Conservative History Journal

Re-reading the second volume of Harold Nicolson's diaries I came across the following for 16th December, 1941, when the author had been pushed out of the government and made one of the BBC's Trustees. Harry Strauss [Conservative MP for Norwich 1935 - 1945, for Combined English Universities 1946 - 1950 and for Norwich South 1950 - 1955, later 1st Baron Conesford] attacks me on the grounds that the BBC is almost wholly left-wing. The Conservative view is never presented. It is difficult to tell him that most of the right-wing...

Not yet time for resolutions so this blog will stick to the traditional greetings: Merry Christmas to one and all. ...

During an idle and entertaining re-reading of Harold Nicolson's diaries I found the following entry for June 22, 1930: I talk to Macmillan. He says that the old party machines are worn out and that the modern electorate thinks more of personalities and programmes than of pressure put upon them by electoral agents. He thinks that the economic situation is so serious that it will lead to a breakdown of the whole party system. He foresees that the Tories may return with a majority of 20 and then be swept away on a snap vote. No...

As we approach a year that will be full of contentious and paralyzingly dull books, articles, celebrations, analyses and other suchlike events of the First World War (indeed, the process has started already) I feel it appropriate that I have just finished reading Marina Soroka's extraordinarily detailed account of the  last Russian Imperial Ambassador's career in London. Count Benckendorff was an interesting person and I shall be writing more about him but first some paragraphs about the beginning of the war that was...

Oliver Cromwell becomes Lord Protector on December 16, 1653. This was England's only experiment with a republic and a military dictatorship (the two are not necessarily the same). It was not altogether a success though I have always liked Cromwell for two reasons: the well-spoken way in which he got rid of that pesky Rump Parliament in April 1653 ("You have sat too long for any good you have been doing lately... Depart, I say; and let...

A hefty tome from Oxford University Press: One Hundred Letters from Hugh Trevor-Roper, which should provide hours of entertainment and enlightenment. On a more serious note, the third issue of West Midlands History. The first two were fascinating and I am sure this one will be as we...

What better way to come back after a slight gap (again) than by two tales of possibly the greatest British Prime Minister of the twentieth century, Margaret Thatcher. One is a very entertaining account by Nigel Farndale, based on reminiscences, of an event that is not quite as unknown as he seems to make out but not very well known either: a dinner organized by Lord Thomas of Swynnerton (the historian Hugh Thomas) for a large group of litterati and academics to meet the Prime Minister who was not then or later considered to...

Alas, pressure of time, tasks and duties has prevented Tory Historian from attending the talk on Disraeli given this evening by Lord Hurd and Edward Young, the biography's co-author. Nothing for it: the book will have to be read and reviewed....

One cannot let this day pass without remembering the great event of November 19, 1863 when the Soldiers' National Cemetery was dedicated at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, four and a half months after the battle in which the Union army was victorious. The star turn was the Hon. Edward Everett, pastor, politician, former Harvard President, former Secretary of State and Massachussetts Senator, who gave, as was normal in those days, a two-hour...

On October 22 I went to a book launch at the very fine Daunt's bookshop in Holland Park Avenue. The book in question was The Daffodil Party, a debut thriller by the author and quondam editor of Debrett's Handbook and Burke's Peerage, the ever charming and gregarious Charles Mosley (and here). Charles and I had known each other in the past and shared many friends but had lost touch for years. It was the much derided Facebook, whose...

For various reasons to do with ongoing research I have been reading some of the essays in the volume edited by  T. G. Otte, The Makers of British Foreign Policy. The first chapter, an introductory overview of the period "from Malplaquet to Maastricht" (a proper acknowledgement of the importance of both those treaties) and written by Professor Otte has this to say among many other  interesting matters (p. 12): The changing political structure of Britain after the extension of the franchise in 1867, moreover, affected...

Technical problems have prevented postings on this site and on Tory Historian's blog. These have now been solved or so we have been led to assume. Postings will resume in a very short ti...

