Oswald Cawley

Oswald Cawley (7 October 1882 – 22 August 1918),[1] styled The Honourable from January 1918, was a British soldier and Liberal Party politician.

Oswald Cawley

He was the fourth and youngest son of Frederick Cawley, 1st Baron Cawley and his wife Elizabeth Smith, daughter of John Smith.[2] An older brother was Harold Thomas Cawley.[2] Cawley was educated at Rugby School and New College, Oxford, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts.[3] He served as lieutenant of the Shropshire Yeomanry[3] and became a captain of the King's Shropshire Light Infantry.[4] He fought in the First World War, where he was killed in action near Merville. Cawley was buried in Néry Communal Cemetery.[5]

Shortly before his death in 1918, Cawley had been elected in a by-election in January to succeed his father as Member of Parliament (MP) for Prestwich.[1]

Memorial to the Cawley brothers in St Peter and St Paul Church, Eye, Herefordshire

It was in memory of Oswald and two other sons - Harold and John - who died in the war that their father endowed a ward at Ancoats Hospital, Manchester, in 1919 at a cost of £10,000.[6] All three brothers are commemorated on the Parliamentary War Memorial in Westminster Hall. Oswald and Harold, on Panel 8, are among the 22 MPs that died during World War I to be named on that memorial. John, included on the memorial as the son of an MP, appears on Panel 2 of the memorial.[7][8][9] Oswald Cawley is one of 19 MPs who fell in the war who are commemorated by heraldic shields in the Commons Chamber.[10] A further act of commemoration came with the unveiling in 1932 of a manuscript-style illuminated book of remembrance for the House of Commons, which includes short biographical accounts of the life and death of the Cawley brothers.[11][12]