Anglo-American Establishment

there was never the smallest affectation." It will be recalled that Milner had refused the

Colonial Secretaryship in 1903; about six years later, according to The Times obituary, he

refused a Unionist offer of a Cabinet post in the next Conservative government, unless

the party would pledge itself to establish compulsory military training. This it would not

do. It is worth recalling that another initiate, Lord Esher, shared Milner's fondness for

compulsory military training, as well as his reluctance to hold public of flee.

2. E. Garrett, The Empire and the Century (London, 1905), 481. Eight years later in

1913, in the introduction to a collection of his speeches called The Nation and the Empire

(Boston, 1913), Milner said almost the same thing. Milner’s distaste for party politics was

shared by Lord Esher and Lord Grey to such an extent as to become a chief motivating

force in their lives. See H. Begbie, Albert, Fourth Earl Grey (London, 1918), especially

p. 52, and The Journals and Letters of Reginald, Viscount Esher (4 vols., London, 1938),

passim.

3. Letter of Milner to Congdon, 23 November 1904, in Cecil Headlam, ed., The

Milner Papers (2 vols., London, 1931-1933), II, 506.

4. Cecil Headlam, ed., The Milner Papers (2 vols., London, 1931-1933), I, 267 and

288; II, 505. Milner’s antipathy for party politics was generally shared by the inner circle

of the Milner Group. The future Lord Lothian, writing in The Round Table, August 1911,

was very critical of party politics and used the same arguments against it as Milner. He

wrote: “At any moment a party numbering among its numbers all the people best

qualified to manage foreign affairs may be cast from office, for reasons which have

nothing to do with their conduct of these matters. . . . If the people of Great Britain

manage to keep at the head of the great Imperial offices of State, men who will command

the confidence of the Dominions, and who pursue steadfastly a . . . successful policy, and

if the people of the Dominions are tolerant and far-sighted enough to accept such a policy

as their own, the present arrangement may last. Does history give us any reason for

expecting that the domestic party system will produce so great a combination of good

fortune and good management?” ( The Round Table, I, 414-418).

In the introduction to The Nation and the Empire, written in 1913, Milner expressed

himself in a similar vein.

5. Marquess of Crewe, Lord Rosebery (2 vols., London, 1931), 615.

6. See John, Viscount Morley, Recollections (2 vols., New York, 1917), II.

7. The fact that a small “secret” group controlled the nominations for Chancellor

of Oxford was widely recognized in Britain, but not frequently mentioned publicly.

In May 1925 the Earl of Birkenhead wrote a letter to The Times to protest against

this usurpation by a nonofficial group and was answered in The Times, by a letter

which stated that, when the group was formed after the interruption of the First

World War, he had been invited to join it but had never acknowledged the

invitation! Milner’s nomination was made by a group that met in New College,

under the chairmanship of H. A. L. Fisher, on 5 May 1925. There were was about

thirty present, including Fisher, Lord Astor, Lord Ernle, Steel-Maitland, Pember,

Wilkinson, Brand, Lucas, M. G. Glazebrook, Sir Herbert Warren (classmate and

friend of Milner’s), Archbishop Davidson, Cyril Bailey, etc. The same group,

according to Lord Halifax’s biographer, nominated Lord Halifax to the

Chancellorship in 1933.

8. The editors were assisted in the work of producing the two volumes by Margaret

Toynbee. The influence of the Milner Group can be discerned in the list of

acknowledgments in the preface to Weaver’s volume. Among eighteen names listed may

be found those of Cyril Bailey (Fellow of Balliol, 1902-1939, and member of the

Ministry of Munitions, 1915-1918); C. R. M. F. Cruttwell (member of All Souls and the

Round Table Group, Principal of Hertford College since 1930); Geoffrey Dawson, H. A.

L. Fisher; and Ernest Swinton (Fellow of All Souls, 1925-1939). Apparently these

persons decided what names should be included in the Dictionary.