The book on Knole and the Sackvilles (mentioned here and here) has now been read. There are many interesting moments in it but one particularly tantalizing question arose on page 134: could John Frederick Sackville, the third Duke of Dorset have prevented the French Revolution. The Sackville family became great supporters of cricket on their estate and, indeed, played it themselves, putting together teams at various times to play others. In...

October 16, 1834 was the day Parliament burned down to be rebuilt eventually into the grand edifice we know today with Westminster Hall the only remaining mediaeval part. Caroline Shenton, a Parliamentary Archivist and author of  The Day Parliament Burned Down, describes the events of that traumatic day. J. M. W. Turner played the role of a disaster photographer by setting up his easel on the other side of the Thames and getting...

And here are a few excerpts from the newspapers of the d...

And talking of Georgians, the British Library's next big exhibition is going to be about them. The full title will be Georgians Revealed: Life, Style and the Making of Modern Britain and it promises to be fascinating. One hopes there will not be too much harping on the various clashes between politesse and riotous behaviour, riches and poverty and more emphasis on this: From beautifully furnished homes to raucous gambling dens, Georgians Revealed explores the revolution in everyday life that took place between 1714 and 1830....

The Georgian Gentleman blog came my way because of its highly entertaining posting on coalitions then and now, complete with a Gillray cartoon of Charles James Fox and the 2nd Earl of Guilford, that can be described as "robust" and an updated version that used some version of photoshop. There seems to have been a good deal less snivelling among politicians at the time and they often gave as good as they received. The blog, by Mike Rendell is based on diaries, letters and miscellaneous papers he inherited from his ancestor,...

Tory Historian continues to find Robert Sackville-West's book on Knole and the Sackvilles fascinating. Edward Sackville, the 4th Earl of Dorset, was described by his highly romantic descendant Vita Sackville-West as "the embodiment of Cavalier romance". As the author points out, he was a far more complicated character with interesting ideas though he did find himself on the Royalist side, despite his exasperation with King Charles I. Edward...

The Museum of London has brought together for the first time since its discovery the entire Cheapside Hoard for an exhibition this winter. The collection of jewellery from the 16th and early 17th century was discovered more than a century ago (in 1912, to be precise) by by workmen using a pickaxe to excavate in a cellar near Cheapside in the City of London. The Jewellery Editor writes: The collection of 500 gems, including loose...

Yesterday's anniversary of Neville Chamberlain returning from Munich with that famous piece of paper in his hands requires a longish blog, on which I am working. In the meantime, let me remind readers of another anniversary, one that shows the triumph of humanity over barbarity. October 1, 1943 was going to be the date on which the SS would round up the 7,800 Jews of Denmark, arguing that as the evening was that of Rosh Hashanah, they would all be at home. Instead, almost all of them had been warned, gone into hiding and were...

Tory Historian has made a momentous decision to concentrate in future blogs on books and what one can gleam from them. It will be a kind of a reading diary of books that might be considered to be relevant to the blog. First off, a book picked up in a strange little bookshop near South Kensington station and next to Daquise restaurant (which is still operating, TH is glad to say, and serving excellent Polish food). The books is entitled...

We have just been informed that copies of the new issue of the Conservative History Journal (our printed but friendly rival) is available at the Conservative Party Conference. More to the point, copies to existing subscribers are in the post and those interested in subscribing can do so on the Group's website: http://conservativehistory.wordpress.com/. You know it makes sense. On the website you will also find information about the next event on November 25 in the House of Commons when Lord Hurd and Edward Young will speak...

It is a daguerrotype really but they are early photographs so that counts. This came my way from Iconic Photos, a site I had not been aware of. It has now been bookmarked. The picture dates back to 1844 and was made by Antoine Claudet, one of the pioneers in the field and a student of Louis Daguerre. Having acquired a share in L. J. M. Daguerre's invention, he was one of the first to practice daguerreotype portraiture in England, and...

This blog has already mentioned the History West Midlands site and the first issue of its magazine, West Midlands History. The second issue is out; this and the next issue are free, thereafter a subscription will be required. Not a big one and may well be worth it. The website has all the details. The magazine's second issue is about migration into the West Midlands from other parts of the country and from the world. The three most interesting articles are about Italian immigration, the Polish community and about the presence...

