in the House of Lords as the Earl of Orford.

Answer: Earl of Bute

John Stuart was born in May 1713 as the eldest son of the 2nd Earl of Bute, and succeeded his father as the 3rd Earl at the age of ten. Because his title was part of the Peerage of Scotland, he had no automatic right to a seat in the House of Lords, who instead elected sixteen representative peers from Scotland. He was first elected in 1737 and served until 1741. In 1751, the Earl was appointed as the tutor to the thirteen-year old Prince of Wales, over whom he had a significant influence.

The accession of the Prince of Wales as George III in 1760 was believed to indicate a rise to political power for the Earl of Bute but, the traditional election held following the accession of a new monarch saw the existing government under the Duke of Newcastle returned comfortably. So, with the connivance of the king, Bute engineered the resignations of both the Duke of Newcastle and William Pitt, the powerful Secretary of State for the Southern Department and, following his re-election as a Scottish Representative Peer, was appointed Prime Minister in May 1762, remaining in office for eleven months. After his resignation, he retained his seat in the House of Lords until 1780.

Answer: Lord Privy Seal

William Pitt first entered the House of Commons in 1734 when, after his elder brother Thomas was elected to two different seats at that year's general election, he passed on one to William. Pitt was the MP for Old Sarum until 1747, before being elected to a number of different seats over the following decade until he became MP for Bath in 1757. By then, he had entered into a partnership with the Duke of Newcastle, which saw Pitt appointed as Secretary of State for the Southern Department, the minister with overall responsibility for prosecuting the then ongoing war with France.

In July 1766, the then Prime Minister, the Marquess of Rockingham, resigned, which led to King George III approaching Pitt to take the position. However, unlike his predecessors, Pitt decided not to assume the role through appointment as First Lord of the Treasury, but instead elected to make himself Lord Privy Seal, which was a position that could only be occupied by a member of the House of Lords. Pitt, who was referred to as "the Great Commoner" for his consistent refusal to accept a title, then stepped down as the MP for Bath and was raised to the peerage as the Earl of Chatham. However, his period in office was dogged by ill-health, and he eventually resigned in 1768.

Answer: His title was a courtesy rather than a substantive one

Frederick North was born as the eldest son of the 3rd Baron Guilford, who was also the 7th Baron North and who, in 1752, was made the 1st Earl of Guilford. Upon his father being created an Earl, Frederick began to use the older peerage as a courtesy title, becoming known as Lord North, which allowed him to serve in the House of Commons. In 1754, North was elected as an MP for the constituency of Banbury, and joined the government of the Duke of Newcastle as a Treasury minister. Aside from a brief period on the backbenches during the premiership of the Marquess of Rockingham, North remained in government throughout this period, serving as Chancellor of the Exchequer under both William Pitt and the Duke of Grafton, before being appointed Prime Minister in January 1770.

North's premiership was dominated by problems in British North America, which ultimately led to the American Revolution and the independence of the thirteen colonies. North eventually faced a vote of confidence following the defeat at Yorktown, after which he was forced to resign in 1782. However, he briefly returned to power as Home Secretary under the Duke of Portland the following year, before leaving mainstream politics altogether. In 1790 he succeeded his father as Earl of Guilford and, vacating his constituency, took his seat in the House of Lords, before dying in 1792.

Answer: Cambridge University

William Pitt the Younger was born in 1759 as the second son of William Pitt, who was subsequently made Earl of Chatham. From a young age, Pitt the Younger showed a desire to follow his father into politics, and contested the seat of Cambridge University at the 1780 general election. However, although he was not elected, the following year he won the seat of Appleby in a by-election, allowing him to enter the House of Commons. The following year, he was appointed as Chancellor of the Exchequer under the Earl of Shelburne. Pitt returned to the backbenches when a new government under the Duke of Portland was appointed in April 1783, but he returned to government at the end of that year when he was appointed as Prime Minister by King George III.

In March 1784, a general election was called, at which Pitt relinquished his Appleby seat, instead standing once again for Cambridge University, the seat he represented for the remainder of his time in the House of Commons. Pitt served as Prime Minister until 1801, when he resigned after a disagreement with the King. He returned to power in 1804, but died in office in January 1806.

