Difference between revisions of "William Waldegrave Palmer, Second Earl of Selborne"

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'''William Waldegrave Palmer''', Second Earl of Selborne, K.G., G.C.M.G., D.C.L., L.L.D., P.C. (17 October 1859 – 26 February, 1942) was a Conservative Unionist politician and colonial adminsitrator who served as [[First Lord of the Admiralty]] from 1900 to 1905.
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{{RIGHTHON}} '''William Waldegrave Palmer, Second Earl of Selborne''', K.G., G.C.M.G., D.C.L., L.L.D., P.C. (17 October 1859 – 26 February, 1942) was a Conservative Unionist politician who served as [[First Lord of the Admiralty]] from 1900 to 1905.
  
 
==Life & Career==
 
==Life & Career==
William Waldegrave Palmer, only son and youngest of the five children of Roundell Palmer [q.v.] , created Earl of Selborne in 1882, was born at 30 Portland Place, London, 17 October 1859. He was educated at Temple Grove, East Sheen, and Winchester. His Winchester days were happy and not undistinguished; although unlike his father he never rose to heights of classical scholarship, he won the English silver medal. Edward Grey (later Viscount Grey of Fallodon) [q.v.] was his fag. He went up to University College, Oxford, in 1878, and in 1881 appeared with one other candidate in the first class in the recently created honour school of modern history. He showed then as subsequently very good ability without literary brilliance or strictly scholarly qualities, keen insight into practical issues, and a great capacity for concentration. He had a strong desire to make the army his career, but this was overridden by his father who persuaded him to choose politics.
 
  
He therefore became private secretary, first to his father as lord chancellor, then to H. C. E. Childers [q.v.] at the War Office and later at the Treasury, thus rapidly acquiring an insight into the work of three great departments of State. On his father's elevation to an earldom, Palmer obtained the courtesy title of Viscount Wolmer. He was elected Liberal member for the Petersfield division of Hampshire after a keen fight in 1885, and a year later, rejecting Gladstone's Home Rule policy, he contested the same seat with equal success as a Liberal Unionist. For ten years until his father's death in 1895 he sat in the House of Commons, during much of this time serving as a popular and energetic Liberal Unionist whip responsible for the organization of the party in the country as well as in the House. His exact forecast during the election of 1892 that there would be a Home Rule majority of forty reveals his political acumen. He decided for that election not to stand again at Petersfield and became candidate for West Edinburgh where he won the seat from the Liberals by five hundred votes: of this victory he was justly proud since few Englishmen have ever sat for Edinburgh.
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==First Lord of the Admiralty==
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The [[Permanent Secretary to the Board of Admiralty|Permanent Secretary]], [[Evan MacGregor|Sir Evan MacGregor]], in a 1902 letter to the Commander-in-Chief on the [[China Station]], [[Cyprian Arthur George Bridge|Sir Cyprian A. G. Bridge]], wrote of Selborne:
  
On his father's death he decided to test the constitutional issue whether succession to a peerage of the United Kingdom necessarily involved relinquishing a seat in the House of Commons, and attempted to continue to sit as member for West Edinburgh. After a lively debate a select committee was appointed which found against him, and West Edinburgh was declared vacant. Within a few months the general election brought in Salisbury's third Government, the Liberal Unionist leaders supporting the Conservatives. Selborne was appointed under-secretary of state for the Colonies with Joseph Chamberlain as his chief. The five years in which he held this office covered the Jameson raid, the West Africa settlement with France, the first Imperial Conference, the South African war, and the passing of the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act. He had to defend his chief's policy in the upper House and from time to time, when Chamberlain was abroad, he was in a highly responsible position.
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<blockquote>The First Lord works very hard and is very pleasant to serve under I find.  Of course it takes some time for any new comer to appreciate the traditions and customs of the Service.<ref>MacGregor to Bridge. Letter of 1 January, 1902. Bridge Papers. National Maritime Museum. BRI/15. Part 1.</ref></blockquote>
  
