Born in the Darnall area of Sheffield, Lockwood left school at the age of fourteen.
He spent much of his spare time at the Darnall Congregational Church and its associated temperance society.
[1] In 1912, Lockwood stood as a Labour candidate for the Darnall ward on Sheffield City Council, although he was easily defeated.
Undeterred, he stood for Sheffield Hillsborough at the 1918 UK general election, with the backing of what became the Co-operative Party.
Lockwood instead moved to London to act as election agent for Alfred Barnes, who won East Ham South in 1922 as a joint Co-operative-Labour candidate.