Background
Edward Shortt was born on 10 March 1862, the second son of Edward Shortt, vicar of St. Anthony’s Church, Byker, Newcastle.
Edward Shortt was born on 10 March 1862, the second son of Edward Shortt, vicar of St. Anthony’s Church, Byker, Newcastle.
He was educated at Durham School and at the University of Durham. In 1890 he was called to the bar by the Middle Temple. He worked on the northeastern circuit and was recorder at Sunderland between 1907 and 1918. Shortt’s legal career was solid but unspectacular; he was more successful in Parliament.
Shortt became Liberal M.P. for Newcastle upon Tyne in January 1910, and retained the redrawn seat (Western Division, 1918-1922) throughout his parliamentary career. He was appointed chief secretary for Ireland in April 1918, his main activity in that post being the arrest of 150 members of Sinn Fein.
On 10 January 1919 he became home secretary in David Lloyd George’s postwar coalition government, his main task being that of dealing with two police strikes in March and August 1919. However, his political career came to an end in October 1922, with the fall of the coalition government. Thereafter, he filled a number of public roles, the most important being that of president of the British Board of Film Censors (1929). He died on 10 November 1935.
He married Isabella Stewart in 1890.