Two-week wait for election results

People who cast their vote in the 1918 General Election, held on December 14, 1918, had to wait a fortnight to find out the results.

At the close of voting in the constituencies of Stirling and Falkirk Burghs and Western Stirlingshire, the ballot boxes were taken to the County Buildings in Stirling and kept under lock and key as the votes of soldiers and sailors, at home and abroad, were awaited.

The count took place two weeks later and in Stirling the numbers of votes cast was totted up at the County Buildings where the staff of 30 enumerators included, for the first time, women.

The Observer said the counting of votes in Stirling took three hours, and added:‘Very little interest seemed to be displayed in the matter so far as the public was concerned and crowd around the entrance to the County Buildings did not number much more than 150.’

In West Stirling, Coalition Unionist Mr Harry Hope took the seat , defeating T Johnston (Labour) and the Liberal candidate Robert B Cunninghame Graham.

Unfortunately, Mr Hope was unable to attend the count as he was‘confined to bed with lumbago and sciatica’and it was his election agent who addressed the count on his behalf.

In Stirling and Falkirk Burghs, there was victory for Liberal Coaltion candidate Mr John Murray Macdonald. His campaign had got off to an inauspicious start when the car in which he was travelling to an election meeting knocked down and injured an elderly Stirling man.

Across the country , it was a triumph for Liberal politician David Lloyd George and his followers.

Lloyd George had led the coalition government during the last two years of the war.