Alexander Brogden

Alexander Brogden (3 November 1825 – 26 November 1892) was a politician who became Member of Parliament for Wednesbury, England.

Career Brogden was born in Manchester on 3 November 1825, the second son of John Brogden (1798 – 1869) and educated at Blackburn, New College Manchester and King's College London, where he read mathematics. He married Anne Garstang on 6 September 1848 at Manchester Cathedral. He joined his father's contracting business, John Brogden and Sons, in 1846. He had intended to join the Bar but was persuaded to support his father instead. Among his first work for the firm was the supervision of contracts for the Manchester, South Junction and Altrincham Railway, the Ashton Branch of the Manchester and Birmingham Railway and the East Lancashire Railway.

In 1850 Brogdens took a lease of the South Staffordshire Line jointly with John McClean and Alexander managed this for about six years.

With the sudden death of his elder brother John in 1855 and the increasing age of his father, it can be assumed that he gradually took control of the business in the late 1850s

The Brogden family had a majority holding in the Ulverston Mining Co. in 1857. Alexander became the sole lessee in 1872.

Brogden unsuccessfully contested Great Yarmouth as a Liberal in July 1865, but was elected as the first member for Wednesbury in December 1868 and represented that constituency for 18 years.

In 1878 Brogden paid for the organ of West Bromwich Town Hall.

In 1881 it was claimed that, when Parliament was not in session, he might be found in the space of 10 days in: Ulverston, Westminster, Cardiff, Paris, Holland and St Petersburg.