‘Politics of the dunghill’: How an ‘odious’ by-election 90 years ago gripped Scotland

One was condemned in the press for his vile and “despicable” behaviour, while the other ended up requiring medical attention after a snowball hit him in the face and smashed his spectacles.

Now, nine decades on, a new book tells the extraordinary story of the Ross and Cromarty by-election of February 1936, which saw Randolph Churchill, whose father Winston would later lead Britain through the Second World War, face off against Malcolm MacDonald, the son of Ramsay MacDonald.

It is a tale encompassing multiple car accidents, a vehicle attacked by a stag, and even the death of King George V. Author Rob McInroy said he stumbled across newspaper reports of the remarkable contest while researching a novel he was writing set in the 1930s.

"I was looking through the Scottish newspapers to try and get a sense of how people were reacting to the King's death," he said. "I kept coming across these headlines about this by-election in Ross and Cromarty, and it just seemed absolutely bonkers. Every day there was something else."

He added: "My initial thought was, I'll write it as fiction. But then I thought, I don't need to write it as fiction because the real thing was so crazy, I didn't need to make anything up. I'd just write it as it happened."

His book, An Odious Campaign, sets out what happened when MacDonald was selected as the ‘National Government’ candidate against the wishes of some local Unionists and Liberals.

His father Ramsay had formed the National Government - a coalition of parties - in 1931 in response to an economic crisis, leading to his expulsion from the Labour Party.

MacDonald’s selection in Ross and Cromarty, aimed at bringing the 34-year-old Cabinet minister back into Westminster after he lost his seat in the 1935 general election, proved controversial. Instead of endorsing him, local Unionists defied party bosses down south and decided to field their own candidate.

Enter Randolph Churchill, then 24 years old, a charismatic and pugnacious Englishman unafraid to fight dirty.

The two men were “chalk and cheese", explains Mr McInroy. "Churchill could just get a crowd going really well,” he said. “He was a brilliant orator. But there was nothing very much behind what he was saying.

"I think it was the opposite extreme for Malcolm MacDonald. He was a very, very serious, sober politician who didn't really come across very well."

Churchill, who had been invited to stand by a group of Easter Ross farmers, quickly launched personal attacks on his rival, dismissing Malcolm and his father - who was also seeking to return to Westminster in a by-election - as “want-to-get-into-parliamentarians”.

Judged on the test of ability, Churchill said, Malcolm would not be in Cabinet. “Judged on the test of patriotism, he is the last man to be in it.”

Stanley Baldwin, the Conservative prime minister, backed MacDonald in the interests of the National Government, provoking the ire of the local Unionists, as the Conservatives were known in Scotland.

A letter from Ramsay to his son on January 16 gives an indication of the strength of feeling involved. The common view, he wrote, was that Randolph should be “stamped out as a slug crawling on our public life”.

"There was no question [Churchill] was exceptionally intelligent,” Mr McInroy said. “He was very, very intelligent. But he had no filter. He was so obnoxious, he just rubbed people up the wrong way, and he didn't care - he absolutely didn't care that he was doing it."

The Inverness Courier accused Churchill of espousing the “politics of the dunghill” in an “odious campaign”. It was, the paper would insist at the end of January, one of the “vilest and most despicable” ever seen in Scotland.

Agriculture - and associated tariffs and subsidies - was a big issue. But Churchill also made much of the need to rearm in response to Hitler, and on this, at least, he would ultimately be vindicated.

Meanwhile, the candidates had to battle through some of the worst winter conditions in decades. Blizzards and snowdrifts made travel hazardous, leading to more than one car accident.

Hector McNeil, the socialist candidate, suffered an injury to his wrist after his vehicle skidded and crashed into a telegraph pole, while a vehicle carrying MacDonald ended up in a ditch. On a separate occasion, McNeil’s car was attacked by a stag.

Then, after a meeting in Ullapool, MacDonald was hit in the face by a snowball, smashing his spectacles. Shattered glass entered his eye and he was forced to rest for days. Shortly after this painful incident, campaigning was halted by the death of King George V.

On February 10, voters had their say - with some having to travel 20 miles or more to a polling station. More than 2,000 people gathered outside Dingwall’s town hall to hear the result.

MacDonald won with 8,949 votes to McNeil’s 5,967, a majority of 2,982. Churchill, for all his noise and press coverage, attracted 2,427 votes. Turnout was an impressive 66 per cent.

Later, during a hotel victory party, MacDonald walked the length of the room on his hands. “I would rather be able to do that than win Ross and Cromarty,” remarked Churchill, who would later secure a Westminster seat in 1940.

It was a bizarre contest firmly rooted in its time and place. But as Mr McInroy observes, there are also parallels to today’s political climate, and perhaps some lessons.

"One of the big issues that came up was rearmament, because by 1936, when this happened, it was already pretty clear that war was coming,” Mr McInroy said. “But it was also equally clear that we were massively unprepared for it."

He added: "You can see exactly the same conversations happening today, with Russia and Europe just not being prepared for it."

‘An Odious Campaign’: The Ross and Cromarty By-Election of 1936 by Rob McInroy is published by Tippermuir Books.