In the autumn of 1900 Selborne succeeded G. J. (later Viscount) Goschen [q.v.] as first lord of the Admiralty and was sworn of the Privy Council. The next five years were epoch-making in the history of the navy. The technical knowledge, driving force, and dynamic personality of Sir John (later Lord) Fisher [q.v.] were behind most of these changes, but the promotion of Fisher from the Mediterranean command to the Admiralty as second sea lord in 1902 was due to Selborne's personal foresight and courage. The step was deliberately taken in order to promote the educational changes which Selborne had himself independently resolved to pursue. These took shape in the establishment of the naval colleges at Osborne and Dartmouth, the Royal Naval War College, and the system of common entry and training for all naval officers, executive and engineer alike, whereby the field of selection was greatly widened and an invidious social distinction modified. The new method of selection after interview and examination fully justified itself. In 1903 he gave Fisher the Portsmouth command to see the new scheme carried out, and then called him back to the Admiralty when the post of first sea lord fell vacant in 1904. While he was first lord he had great difficulty in resisting the pressure of the Treasury to reduce expenditure at a time when the menace of the new German navy forced upon the Admiralty both construction and strategic reorganization. The wholesale scrapping of out-of-date vessels helped to solve the problem. The establishment of the Committee of Imperial Defence owed much to Selborne's personal initiative and pressure on the Cabinet. The introduction of wireless telegraphy, of submarines, of water-tube boilers, steam turbines, fuel oil, and the establishment of the naval base at Rosyth were among the decisions of the boards over which he presided. When he left the Admiralty the design for the Dreadnought had been accepted, the navy in all its branches had been brought to the highest level of efficiency, notably in gunnery, the defences of Gibraltar and Malta had been strengthened, and the system for manning the fleet had been overhauled. He had set up the committee on naval reserves which led to the formation of the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve and the creation of the Royal Fleet Reserve of short-service men (‘Selborne's Light Horse’).
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The German Naval Attaché in London, von Coerper, wrote to Tirpitz that Selborne:
  
In 1904 Selborne accepted the prime minister's suggestion that he should succeed Lord Curzon [q.v.] as viceroy of India, but the decision that Curzon should return to India for a further period nullified the proposal. The suggestion was renewed in 1905 but by that time Selborne was already fully engaged and highly interested in his work in South Africa and thought it his duty to refuse.
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<blockquote>is easily influenced by men whom he has recognised as efficient &hellip; he is entirely subservient to the influence of Sir John Fisher and subscribes blindly to his proposals.<ref>Letter of 25 January, 1905.  Quoted in Marder.  pp. 21-22.</ref></blockquote>
  
In 1905 Selborne was appointed high commissioner for South Africa and governor of the two newly annexed colonies of the Transvaal and Orange River. The brilliant constructive work of Lord Milner [q.v.] had left problems behind it. The introduction of Chinese labour into the Transvaal mines in 1904, although economically necessary as a temporary measure, became politically untenable on the advent of a Liberal Government. Selborne had been only a few months in South Africa when Balfour resigned, and he never had the full support of Lord Elgin [q.v.] who then went to the Colonial Office. Selborne considered Elgin's determination to prevent Witwatersrand control at the risk of a Boer majority in the new Transvaal constitution unwise, and unfair to British interests; and he incurred the censure of the Cabinet when they misunderstood the way in which he used his influence at the time of the West Ridgeway committee. More than once in 1906 he was near to resignation, but he believed it was to the interest of South Africa and the Empire that he should remain, and bore in silence the rejection of his advice by the colonial secretary. Elgin, however, gave him better support in his work of achieving the settlement of Swaziland in 1908–9 for which he made use of the services of George Grey, the brother of the foreign secretary.
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==South Africa and After==
  
