Herbert Nield was a forthright and widely respected Conservative backbencher, notable for the part he played in the National Union and in London politics. His active interest in working men's clubs led him to take the chair of the Association of Conservative Clubs after the death of Sir Herbert Mackworth Praed, a post that he held until his death, and he chaired the National Union of Conservative Associations in 1923-24. Although a successful lawyer, his attitudes always seemed to be more those of a country squire. He had no love for foreigners of any sort and he delivered his speeches with a passion that seemed more akin to fury than reasoned argument. That made him a much more effective platform speaker than he was a parliamentary debater, where he was thought pompous. His evident sincerity, however, and genuine kindliness made him popular even with those opposed to his views, which could only be characterised as "diehard".
Born on 20 October 1862, he was the second son of W.R.Nield of Midge Hall, Saddleworth in Yorkshire, and his wife Eliza, daughter of W.H.Turner. He was admitted a solicitor with honours in 1885, but was called to the Bar by the Inner Temple a decade later. He practised on the North Eastern Circuit and took silk in 1913. He was deputy chairman of the Middlesex Quarter Sessions from 1909 and was appointed Recorder of York in April 1917.
He was elected as MP for the Ealing division at the 1906 general election, and held the seat until 1918. He then sat for the borough of Ealing. Although strongly opposed to the Coalition, he was opposed by another Diehard in the 1922 General Election but his majority over Labour was a comfortable 8,352. Faced with a Liberal candidate as well in 1923, Nield's vote fell from 14,507 to 12,349 and his majority over his Liberal opponent was no more than 5,939. In 1924, with the labour candidate making his fourth attempt on the seat and no Liberal, Nield polled 18,572 to Labour's 6,765. In 1929 he again faced Liberal as well as Labour opposition, but he polled 20,503 to his Socialist opponent's 9,093 with the Liberal a further 1051 behind. He was already suffering from illness and it was ill health that caused him to retire from the House of Commons at the 1931 general election. The celebration planned for his 25 years in Parliament had to be postponed in April 1931 and although he was re-elected deputy chairman of the Middlesex sessions in July, his doctors ordered him to take a complete rest followed by a Mediterranean cruise.
Nield was a strong individualist, with a particular dislike of temperance reformers, and he was also a powerful opponent of bureaucracy. He was ready to follow his own convictions even if it led him to oppose his own government. He did not like the way in which the Coalition government had perpetuated the restriction on club hours imposed during the war, and continued to lobby his own government in a vain attempt to get them to rescind the 1921 Licensing Act. It was not the only Coalition measure that he regarded with deep dislike, but his dissent extended to some of the Baldwin government's measures also. He was paired against the second reading of Equal Franchise bill in 1928 and was one of 16 MPs who attempted to raise the voting age for both men and women to 25. In 1930 he vehemently opposed the Canal Boats Bill, particularly the proposed ban on children under 15 being allowed on the boats.
He took great pride in the fact that more than 1,560 Clubs with more than half a million members were affiliated to his Association and was a regular presence at regional conferences; he seems to have been responsible for beginning in 1924 an extended series of regional conferences each year and before the 1929 election he organised three regional conferences at which he denounced socialism as "the exploitation of the many by the adventurous few" and pointed to the roads programme as a rebuttal of Lloyd George's belated programme. In 1930 too he organised ten special regional conferences, noting that they were of particular importance not only politically, but because the Royal Commission on Licensing was in being. He presided over each one and he followed this effort with a further nine special regional conferences for the clubs in the first five months of 1931.
In the face of Beaverbrook's challenge to the Party leadership, Nield as a staunch tariff reformer might have been expected to show some sympathy for Empire Free Trade. However he remained loyal to the party. When asked about the effect of Beaverbrook's Empire Free Trade Party on Club membership, he took the view that, while support for the Empire Crusade and party membership were perfectly compatible, if the United Empire Party developed an alternative programme to that of the party it would be a very different matter. He was himself chairman of the political committee of the St Stephen's Club and in that capacity distanced the club from the supposed outcome of a meeting held there in October 1930 when the press were told inaccurately that the 44 Conservative MPs present had signed a requisition for a change in the leadership of the party.
From 1912 until 1924 he was the chairman of the Middlesex Division of the National Union and was elected on to the executive of the National Union in April of that year. He chaired the National Union itself in 1923-24 and was made a member of the Privy Council in 1924. He succeeded Sir Herbert Mackworth Praed as Chairman of the Association of Conservative Clubs in 1920 and continued to serve in that capacity and on the Executive Committee of the National Union until he died.
In addition to being a JP, Nield was also a Deputy Lieutenant for the County of Middlesex. He was a member of the Middlesex TF from 1909. He had served on the Middlesex County Council from 1895 and became an Alderman in 1906.He became its Vice Chairman and it was not until June 1929 that he felt he must stand down from a number of its committees because of his health. He represented Middlesex on the Lee Conservancy Board from 1903 and was its chairman from 1930 until his death. The new tidal lock at Bromley by Bow was named in his memory shortly after his death. He was also Chairman of the Lee Catchment Board from its formation. As a director of the Regents Canal Company, he was apopoited to the Board of the Grand Union Canal Company when it was formed in 1929. During the First World War he served as chairman of the Middlesex Appeal Tribunal.
He was knighted in 1918 and appointed a Privy Councillor in 1924.
His first wife, Mary Catherine, the daughter of John Baker of Colyton in Devon died in 1893, leaving one son who followed his father to the Bar. He married for a second time in 1893; his new wife Mabel Owen was the daughter of Sir Francis Cory-Wright Bt.
He died on 11 October 1932 at Bishop's Mead, his Hampstead home, shortly before his 70th birthday, from acute bronchitis and his funeral was held at St Michael's Highgate on 14 October. He was buried in Highgate cemetery.