Chapter 6

1. The Milner Group's control over these lectures appears as much from the list of

presiding officers as from the list of lecturers, thus:

President Speaker Title

A. D. Steel-Maitland Michael Sadler The Universities and the War

Lord Bryce Charles Lucas The Empire and Democracy

Lord Milner A. L. Smith The People and the Duties of Empire

Lord Selborne H. A. L. Fisher Imperial Administration

Earl St. Aldwyn Philip Kerr The Commonwealth and the Empire

Lord Sumner G. R. Parkin The Duty of the Empire in the World

2. Buckle came to The Times staff in 1880 because of his All Souls connection, being

recommended by Sir William Anson, according to the official History of The Times. He

was apparently selected to be the future editor from the beginning, since he was given a

specially created position as "confidential assistant" to the editor, at a salary "decidedly

higher than an Oxford graduate with a good degree could reasonably hope to gain in a

few years in any of the regular professions." See The History of The Times (4 vols.,

London, 1935), II, 529. Buckle may have been the link between Lord Salisbury and The

Times, since they could easily meet at All Souls. Obviously The History of the Times,

which devotes a full volume of 862 pages to the period of Buckle's editorship, does not

tell the full story on Buckle, since he rarely appears on the scene as an actor and would

seem, from the History, to have been ignorant of most of what was happening in his

offices (the Rhodes-Jameson connection, for example). This is difficult to believe.

The History of The Times is unsatisfactory on other grounds as well. For example, it is

not possible from this work to construct a complete record of who held various staff

positions. We are told, for example, that Flora Shaw became head of the Colonial

Department in 189O, but that ends that department as far as the volume is concerned.

There is considerable material on Miss Shaw, especially in the chapters on the Transvaal,

but we never find out w ho was her successor, or when she left the staff, or if (as appears

likely) the Colonial Department was a creation for her occupancy only and did not

survive her (undated) withdrawal from the staff; similarly the exact dates and positions of

men like Amery and Grigg are not clear.

3. The History of The Times (4 vols., London, 1935), III, 755.

4. There were others, but they are not of primary, or even secondary importance in the

Milner Croup. We might mention Aubrey L. Kennedy (son of Sir John Kennedy of the

diplomatic service), who was on The Times staff from 1910 to 1942, in military

intelligence in 1914-1919, diplomatic correspondent for the BBC in 1942-1945, and an

influential member of Chatham House since 1919.

5. E. Moberly Bell, Flora Shaw (London, 1947), 115.

6. At the suggestion of the British Foreign Office, copies of these articles were

circulated in America and in Europe. See E. Moberly Bell, Flora Shaw (London, 1947)

228.

7. The History of The Times (4 vols., London, 1935), III, 212, 214.

8. All quotations are from The History of The Times (4 vols., London, 1935), III,

chapters 7 and 9.

9. See E. T. Cook, Edmund Garrett (London, 1909), 118-119. The difference of

opinion between Stead and the others can be traced in F. Whyte, The Life of W. T. Stead

(2 vols., Boston, 1925), Ch. 21.

The failure of the plotters in Johannesburg to revolt so haunted the plotters elsewhere

that they salved their wounds by fantasy. Stead wrote this fantasy for The Review of

Reviews annual of January 1897, and consulted with Garrett, who had similar plans for

the Christmas 1896 number of the Cape Times. In Stead's story, the Jameson fiasco was

to be turned into a smashing success by a heroic South African editor, who, when all

appeared lost, would rush to Johannesburg, stir up the revolt, and save the day. Garrett,

who was to be the original model for the hero, wrote back: "A suggestion which will help

to keep us distinct, give you a much grander theme, and do something for C.J. R. which

no one has yet dared—I went nearer to 'Cecil Rhodes' Dream' but that was a hint only:

viz. Make world see what he was driving at and what would have come if all had come

off and if Johannesburg had played up.... As to making me the hero. No.... But he must be

not only me but you also, and A. Milner, and a few more rolled into one, and he must do

what I dreamed of doing but time and space prevented." For the name of this hero Garrett

suggested combining the three names into 'Milner Garsted" or "Milstead." Ultimately,

Stead made the hero a woman. The new model was probably Flora Shawl The story

appeared with the title "The History of a Mystery." See F. Whyte, The Life of W. T.