Selborne was, however, remarkably successful in winning the confidence of the old Boer population. Without this the Union of South Africa, which was largely the achievement of his personal statesmanship, could not have been effected. After careful preparation and at the request of all the colonies concerned he issued in January 1907 the famous Selborne memorandum recommending a central national Government. This was published in a Cape blue book and in a paper presented in July to the imperial Parliament. In May 1908 it was resolved to hold a National Convention to draft a constitution for South Africa. The convention met in Durban in October and again in Cape Town and Bloemfontein. Selborne's personal part in the work of the convention, of which he was not a member but with which he was in daily touch, consisted chiefly in furthering its progress by work behind the scenes. He also strove with considerable success to protect the interests of the natives of Basutoland, Swaziland, and Bechuanaland. He accompanied the delegates to London and helped the British Government in seeing the South Africa Act of 1909 through the imperial Parliament. In July he was rewarded with the Order of the Garter in recognition of ‘the strong and grateful sense on the part of H.M. present Government of his loyal and efficient co-operation during the last four years in a peculiarly difficult situation’. He returned to South Africa in September, but it was decided that the first governor-general of the new Union of South Africa must be a party appointment. His last act in South Africa was to persuade his successor (Lord Gladstone [q.v.] ) that the first prime minister of the Union should be Louis Botha [q.v.] . He left South Africa amid universal regret. He carried the standard of South Africa at the coronation of King George V.
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==Bibliography==
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{{refbegin}}
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*"Earl of Selborne" (Obituaries).  ''The Times''.  Friday, 27 February, 1942. Issue '''49171''', col D, p. 7.
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*Boyce, D. George. Ed. (1990).  ''The Crisis of British Power: The Imperial and Naval Papers of the Second Earl of Selborne, 1895-1910''. London: The Historians' Press. ISBN 0950890081.
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{{refend}}
  
In the next five years of Liberal government Selborne was free from the burdens of office, but was prominent during the political crisis which led to the Parliament Act of 1911 and was among those to whom the term ‘Diehard’ was originally applied. He refused to believe that the interests of the House of Lords or of the country could be served by voting under pressure against his convictions. He was active in promoting the Halsbury Club and ardently advocated reform of the upper House.
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==Papers==
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{{refbegin}}
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*[http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/dept/scwmss/wmss/online/modern/selborne2/selborne2.html Papers in the possession of the Bodleian Library, University of Oxford.]
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{{refend}}
  
In May 1915 he joined the first coalition ministry as president of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries. Foreseeing the gravity of the submarine menace he worked hard to increase production of home-grown food, but failed to convince the Cabinet of the necessity of the measures which he advocated, among which was a guaranteed minimum price for wheat. In 1915 he appointed the Acland advisory committee on home-grown timber which led to the establishment of the Forestry Commission. In June 1916 he resigned office on the Government's Irish policy. He had a rooted distrust of Lloyd George and subsequently refused offers from him of the viceroyalty of India, the viceroyalty of Ireland, and a marquessate.
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==See Also==
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{{refbegin}}
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{{refend}}
  
He was made chairman of the agricultural policy sub-committee of the Reconstruction Committee which in 1917 supported his views on wheat prices, advocated a minimum wage for farm labourers fixed by wages boards, and State powers to enforce good cultivation. These were embodied in the Corn Production Act of 1917. The final report of this sub-committee remains of permanent value as a survey of British agricultural conditions.
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{{TabAppts|Political Appointments}} 
 
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{{Appt
In 1919 he was elected chairman of the joint committee of both Houses of Parliament on the bill to carry out the recommendations of the Montagu-Chelmsford report on India, but the bill which it produced was little to his liking.
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|[[First Lord of the Admiralty]]|[[George Joachim Goschen, First Viscount Goschen|The Rt. Hon. George J. Goschen]]|1900 &ndash; 1905|[[Frederick Archibald Vaughan Campbell, Third Earl Cawdor|The Rt. Hon. The Earl Cawdor]]
 
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}}
In his later years his political activities grew less, but he worked hard for women's suffrage, for the reform of the House of Lords and the revision of the Parliament Act. His concern for a wise agricultural policy never left him. His views as an elder statesman found frequent expression in letters to The Times, notable for their brevity and directness. His wide interests and balanced judgement, backed by a strong, fearless, and lovable nature and deep religious convictions, made his influence considerable. During these years he undertook much work in Hampshire. An original alderman of the Hampshire County Council in 1886, he filled the ancient office of lord high steward of Winchester from 1929 until his death. He was warden of Winchester College from 1920 to 1925. In 1905 he was appointed G.C.M.G.; he was an elder brother of Trinity House from 1904; and he received the honorary degrees of LL.D. from Cambridge (1910) and D.C.L. from Oxford (1911).
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{{TabEnd}}
 
