firsts.

[giltbrookian]

Countess Marcievitcz( very probably the incorrect spelling of her name.!) was the first woman to be elected to the House of Commons.
Nancy Astor was the first woman to take her seat in the Commons.
Who was the first woman to sit in the House of Lords.

[grasscarp]

Seems there were 3 of them. In1958 the Life Peerages Act entitled women to sit in the House of Lords for the first time. Baroness Swanbourough, Lady Reading and Baroness Barbara Wooton were the first to take their seats. (www.bbc.co.uk)

[Town Crier]

FIRST WOMAN IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS
The first woman member of the House of Lords was Baroness Wootton of Abinger, the sociology professor and magistrate Barbara Wootton, who was created a life peer on 8 August 1958. She was one of the first four women so created following passage of the 1958 Life Peerage Act, which addressed the need for fresh blood to revive the House. However the first of these four to take her seat, on 21 October 1958, was Baroness Swanborough, dowager Marchioness of Reading and founder of the Women's Royal Voluntary Service. Lady Wootton sat as a Labour peer and Lady Swanborough was a Cross-Bencher. Lady Wootton's husband hoped he could sit in the same gallery as the peers' wives but was instead given a place in the Distinguished Strangers' Gallery.

http://www.qub.ac.uk/cawp/UKhtmls/RecordsUK.ht m

[giltbrookian]

Thank you both for your prompt and informative answers.
The more I peruse the Answer Bank the more knowledgeable I become.

[Prescott]

Hear, hear.
Having just joined I'm impressed.