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This year marks the 300th anniversary of the Treaty of Utrecht (1713), a complicated affair of many different treaties signed between various countries that brought to an end the War of Spanish Succession. Signed on April 11 (and yes, it ought to have been noted then), its principal provisions included the ceding of Gibraltar to Britain and so it has remained though from time to time the issue is revived by Spanish governments, particularly if there are economic or political problems in the country. Today is Gibraltar's National...

Economic historians are not usually entertaining but David S. Landes, author of the seminal The Wealth and Poverty of Nations: Why Some Are So Rich and Some So Poor (it even has a Wikipedia entry all of its own) was as well as original. When he was accused of being "eurocentric" in his approach he did not deny it, pointing out that economic development that changed the world started in Europe and was based on European ideas. There is an excellent obituary in the New York Times. His son, Richard Landes, also an historian...

Susan Abernethy describes herself as a free-lance historian, a category of people that is actually quite numerous but about whom less is written than about academics and teledons. She writes a blog called The Freelance Historian, which is TH's envy: there are many entries on various subjects that Ms Abernethy is interested in and they are all detailed and well researched. There is information about Susan Abernethy herself here and more in this intervi...

It is a little difficult to listen to a series that is broadcast at 1.45 pm every day on Radio 4 in fifteen minute chunks but there will be a so-called omnibus edition of all of this week's episodes this evening at 9 pm. The same pattern of broadcasting will apply next week, I believe. The programmes are also available on iPlayer. The BBC seems to think that a history of British conservatism that does not talk of nasty mill owners sending...

The Guildhall Library is not as well known as it should be, despite its convenient location and astonishing collection. So, this blog is going to do its best by promoting it. (There will be other institutions the blog will take under its wing. This is merely the start.) Here is a list of forthcoming events this ye...

The most memorable one is probably that of the unconditional surrender signed by the Japanese on September 2, 1945 on SS Missouri. (No, it was not the Emperor who signed it on Japan's behalf as President Obama once said, but by the Foreign Minister, Mamoro Shigemitsu and General Umezu. While the Emperor remained in place, there was an unquestionable regime change during a prolonged American occupation. One cannot really argue that Japan is not a better place for that. Moving backward into history, today is the 170th anniversary...

One of the first European colonizers of America is alive and well at 383 years. A story on treehugger, not usually included in Tory Historian's reading matter, tells us that a pear tree, planted in 1630 by John Endicott, first governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony, is still alive, having been rescued after hurricanes and even a vandal attack in the sixties, and is bearing fruit, though the pears do not sound particularly appetizi...

Tory Historian apologizes for a long absence and returns with a favourite topic: maps. Maps are the most wonderful things any historian can wish for. New maps, old maps, historic maps and fictional maps (in detective stories) - they are all a joy to scan and to read. Here, however, is the map to end all maps. It is the 1931 Histomap that distils 4,000 years of world history and it is fully "zoomable". In all probability many readers...

Some time ago I mentioned that I was reading Dick Leonard's double biography (though for some reason he describes it as a "comparative biography") of Benjamin Disraeli and William Gladstone, a book that has turned out to be interesting and annoying in more or less equal measures. The great rivalry itself, though it appears to dominate nineteenth century politics, took up less of it than we assume, though while it lasted it was vicious,...

This is surely unmissable: an article on Kentnews.co.uk tells us that the week-end of September 21 - 22 (which will be Open House Weekend in London but more of that anon) will be very special in Chartwell. The origins of Sir Winston Churchill’s writing, painting and entertaining will be explored in a special weekend at his former Chartwell home. Part of a National Trust programme, Uncovered: The Story of British Landscape is a series of events and activities taking place across seven Trust places around the country aiming...

When I wrote about the Labour landslide victory in 1945 it was pointed out to me, inter alia, that the Golden Age Detective (GAD) writers did not like the victory or the country it created. They certainly did not. Let me just mention a few. Cyril Hare's post-war novels are full of sad nostalgia and his non-series book, An English Murder, published in 1951 is not just nostalgic and unhappy but shows real anger towards socialist politicians...

