1923 Portsmouth South by-election

The seat had become vacant when the constituency's Conservative MP Leslie Orme Wilson had been appointed as Governor of Bombay,^[1] and had therefore resigned from the Commons on 26 July by the procedural device of accepting appointment as Steward of the Manor of Northstead.^[2] Wilson had held the seat for less than a year, having won it at a by-election in December 1922.^[3] He had previously been the MP for Reading from 1913 to 1922.

The result at the last election was

• The Conservative candidate was Herbert Cayzer, who had held the seat from the 1918 general election until his resignation on 27 November 1922, only two weeks after being returned at the general election in November 1922.
• The Liberal Party candidate was 64-year-old retired army general, Sir Henry Lawson, who had previously contested the seat unsuccessfully at the 1922 general election.

Cayzer was re-elected for Portsmouth South at the next five general elections, and held the seat until he was ennobled in 1939. Lawson never stood for Parliament again. The result at the following general election;

• Portsmouth South (UK Parliament constituency)
• 1922 Portsmouth South by-election
• 1939 Portsmouth South by-election
• 1984 Portsmouth South by-election
• The city of Portsmouth
• List of United Kingdom by-elections