Elected by Rommel

Before Tobruk fell, no one gave even an outside chance to the Independent candidate in the by-election at Maldon, near London. Middle-class Maldon was considered a sure Conservative district. Independent Candidate Tom Driberg, 37, although England's most widely read columnist ("William Hickey" of the London Daily Express), was a breezy leftist, so unconventional that in 1939 he called Adolf Hitler at his Berlin telephone number (only to be told that he could not speak to the Fuehrer). But when the Government candidate, Conservative Reuben Hunt, attributed Britain's Libyan reverses to "our too-heavy shipments of arms to Russia," Independent Driberg accused him of a "wretched alibi for the incompetence of brass hats," and Maldon agreed with Driberg.

Before the votes were cast, Tobruk had fallen. Independent Driberg defeated his Governmental rival, 12,219-10-6,226.

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