William Dobbie (politician)
This article needs additional citations for verification. (October 2008) |
John Henry Jones | |
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City of York Councillor | |
In office 1911–1950 | |
Personal details | |
Born | 1878 Maybole, Scotland |
Died | 19 January 1950 York, England |
Political party | Labour |
William Dobbie CBE (1878 – 19 January 1950[1]) was a British Labour Party politician.
Dobbie was born in Maybole, Ayrshire. When he was just two-years-old, his parents, Francis Dobbie and Agnes McCreath, died there leaving two young sons, William and his brother James aged six. James remained in Maybole with his maternal grandparents while William was raised in Glasgow by his aunt.
Dobbie became a railway employee and moved to
Dobbie stood for Parliament without success for Barkston Ash in 1924 and Clitheroe in 1929 before being elected Member of Parliament (MP) for Rotherham in a by-election in 1933. In 1936, during the Spanish Civil War, Dobbie visited the Alcazar, a military academy under siege by Republican troops. Willie Forrest, who arrived in a chauffeur-driven Rolls-Royce requisitioned from a Royalist nobleman said of the occasion, "I took William Dobbie, a visiting Labour MP, up a church tower from which you get a wonderful view of the Alcazar's courtyard. There was a machine-gun in the tower and Dobbie couldn't resist the temptation to fire it at the fascists."[3] William Dobbie later served a second term as Lord Mayor in 1947 and in the same year was made a CBE (it is said he refused a knighthood), remaining a Member of Parliament until his death.
References
- ^ "Mr William Dobbie (Hansard)".
- ^ Hills, R. I. The Inevitable March of Labour?: Electoral Politics in York, 1900-1914. p. 27.
- ^ Mitchell, D. The Spanish Civil War. p.59
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