Stead, 94-95

10. Even after the view of the majority prevailed, Stead refused to yield and published

his version of a proper defense in The Scandal of the South Africa Committee (London,

1899). It was Stead's belief that preparation for"a raid" was a patriotic act which, if

confessed, would have won public acclaim rather than condemnation.

11. On this see Journals and Letters of Reginald, Viscount Esher, (4 vols., London,

1938N, 1, 196-202.

12. The History of The Times (4 vols., London, 1935), 111, 244. It is clear from Miss

Moberly Bell's biography of Flora Shaw (183-188) that Buckle knew this fact at least by

24 May 1897, although Miss Shaw had previously written him a letter stating explicit!)

(probably for the record) that she had been acting without either Buckle's or Bell's

knowledge. The night before Miss Shaw testified before the Select Committee, Buckle

sent her a detailed letter of instruction on how to answer the committee's questions.

13. W. S. Blunt, My Diaries (London, 1932), 226.

14. See The History of The Times (4 vols., London, 1935), 111, 315-316.

Chapter 7

1. L. Curtis, Dyarchy (Oxford, 1920), 41.

There can be no doubt that the original inspiration for the Round Table movement was

to be found in anti-German feeling. In fact, there are some indications that this was the

primary motive and that the stated purpose of working for imperial federation was, to

some extent at least, a mask. The Round Table, in 1940, in its obituary of Abe Bailey

(September 1940, XXX, 743-746) attributes its foundation to this cause as follows:

"German ambitions to destroy and supplant the British Commonwealth were manifest to

those who had eyes to see.... [These asked] 'Can not all the Dominions he brought to

realize the common danger that confronts them as much as it confronts Great Britain and

think out in mutual discussion the means of uniting all the force and resolution of the

Empire in its defense?' To the solution of this question the founders of the Closer Union

Societies resolved to apply a similar procedure. Round Table Groups were established in

all the British Dominions to study the problem." A similar cause for the founding

appeared in The Round Table as recently as the issue of September 1948.

2. The original leader of the Round Table Groups in New Zealand was apparently

James Allen (Sir James after 1917), who had been educated in England, at Clifton School

and Cambridge University, and was an M. P. in New Zealand from 1887 to 1920. He was

Minister of Defense (1912-1920), Minister of Finance and Education (1912-1915), and

Minister of Finance (1919-1920), before he became in 1920, New Zealand's High

Commissioner in London. He was a member of the Royal Institute of International

Affairs.

In the Round Table Group for New Zealand, Allen was soon supplemented and

eventually succeeded by William Downie-Stewart as the most important member.

Stewart was at the time Mayor of Dunedin (1913) but soon began a twenty-one-year

period as an M.P. (1914-1935). He was also Minister of Customs (1921-1928); Minister

of Internal Affairs (1921-1924); Minister of Industries and Commerce (1923-1926);

Attorney General (1926); Minister of Finance (1926-1928, 1931-1933); Acting Prime

Minister (1926); New Zealand delegate to the Ottawa Conference (1932); Vice-

Chancellor of Otago University; prominent businessman, and president of the New

Zealand Institute of International Affairs (1935- ). According to Dove's letters, he

attended a Milner Group discussion meeting at Lord Lothian's country house in October

1932.

3. The chief leaders in Australia were Thomas Bavin (Sir Thomas after 1933) and

Frederic W. Eggleston (Sir Frederic since 1941). The former, who died in 1941 (see

obituary in The Round Table for December 1941), was a barrister in New South Wales

from 1897, Professor of Law and Modern History at the University of Tasmania (1900-

1901); private secretary to the first Prime Minister of Australia, Sir Edmund Barton, in

1901-1904; Secretary and Chief Law Officer of Australia in 1907; It. commander in

naval intelligence in 1916-1918; an Australian M.P. in 1919-1935; held many cabinet

posts in New South Wales from 1922 to 1930, ending as Premier (1927-1930). He

finished his career as a judge of the Supreme Court in 1935-1941. He was one of the

original members of the Round Table Group in Australia, a regular contributor to The

Round Table, and an important member of the Australian Institute of International

Affairs.