Answer: William Gladstone

Up until the 1880s, the Prime Minister had either served from the House of Lords, or had represented an English constituency in the House of Commons. One of these was William Gladstone, who first became Prime Minister in 1868 representing the constituency of Greenwich. Gladstone's Liberal government was defeated in the 1874 election, and he returned to the backbenches in the House of Commons. However, at the following general election, which was held in 1880, Gladstone, who had Scottish ancestry, stood for election in the constituency of Midlothian.

The Liberals won the election, and the party's leadership of Lord Hartington and Lord Glanville stepped aside in favour of Gladstone, who was appointed Prime Minister for a second time, becoming the first to represent a non-English constituency. Gladstone remained as MP for Midlothian until standing down at the 1895 general election, by which time he had been appointed to the premiership twice more, stepping down for the final time in 1894.

Answer: Marquess of Salisbury

Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, the 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, had a distinguished political career that began when he entered the House of Commons in 1853 as the MP for Stamford. As a younger son, he was not expected to succeed to his father's title until, in 1865, his elder brother died unmarried, which saw Gascoyne-Cecil become the heir apparent. He took the courtesy title Viscount Cranborne, but remained in the Commons until 1868 when, on the death of his father, he succeeded to the marquessate and took his seat in the House of Lords.

Salisbury served in the government of Benjamin Disraeli first as Indian Secretary, then as Foreign Secretary until the Conservative Party lost the 1880 general election. Upon the death of Disraeli in 1881, Salisbury was appointed as the party leader in the Lords, eventually assuming full control and becoming Prime Minister in 1885. He eventually served three separate terms as Prime Minister from the Lords, eventually resigning as a result of ill-health in 1902. Since then, aside from approximately four weeks in 1963, the Prime Minister has served from the Commons.

Answer: David Lloyd George

David Lloyd George was a solicitor, born in Manchester to Welsh speaking parents, when he was elected as MP for Caernarfon Boroughs at a by-election in 1890. After his election, he became a uniting force for Welsh Liberals, as well as an advocate for Welsh devolution. He first entered government in 1905 as President of the Board of Trade under Henry Campbell-Bannerman, before being appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1908 when H.H. Asquith became Prime Minister. Lloyd George served under Asquith in a number of roles until December 1916.

Lloyd George was appointed Prime Minister in December 1916 following Asquith's resignation, the first time an MP from a Welsh constituency had served in the role, and retained the position following the general election in 1918, when he remained at the head of the wartime coalition. He remained as Prime Minister until October 1922, when the coalition was dissolved by the Conservative Party. Lloyd George subsequently remained an MP until he stood down in January 1945, accepting a peerage as Earl Lloyd-George of Dwyfor.

Answer: Durham

Ramsay MacDonald was one of the significant founding figures of the Labour Party, and was first elected as an MP in the 1906 general election, representing Leicester. However, he lost his seat in the 1918 general election, not regaining membership of the House of Commons until he was elected as MP for Aberavon in Wales in 1922, when he also became the Leader of the Opposition. In January 1924, the minority Conservative government fell, and Ramsay MacDonald was appointed Prime Minister for the first time. However, his first term lasted until October, when the Labour Party lost the general election.

Ramsay MacDonald returned to the premiership following the 1929 election. But, in the intervening period, he had fallen out with the party organisation in his Aberavon seat, and instead stood for election in Seaham, a safer seat in County Durham which he represented throughout his second period as Prime Minister, which ended in June 1935.

Answer: Woodford

Epping was the fourth seat in the House of Commons to be represented by Winston Churchill, when he was elected to the seat in 1924. However, for the 1945 general election, the seat was divided into two, with one retaining the name Epping, and the other named as Woodford. Churchill stood in Woodford, which he won. However, the Labour Party won the election in a landslide, with Churchill's former Deputy in the wartime coalition, Clement Atlee, becoming Prime Minister.

Churchill returned to the premiership in 1951, remaining as the MP for Woodford throughout his second term, which lasted until his resignation in 1955. Despite twice being offered a dukedom - King George VI proposed to make him Duke of Dover in 1945, while Queen Elizabeth II offered to create him Duke of London in 1955 - he remained as MP for Woodford, the constituency's only MP until it was abolished, until he finally stood down at the 1964 general election.