With all the various court cases going on and complaints about nasty things being said on twitter, it might be worth looking at certain aspects of censorship as practised in 1703. On July 31 of that year Daniel Defoe, the writer, journalist, merchant, probable royal spy and political muckraker was placed in the stocks as punishment for writing a curious pamphlet entitled The Shortest Way With Dissenters. It is written in the style of existing...

The results of the 1945 General Election, in which votes took a long time to count because of the numbers that were still overseas, were declared on July 26: an astonishing though not altogether surprising (if I may use such a paradox) landslide victory for the Labour Party, led by Clement Attlee who, as Deputy Prime Minister during the war, managed to spread many of the party's ideas and create the necessary structures even before he withdrew from the Coalition and demanded and election. This blog has referred to this in a...

The Conservative History Journal blog is very pleased to be publishing this article about an unjustly neglected Conservative politician and personality. The first Lord Hailsham played an important part in the Conservative Party in the twenties and thirties but has suffered the fate of so many politicians of that period in that attention has been concentrated on the Second World War and the events leading up to it with too many important...

Last autumn I attended a conference (as I do from time to time) on Dickens and Russia, parts of which were fascinating. Others, mostly profound academic analyses of Dostoyevsky's debt to Dickens considerably less so. However, one astonishing account to emerge was the story of Dickens's supposed meeting with Dostoyevsky in 1862, first written about by Stephanie Harvey in the The Dickensian in 2002. The story was picked up by the two most recent biographers of Dickens, Michael Slater in 2009 and Claire Tomalin in 2011. However,...

Tory Historian finds on Londonist's excellent blog that the British Library will be celebrating the anniversary of the signing of Magna Carta in excellent style next year: the four surviving copies of Magna Carta will be united for the first time, marking the 800th anniversary of the landmark legal document’s signing. During a three-day event at the British Library, visitors and scholars will get to see the quartet in one room. Currently, the Library holds two copies, while the others are at Salisbury and Lincoln Cathedrals. Sadly,...

A new double biography of those two nineteenth century giants, Gladstone and Disraeli. The Great Rivalry by Dick Leonard is published by I. B. Tauris and concentrates on the rivalry that shaped British politics for several decades. It is not, by any means, the first time the rivalry has been written about and the two men's differing personalities and backgrounds have been covered before. To be fair to the author, Dick Leonard, he says this in the Introduction; why the publisher needs to produce such inaccurate hype is unclear. My...

And here, just to make a change and have a break from all the rejoicing is the text of Dr Johnson's response to the Resolutions and Address of the American Congress, entitled Taxation is No Tyranny. The great sage, incidentally, was unimpressed by the yearning for liberty by a group of slave owners....

Legislation that gave women the right to vote on the same terms as men received its Royal Assent on July 2, 1928. Representation of the People (Equal Franchise) Act 1928 is sometimes referred to as the Fifth Reform Act or the Equal Suffrage Act but that is its proper tit...

Or so I was reminded by Mike Paterson of London Historians. Two of them died on this day, Spencer Compton, the Earl of Wilmington in 1743 and Sir Robert Peel in 1850 as well as the man who, according to some, should have been Prime Minister, Joseph Chamberlain in 1914 (a good time to go). As against that, one, Sir Alec Douglas-Home, Lord Home of the Hirsel, was born on this day in 1903. You win some and you lose so...

Each man's death diminishes me. John Donne's words echo in my mind as I think of the death, first heard of late last night, of Professor Ken Minogue (whoever called him Kenneth except as a joke?), a towering intellectual and writer, a man who thought deeply about our society, our basic ideas and our political structures, and expressed his ideas lucidly and entertainingly. He was also a friend of whom I was very fond and with whom...

Sir Harold Nicolson, diplomat, writer, diarist, politician and gardener, belonged to several parties but never the Conservative one. In fact, he thought of himself as something of a radical and was, though not in domestic matters. There, he and his Conservative supporting wife, Vita Sackville-West (poet, writer and gardener) inhabited an area of confluence between high Toryism and socialism. Also he was, briefly, a junior member of Churchill's...