Eggleston was a barrister from 1897; a member, correspondent, and chief agent in

Australia for The Round Table from 1911; a member of the Legislative Assembly of

Australia, (1920-1927); Minister for Railways, (1924-1926); chairman of the

Commonwealth Grants Commission, (1934-1941); Minister of China (1941-1944) and to

the United States (1944-1946). He was one of the founders and chief officers of the

Australian Institute of International Affairs and its representative on the council of the

Institute of Pacific Relations.

4. Glazebrook, although virtually unknown, was a very important figure in Canadian

life, especially in financial and imperialist circles, up to his death in 1940. For many

years he had a practical monopoly in foreign exchange transactions in Toronto, through

his firm, Glazebrook and Cronyn (founded 1900). Like most members of the Milner

Group, he was interested in adult education, workers' education, and university

management. He promoted all of these in Toronto, lecturing himself to the Workers'

Educational Association, and at the University of Toronto where he was assistant

Professor of Banking and Finance (1926-1937). He was the chief adviser of leading

bankers of Canada, and of London and New York bankers on Canadian matters. The

Round Table says of him: "Through his friendship with Lord Milner and others he had at

one time a wide acquaintance among the prominent figures in British public life, and it is

well-known to his intimates that on numerous occasions British ministers, anxious to

secure reliable information about certain Canadian affairs through unofficial channels,

had recourse of Glazebrook.... By precept and example he exercised an immense

influence for good upon the characters and outlook of a number of young Canadians who

had the privilege of his society and knew him as 'The Sage.' Some of them, who have

come to high place in the life of the Dominion, will not be slow to acknowledge the value

of the inspiration and enlightenment which they derived from him. Continually he

preached the doctrine to his young friends that it was their duty, if fortune had placed

them in comfortable circumstances, to give some of their time to the intelligent study of

public affairs and to the service of the community, and he awakened in not a few minds

for the first time the idea that there were better goals in life than the making of money. It

is true that the Round Table Groups which he organized with such enthusiasm have now

faded into oblivion, but many of their members did not lose the zest for an intelligent

study of politics which Glazebrook had implanted in them, and after the last war they

proved keen supporters of the Canadian Institute of International Affairs as an agency for

continuing the political education which Glazebrook had begun."

5. That Curtis consulted with Lord Chelmsford on the planned reforms before Lord

Chelmsford went to India in 1916 was revealed in the House of Lords by Lord Crewe on

12 December 1919, and by Curtis in his book Dyarchy (Oxford, 1920), xxvii.

6. Dyarchy (Oxford, 1920), 74.

7. See R. H. Brand, ed., Letters of John Dove (London, 1938), 115-116.

8. See R. H. Brand, ed., Letters of John Dove (London, 1938), 326, 340.

9. Some of Milner's Canadian speeches in 1908 and in 1912 will be found in The

Nation and the Empire (Boston, 1913). Kerr's speech at Toronto on 30 July 1912 was

published by Glazebrook in June 1917 as an aid to the war effort. It bore on the cover the

inscription "The Round Table in Canada." Curtis's speech, so far as I can determine, is

unpublished.

10. See R. L. Schuyler, "The Rise of Anti-Imperialism in England," in The Political

Science Quarterly (September 1928 and December 1921); O. D. Skelton, Life and Times

of Sir Alexander Tilloch Galt (Toronto, 1920),440; and C. A. Bodelson, Studies in Mid-

Victorian Imperialism (Copenhagen, 1924), 104.

11. All of these papers will be found in The Proceedings of the Royal Colonial

Institute, VI, 36-85; XII, 346-391; and XI, 90-132.

