The Office of Mayor of Winchester

Winchester

Winchester is a historic cathedral city and former capital city of England. It is the county town of Hampshire, in South East England. The city lies at the heart of the wider City of Winchester, a local government district, and is located at the western end of the South Downs, along the course of...

is the second oldest mayoralty in England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

, dating back to the period when Winchester was the capital of Wessex

Wessex

The Kingdom of Wessex or Kingdom of the West Saxons was an Anglo-Saxon kingdom of the West Saxons, in South West England, from the 6th century, until the emergence of a united English state in the 10th century, under the Wessex dynasty. It was to be an earldom after Canute the Great's conquest...

 and England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

. The Mayor of Winchester thus stands second only to the Lord Mayor of the City of London in the order of precedence of civic heads.

Winchester is one of just five local authorities in England to have an official residence for its Mayor. Abbey House was built in about 1700 and sited in the Abbey Gardens just off The Broadway in Winchester. It was acquired by the City Council in 1889. The house stands on the site of a monastic establishment known as Nunnaminster and later as St Mary's Abbey, which was founded around AD900 by Alfred

Alfred the Great

Alfred the Great was King of Wessex from 871 to 899.Alfred is noted for his defence of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of southern England against the Vikings, becoming the only English monarch still to be accorded the epithet "the Great". Alfred was the first King of the West Saxons to style himself...

's Queen Ealhswith

Ealhswith

Ealhswith or Ealswitha was the daughter of a Mercian nobleman, Æthelred Mucil, Ealdorman of the Gaini. She was married in 868 to Alfred the Great, before he became king of Wessex. In accordance with ninth century West Saxon custom, she was not given the title of queen. -Life:Ealswith was the...

. The Abbey survived until the late 1530s when it was formally surrendered to the Crown as part of the Dissolution of the Monasteries

Dissolution of the Monasteries

The Dissolution of the Monasteries, sometimes referred to as the Suppression of the Monasteries, was the set of administrative and legal processes between 1536 and 1541 by which Henry VIII disbanded monasteries, priories, convents and friaries in England, Wales and Ireland; appropriated their...

.

History

The exact date of the conferment of full mayoral rights is not known, since the original charter cannot be traced. When London petitioned the King for a grant of mayoralty in 1190, Winchester was not cited as precedent (as were certain French cities), but by 1200 there was reference to the mayoralty as an existing office. It is, therefore, safe to say that the office dates back to the 1190s.

The earliest Mayors sometimes held the office for several years in succession, but from the 13th century to the present day, the Mayor has been chosen annually. Until the 16th century, the Mayor-elect was required to travel to Westminster to receive the royal assent.

Past Mayors of Winchester

The following is a list of every person to have held the office of Mayor of Winchester since 1900:

1900-1901 - Alfred Bowker

1901-1902 - Bertram Cancellor

1902-1903 - James Fort

1903-1904 - George Ward

1904-1905 - Frederick Seymour Morgan

1905-1906 - Chaloner Shenton

1906-1907 - Reginald Harris

1907-1908 - William Forder

1908-1909 - Frederick King

1909-1910 - Harold Stratton

1910-1911 - John Furley

1911-1912 - Frederick Holdaway

1912-1913 - Howard Elkington

1913-1914 - Harry Sealey

1914-1919 - Alfred Edmeades

1919-1921 - Arthur Dyer

1921-1922 - Stanley Clifton

1922-1924 - Herbert Vacher

1924-1925 - Henry Johnson

1925-1926 - William Hayward

1926-1928 - Frederick Manley

1928-1929 - William Symes

1929-1930 - Harry Collis

1930-1931 - Walter Hamblin

1931-1932 - William Lansdell

1932-1933 - Hew Ross

1933-1934 - Frank Newton

1934-1935 - John Hodder

1935-1936 - Arthur Edmonds

1936-1937 - John Pinsent

1937-1938 - William Richardson

1938-1945 - Francis Griffiths

1945-1946 - Charles Sankey

1946-1947 - Cyril Bones

1947-1949 - Doris Crompton

1949-1950 - Cyril Taylor

1950-1951 - Reginald Evans

1951-1952 - Arthur Edmonds

1952-1953 - Doris Edmeades

1953-1954 - Reginald Dutton

1954-1955 - Adelaide Charles (died in office then Doris Edmeades)

1955-1956 - Barbara Gertrude Thackeray

1956-1957 - Major Paul Henry Benson Woodhouse

1957-1958 - Evelyn Mary Barnes

1958-1959 - Fendall W Harvey Pratt

1959-1960 - Margaret E L Lowden

1960-1961 - Lt Colonel Donald Charles Spelman

1961-1962 - Vera Neate

1962-1963 - John Hutchins

1963-1964 - Dorothy Richards

1964-1965 - Stanley Steel

1965-1966 - Cyril Bones

1966-1967 - Barbara Carpenter Turner

1967-1968 - D Jeffrey Smith

1968-1969 - Stewart Green

1969-1970 - S E Spicer

1970-1971 - Stanley Steel

1971-1972 - Alice Cleary

1972-1973 - T David Sermon

1973-1974 - Cyril Taylor

1974-1975 - Barbara Carpenter Turner

1975-1976 - Alan Cotterill

1976-1977 - Gwendoline Shave

1977-1978 - David Ball

1978-1979 - John Flook

1979-1980 - John Green

1980-1981 - M Pamela Pitt

1981-1982 - Ian Bidgood

1982-1983 - Albert Austen

1983-1984 - Frederick Peachey

1984-1985 - John Broadway

1985-1986 - Jean Freeman

1986-1987 - Sue Gentry

1987-1988 - Major D Covill MBE DCM

1988-1989 - Commander B Hall MBE

1989-1990 - Frederick Allgood JP

1990-1991 - Pamela Peskett

1991-1992 - Capt Richard Bates

1992-1993 - Wing Cdr John Nunn

1993-1994 - Susan Glasspool

1994-1995 - Raymond Pearce

1995-1996 - Patricia Norris

1996-1997 - Brian Blunt

1997-1998 - Norman Hibdige

1998-1999 - George Fothergill

1999-2000 - Allan Mitchell

2000-2001 - Georgina Busher

2001-2002 - Therese Evans

2002-2003 - John Steel

2003-2004 - Jean Hammerton

2004-2005 - Cecily Sutton

2005-2006 - Neil Baxter

2006-2007 - Sue Nelmes

2007-2008 - Chris Pines

2008-2009 - Michael Read

2009-2010 - Dominic Hiscock

2010-2011 - Richard Izard

External links

• Winchester City Council website