Somerville Hastings

Somerville Hastings, FRCS (4 March 1878 – 7 July 1967) was a British surgeon and Labour Party politician.

The son of the Reverend H G Hastings, he was born in Warminster, Wiltshire. He was educated at Wycliffe College (Gloucestershire), University College (receiving the gold and silver medals for botany) and the Middlesex Hospital, London. He qualified as MRCS LRCP in 1902, FRCS in 1904 and MB (London) in 1908.

On 19 October 1911 Hastings married Bessie Tuke (1881/2–1958), daughter of the architect William Tuke, they had two children.

Hastings was Member of Parliament (MP) for Reading, in Berkshire, from 1923 to 1924, and from 1929 to 1931. He returned to the House of Commons at the 1945 general election as MP for Barking, holding the seat until his retirement at the 1959 general election.

Thora Silverthorne worked for Hastings as a nanny and went on to be secretary of the Socialist Medical Association.