12. The ideas expressed by Lionel Curtis were really Milner's ideas. This was publicly

admitted by Milner in a speech before a conference of British and Dominion

parliamentarians called together by the Empire Parliamentary Association, 28 July 1916.

At this meeting "Milner expressed complete agreement with the general argument of Mr.

Curtis, making lengthy quotations from his book, and also accepted the main lines of his

plan for Imperial Federation. The resulting discussion showed that not a single Dominion

Member present agreed either with Mr. Curtis or Lord Milner." H. D. Hall, The British

Commonwealth of Nations (London, 1920), 166. The whole argument of Curtis's book

was expressed briefly by Milner in 1913 in the Introduction to The Nation and the

Empire.

13. Milner's two letters were in Cecil Headlam, ed., The Milner Papers (2 vols.,

London, 1931-1933), I, 159-160 and 267; On Edward Wood's role, see A. C. Johnson,

Viscount Halifax (New York, 1941), 88-95. The project for devolution on a geographic

basis for political matters and on a functional basis for economic matters was advocated

by The Round Table in an article entitled "Some problems in democracy and

reconstruction' in the issue of September 1917. The former type was accepted by Curtis

as a method for solving the Irish problem and as a method which might well have been

used in solving the Scottish problem in 1707. He wrote: "The continued existence in

Edinburgh and London of provincial executives and legislatures, entrusted respectively

with interests which were strictly Scottish and strictly English, was not incompatible with

the policy of merging Scots and Englishmen in a common state. The possibility of

distinguishing local from general interests had not as yet been realized." Again, he wrote:

"If ever it should prove expedient to unburden the Parliament of the United Kingdom by

delegating to the inhabitants of England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales the management of

their own provincial affairs and the condition of Ireland should prove no bar to such a

measure, the Irish problem will once for all have been closed"— The Commonwealth of

Nations (London, 1916), 295,518.

14. R. H. Brand, ed., Letters of John Dove (London, 1938), 321.)

15. "The Financial and Economic Future" in The Round Table (December 1918), IX,

114-134. The quotation is from pages 121-123.

16. The Commonwealth of Nations (London, 1916), 8. This emphasis on duty to the

community is to be found throughout the Milner Group. See, for example, Lord Grey's

violent retort to a Canadian (who tried to belittle A. J. Glazebrook because he made no

real effort to accumulate wealth) in The Round Table obituary of Glazebrook (March

1941 issue). The same idea was advocated by Hichens and Milner to settle the problems

of management and labor within the industrial system. In a speech at Swanwick in 1919,

the former said: "The industrial problem is primarily a moral one.... If we have rights, we

also have duties.... In the industrial world our duty clearly is to regard our work as the

Service which we render to the rest of the community, and it is obvious that we should

give, not grudgingly or of necessity but in full measure" (The Round Table, December

1940, XXXI, 11). Milner's views are in Questions of the Hour (London, 1923).

17. In the August 1911 issue of The Round Table the future Lord Lothian wrote:

"There are at present two codes of international morality—the British or Anglo-Saxon

and the continental or German. Both cannot prevail. If the British Empire is not strong

enough to be a real influence for fair dealing between nations, the reactionary standards

of the German bureaucracy will triumph, and it will then only be a question of time

before the British Empire itself is victimized by an international 'hold-up' on the lines of

the Agadir incident. Unless the British peoples are strong enough to make it impossible

for backward rivals to attack them with any prospect of success, they will have to accept

the political standards of the aggressive military powers" ( The Round Table, August

1911, I, 422-423). What a disaster for the world that Lord Lothian, in March 1936, was

not able to take to heart his own words written twenty-five years earlier!

18. As a matter of fact, one American Rhodes Scholar was a Negro; the experiment

was not a success, not because of any objections by the English, but because of the

objections of other American Rhodes Scholars.

19. L. Curtis, Dyarchy (Oxford, 1920), liii-liv.

20. The Commonwealth of Nations (London, 1916), 16, 24.

21. The Commonwealth of Nations (London, 1916), 181. See also The Problems of the

Commonwealth (London, 1915), 18-19.