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Selborne's father had been one of the great ecclesiastical statesmen of the Victorian era, and throughout his life Selborne carried on this work. He was chairman of the commission appointed by the archbishops in 1913 whose recommendations were effected by the constitution of the Church Assembly and the Enabling Act of 1919. He was the first chairman of the central board of finance, and from 1924 until his death he was chairman of the House of Laity in the Church Assembly. He took a chief part in winning the approval of the House of Lords for the Prayer Book measure of 1927. After its rejection by the Commons he became a member of the Archbishops' Commission on the Relations between Church and State which made its report in 1935. His last official act was to assist as chairman of the House of Laity in welcoming the King at the opening of the new Church House in 1940.
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In 1883 Selborne married Lady Beatrix Maud Cecil (died 1950), daughter of the third Marquess of Salisbury [q.v.] , then leader of the Opposition. They had three sons and one daughter. The second son was killed in action in Mesopotamia in 1916. Selborne died at his home in London 26 February 1942, and was succeeded by his eldest son, Roundell Cecil (born 1887), who had just been appointed minister of economic warfare in (Sir) Winston Churchill's Government, and who contributes to this SUPPLEMENT. Portraits by P. A. de László hang in Church House, and Mercers' Hall, London, and Blackmoor House, Liss.
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<div name=fredbot:appts></div name=fredbot:appts>
 
==Footnotes==
 
==Footnotes==
 
{{reflist}}
 
{{reflist}}
  
==Bibliography==
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Palmer, William Waldegrave}}
{{refbegin}}
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*"Earl of Selborne" (Obituaries).  ''The Times''.  Friday, 27 February, 1942.  Issue '''49171''', col D, pg. 7.
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{{refend}}
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{| border="1" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" align="center"
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|-
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| colspan="3" align="center" style="background:#CEDFF2" | '''Political Office'''
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|-
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| width="220" style="border-bottom:1px solid grey;"  align="center"| Preceded by<br>'''[[George Joachim Goshcen, First Viscount Goschen|Viscount Goschen]]'''
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| width="220" style="border-bottom:1px solid grey;"  align="center"| '''[[First Lord of the Admiralty]]'''<br>1900 - 1905
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| width="220" style="border-bottom:1px solid grey;"  align="center"| Succeeded by<br>'''[[Frederick Archibald Vaughan Campbell, Third Earl Cawdor|Earl Cawdor]]'''
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|-
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|}
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[[Category:1859 births|Selborne]]
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{{CatPerson|UK|1859|1942}}
[[Category:1942 deaths|Selborne]]
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[[Category:Personalities|Selborne]]
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[[Category:First Lords of the Admiralty|Selborne]]
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Revision as of 10:10, 5 March 2018

THE RIGHT HONOURABLE William Waldegrave Palmer, Second Earl of Selborne, K.G., G.C.M.G., D.C.L., L.L.D., P.C. (17 October 1859 – 26 February, 1942) was a Conservative Unionist politician who served as First Lord of the Admiralty from 1900 to 1905.

Life & Career

First Lord of the Admiralty

The Permanent Secretary, Sir Evan MacGregor, in a 1902 letter to the Commander-in-Chief on the China Station, Sir Cyprian A. G. Bridge, wrote of Selborne:

The First Lord works very hard and is very pleasant to serve under I find. Of course it takes some time for any new comer to appreciate the traditions and customs of the Service.[1]

The German Naval Attaché in London, von Coerper, wrote to Tirpitz that Selborne:

is easily influenced by men whom he has recognised as efficient … he is entirely subservient to the influence of Sir John Fisher and subscribes blindly to his proposals.[2]

South Africa and After

Bibliography

  • "Earl of Selborne" (Obituaries). The Times. Friday, 27 February, 1942. Issue 49171, col D, p. 7.
  • Boyce, D. George. Ed. (1990). The Crisis of British Power: The Imperial and Naval Papers of the Second Earl of Selborne, 1895-1910. London: The Historians' Press. ISBN 0950890081.

Papers

See Also

Political Appointments
Preceded by
The Rt. Hon. George J. Goschen
First Lord of the Admiralty
1900 – 1905
Succeeded by
The Rt. Hon. The Earl Cawdor

Footnotes

  1. MacGregor to Bridge. Letter of 1 January, 1902. Bridge Papers. National Maritime Museum. BRI/15. Part 1.
  2. Letter of 25 January, 1905. Quoted in Marder. pp. 21-22.