Astor, Nancy (1879–1964)

US-born British Conservative politician, the first woman member to sit in the House of Commons. After marrying into the wealthy Anglo-American Astor family, Nancy Astor entered Parliament in 1919. She was a keen advocate of women's rights, social reform, and temperance movements. She wrote an early biography My Two Countries (1923).

Nancy Astor was born into a prosperous family in Danville, Virginia, and married Waldorf Astor in 1906. When her husband became the 2nd Viscount Astor of Cliveden in 1919, she succeeded him in the Commons as the member for the Plymouth constituency. Although she was the first sitting British woman member of Parliament, she was not the first to be elected (see Constance Markievicz). She was re-elected in every general election up to 1945, when she retired from Parliament.