22. The quotations from Curtis will be found in The Commonwealth of Nations

(London, 1916), 181 and 176; also The Problem of the Commonwealth (London, 1915),

18-19; the quotation from Dove is in a long letter to Brand, dated 9 September 1919, in

Letters of John Dove, edited by R. H. Brand (London, 1938), 96-106; Philip Kerr's

statement will be found in L. Curtis, Dyarchy (Oxford, 1920),73. See also Kerr's speech

at King's College in 1915, published in The Empire and the Future (London, 1916); he

attacks jingo-imperialism, racial superiority, and national conceit as "Prussian heresy"

and adds: "That the spirit of Prussia has brooded over this land is proved by the shortest

examination of the history of Ireland." He then attacks the Little Englanders and

economic or commercial imperialism, giving shocking examples of their effects on native

lives and cultures. He concludes: "The one thing you cannot do, if you are a human

being, is to do nothing. Civilization cannot stand on one side and see native tribes

destroyed by so-called civilized looters and marauders, or as the result of the free

introduction of firearms, drink, and other instruments of vice. He decides that Britain, by

following a middle ground, has "created not an Empire but a Commonwealth" and

defines the latter as a community activated by the spirit "Love thy neighbor as thyself."

( The Empire and the Future, 70-86). George R. Parkin expresses similar ideas in the

same volume on pp. 95-97. Kerr had expressed somewhat similar sentiments in a speech

before the Canadian Round Table in Toronto, 30 July 1912. This was published by

Glazebrook as a pamphlet (Toronto, 1917).

23. The quotations from A. L. Smith are from The Empire and the Future (London,

1916), 29-30.

Chapter 8

1. The success of the Group in getting the foreign policy they wanted under a Liberal

government may be explained by the pressure from without through The Times and the

assistance from within through Asquith, Grey, and Haldane, and through the less obvious

but no less important work of persons like Sir Eyre Crowe and above all Lord Esher.

2. During this period Lord Esher played a vital but still mysterious role in the

government. He was a strong supporter of Milner and his Group and was an influential

adviser of Lloyd George. On 12 November 1917, he had a long walk with his protege,

Hankey, in Paris and "urged the vital importance of sending Milner as Ambassador,

Minister-Plenipotentiary, call him what you will. Henry Wilson cannot stand alone."

Later the same day he spoke to Lloyd George: "I urged most strongly that he should send

Milner here, on the ground that he would give stability where there is none and that his

presence would ensure Henry Wilson getting 'information.' this I urged specially in view

of the future as of the present. Otherwise we might one day find the Italian position

reproduced in France. He finds Milner almost indispensable, but he will seriously think

of the proposal." Milner was sent to Paris, as Esher wished, four months later. On 2

February 1918, Esher had another conversation, in which Lloyd George spoke of putting

Milner in Derby's place at the War Office. The change was made two months later.

( Journals and Letters of Reginald, Viscount Esher [4 vols., London, 1938], 158-159 and

178.)

3. Zimmern was unquestionably one of the better minds in the Milner Group, and his

ideas were frequently closer to Milner's than those of others of the inner circle. Although

Zimmern agreed with the others in 1919 about the severity of the treaty, his reasons were

quite different and do credit to both his integrity and his intelligence. He objected to the

severity of the treaty because it was a breach of the pre-armistice commitments to the

Germans; at the same time he wanted a continuation of the alliance that had won the war

and a strong League of Nations, because he had no illusions about converting the

Germans to peaceful ways in the near future. The inner circle of the Milner Group were

against a severe treaty or a strong League or an alliance with France because they

believed that Germany could be converted to the British way of thinking and acting and

because they wanted to rebuild Germany as a weapon in a balance-of-power system

against "Russian bolshevism" and "French militarism." Part II of Europe in

Convalescence (New York, 1922) remains to this day the most brilliant summary

available on what went wrong in 1919.

