Who was the last Liberal Party councillor in the old London Borough of
Chelsea (prior to the Kengingston & Chelsea merger), and when did he
serve?

Hi kingofpop,

I just want you to know we are working on your question, but the
answer is not as straightforward as it appears.

Below is a response I received from The Chelsea Library after the Town
Hall of Kensington and Chelsea forwarded my question to them.

"I'm not an expert on local government history so I can only tell you
what I've been able to find out form the material in the Library. It
seems that political parties did not operate fully in local government
as we see it today until after the 1972 Local
Government Act. Before that many councillors were "independent", some
authorities were ruled by members of a national political party and
some weren't. Before the early years of the 20th century when the
Labour Party started organising in local government
there was often little distinction made between liberals and
conservatives - groupings
within councils would use different labels such as "improvers"
"economisers" and "progressives". Councillors were ususally drawn from
the same social background. This began to change when the Labour Party
began winning council seats and controlling authorities, but the
reticence over declaring a political interest remained for a long
time.
So it's not altogether surprising that none of the records we have
here - Council minutes, local directories - make any mention of the
political affiliations of individual councillors. I've made some
detailed checks in the minutes for the one period when the Borough of
Chelsea might have had a liberal councillor, the period before WW1
when there was a liberal MP representing the parliamentary
constituency and can't find anything.So the short answer to the
question is that it's quite likely the Borough of Chelsea never had a
councillor who was formally affiliated to the Liberal Party."
I hope this is some help.

Senior Librarian
Chelsea Library
020 7361 4158

I have also emailed several other contacts and I'll let you know of
the responses I receive.
Regards,
rainbow~

Thanks for your work so far. I had also tried Chelsea library but had
no luck. Am wondering if there is a definitive book of these things...

Hi kingofpop,

I received the following message from the London Liberal Democrats
website:

"I'm afraid I've asked around and no-one seems to know. We do have
some archives which are deposited with LSE, but I don't know if these
would help. I think your best bet is to contact the local history
library at K&C (they're bound to have one) and pick their brains.
You'll probably find it on their website. Best wishes.
Flick Rea 
Regional Administrator
London Liberal Democrats"
londonlibdems@cix.co.uk 
http://london.libdems.org/index.html


Another reply I received from the Liberal Democrats:

"I suggest you contact the London Research Centre whose predecessor 
organisation published the results.  I'm afraid I do not currently
have
contact details for them.
E Price
Information Co-ordinator"
libdems@cix.co.uk
http://www.libdems.org.uk/

I'll let you know of any more responses as I receive them.
Regards,
rainbow~