List of Members of the Metropolitan Board of Works

This a list of the members of the Metropolitan Board of Works 1856-1889.

Members of the board were not elected by the general public, but were chosen by the City of London Corporation and by the Vestries and District Boards of the Metropolis from among their members.

The first members were elected in December 1855, coming into office in January 1856. From May 1857 one third of the board retired annually, the seats becoming vacant being chosen by ballot. Where casual vacancies occurred these were filled for the remainder of the term these are shown with bracketed letters: (a).

In 1885/86 the membership of the board was enlarged when a number of populous areas were given additional members. Metropolis Management Amendment Act 1885 (48&49 Vict. c.33) "From and after the passing of this Act the Vestries of the Parishes of Saint Mary Islington, Lambeth, Saint Pancras, Saint Mary Abbott Kensington, and the Board of Works for the District of Wandsworth, shall each be entitled to elect three persons to be members of the Metropolitan Board of Works, and the Vestries of the parishes of Camberwell and Paddington, and the Boards of Works of the Greenwich, Hackney, and Poplar Districts shall each be entitled to elect two persons to be members of the said Board, instead of the number in the said recited Act mentioned with respect to those Parishes and Districts."

"The Districts of Plumstead and Lewisham shall, from and after the passing of this Act, cease to be united for the purpose of electing a member of the Metropolitan Board of Works, as in the said recited Act provided, and the Board of Works of each of those Districts shall be entitled to elect a separate member, as though each District were mentioned in the first part of Schedule B to that Act. The first election of a member for each district shall take place on or before the first day of October, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-five, and, on that day, the member elected for the united Districts of Plumstead and Lewisham shall go out of office, and, on the following day, the new members shall come into office."

"From and after the twenty-fifth day of March, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-six, the Board of Works for the District of Fulham shall be dissolved, and the Vestries of the respective Parishes of St. Peter and St. Paul, Hammersmith, and Fulham, shall from that date be incorporated, and shall have all such powers and be subject to all such provisions as if they had been named in Part II. of Schedule A to the said recited Act. "The Vestry of each of the said Parishes shall on the said day elect one person to be a member of the Metropolitan Board of Works, and on that day the member elected by the Fulham Board of Works shall go out of office, and on the following day the new members shall come into office."

In addition to the members chosen by the various local authorities of the Metropolis, the board had a salaried chairman:
 * John Thwaites (elected by Greenwich and St Saviours Districts in 1855. Resigned both seats on becoming chairman 22 December 1855.) He was knighted in 1865.
 * James Hogg, who had been elected to represent St George Hanover Square, succeeded Thwaites on 18 November 1870. He assumed the surname of McGarel Hogg in 1877 and was created Baron Magheramorne in 1887.

‡ There were two members of the board named Thomas Turner, one (1804-1883) sat for Hampstead Vestry 1855-59 and Rotherhithe with St Olave 1886-75 ; the other for Shoreditch 1878-86.