Chapter 9

1. In June 1908, in a speech to the Royal Colonial Institute, Milner said: "Anything

like imperial federation—the effective union of the self-governing states—is not, indeed

as some think, a dream, but is certainly at present little more than an aspiration" (Milner,

The Nation and the Empire [Boston, 1913], 293). In 1891 Sir Charles Tupper said: "Most

people have come to the conclusion stated by Lord Rosebery at the Mansion House, that

a Parliamentary Federation, if practicable, is so remote that during the coming century it

is not likely to make any very great advance." In 1899, Rosebery said: "Imperial

Federation in any form is an impossible dream." See H. D. Hall, The British

Commonwealth of Nations (London, 1920), 70-71. In October 1905, Joseph Chamberlain

said: "You cannot approach closer union by that means." Philip Kerr in 1911 spoke of

federation as "the ill-considered proposals of the Imperial Federation League" ( The

Round Table, August 1911, 1, 374). By this last date, only Lionel Curtis, of the Milner

Group, had much faith in the possibility of federation. This is why his name alone was

affixed, as editor, to the two volumes published by the Group in 1916.

2. On the secret group of 1903-1905, see H. D. Hall, The British Commonwealth of

Nations (London, 1920). The group was clearly made up of members of the Cecil Bloc

and Milner Group. On its report, see the Proceedings of the Royal Colonial Institute for

1905, appendix; W. B. Worsfold, The Empire on the Anvil (London, 1916); and R. Jebb,

The Imperial Conference (London, 1911), Vol. II. Lyttleton's dispatch is Cond. 2785 of

1905. Kerr's remark is in The Round Table (August 1911), I, 410.

3. This opinion of the important role played by Milner in the period 1916-1921

undoubtedly originated from Geoffrey Dawson, but it was shared by all the members of

the Kindergarten. It is stated in different words by Basil Williams in The Dictionary of

National Biography and by John Buchan in his autobiography, Pilgrim's Way (Boston,

1940).

4. On the reaction to the speeches of Smuts and Halifax, see J. G. Allen, Editorial

Opinion in the Contemporary British Commonwealth and Empire (Boulder, Colorado,

1946).

5. On this whole section, see "George Louis Beer" in The Round Table (September

1920), X, 933-935; G. L. Beer, African Questions at the Peace Conference (New York

1923), 424-425; H. D. Hall, Mandates, Dependencies, and Trusteeship (Washington,

1948); U.S. State Department, Foreign Relations of the United States. Paris Peace

Conference 1919, VI, 727-729. That Kerr wrote Article 22 is revealed in H. V.

Temperley, History of the Peace Conference, V1, 501. That Curtis wrote"Windows of

Freedom" and showed it to Smuts before he wrote his memorandum was revealed by

Curtis in a private communication to Professor Quincy Wright, according to Q. Wright,

Mandates under the League of Nations (Chicago, 1930), 22-23, note 53a.

6. W. K. Hancock, Survey of British Commonwealth Affairs (3 vols., London, 1940-

1942), 1, 125.

7. S. G. Millen, General Smuts (2 vols., London, 1936), II, 321.

Chapter 10

1. Robert Jemmett Stopford (1895- ) was a banker in London from 1921 to 1928. He

was private secretary to the chairman of the Simon Commission in 1928-193O, a member

of the "Standstill Committee" on German Foreign Debts, a member of the Runciman

Commission to Czechoslovakia in 1938, Liaison Officer for Refugees with the

Czechoslovakian government in 1938-1939, Financial Counselor at the British Embassy

in Washington in 1943-1945.

Chapter 11

1. See Journals and Letters of Reginald, Viscount Esher (4 vols., London 1938), 11,

56, and III, 8.

2. According to David Ogg, Herbert Fisher, 1865-1940 (London, 1947), 96, Fisher,

"helped Mr. Montagu in drafting the Montagu-Chelmsford Report."

3. This memorandum was published, with Lord Halifax's permission, in A. C.

Johnson, Viscount Halifax (New York, 1941).

Chapter 12

1. See the minutes of the Council of Four, as recorded by Sir Maurice Hankey, in U.S.

Department of State, Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States. The

Paris Peace Conference, (Washington, D.C., 1946), VI, 138-160.

2. In Europe in Convalescence (New York, 1922), Alfred Zimmern wrote of October

1918 as follows: "Europe, 'from the Rhine to the Volga' to quote from a memorandum

written at the time, was in solution. It was not a question now of autocratic against

popular government; it was a question of government against anarchy. From one moment

to the next every responsible student of public affairs, outside the ranks of the

professional revolutionaries, however red his previous affiliations may have been, was

turned perforce into a Conservative. The one urgent question was to get Europe back to

work" (80).

In The Round Table for December 1918 (91-92) a writer (probably Curtis) stated:

"Modern civilization is at grips with two great dangers, the danger of organized

militarism . . . and the more insidious, because more pervasive danger of anarchy and

class conflict.... As militarism breeds anarchy, so anarchy in its turn breeds militarism.

Both are antagonistic to civilization."

In The Round Table for June 1919, Brand wrote: "It is out of any surplus on her

foreign balance of trade that Germany can alone—apart from any immediately available

assets—pay an indemnity. Why should Germany be able to do the miracle that France

and Italy cannot do, and not only balance her trade, but have great surpluses in addition to

pay over to her enemies? . . . If, as soon as peace is declared, Germany is given assistance

and credit, she can pay us something, and should pay all she can. But what she can pay in

the next five years must be, we repeat, limited. If, on the other hand, we take away from

her all her liquid assets, and all her working capital, if furthermore, she is bound in future

to make yearly payments to an amount which will in any reasonable human expectation

exceed her capacity, then no one outside of a lunatic asylum will lend her money or

credit, and she will not recover sufficiently to pay anything" —War and National Finance

(London, 1921), 193.

3. The attitude of the Group toward "French militarism" can be found in many places.

Among others, see Smuts's speech of October 1923, quoted below. This attitude was not

shared by Professor Zimmern, whose understanding of Europe in general and of France

in particular was much more profound than that of other members of the Group. In

Europe in Convalescence (158-161) he wrote: "A declaration of British readiness to sign

the Guarantee Treaty would be the best possible answer to French, and it may be added

also to Belgian fears.... He little knows either the French peasant or the French townsman

who thinks that aggression, whether open or concealed, against Germany need ever be

feared from their country.... France feels that the same willfully uncomprehending British

policy, the same aggravatingly self-righteous professions of rectitude, pursue her in the

East, from Danzig to Upper Silesia, as on the Western frontier of her hereditary foe; and

in her nervous exasperation she puts herself ever more in the wrong with her impeccably

cool-headed neighbor."

The Group's attitude toward Bolshevism was clearly stated is an article in The Round

Table for March 1919: "Bolshevism is a tyranny—a revolutionary tyranny if you will—

which is the complete abnegation of democracy and of all freedom of thought and action.

Based on force and terroristic violence, it is simply following out the same philosophy

which was preached by Nietzsche and Haeckel, and which for the past twenty-five years

has glorified the might of force as the final justification of all existence.... In its present

form Bolshevism must either spread or die. It certainly cannot remain stationary. And at

the present moment, it stands as a very real menace to the peace of Europe and to any

successful establishment of a League of Nations. This is the real problem which the

Allied delegates in Paris have now to face." (The italics are mine.)

4. The German emissary, whose name Smuts does not mention, was Walter de Haas,

Ministerialdirektor in the Foreign Ministry in Berlin.

5. When the Labour government was in power in 1924 and the Dawes settlement of

reparations was an accomplished fact, Stresemann was so afraid that D'Abernon would be

replaced as British Ambassador in Berlin that he w rote a letter to Lord Parmoor (father

of Stafford Cripps, Lord President in the Labour Cabinet, and delegate at the time to the

League of Nations), asking that D'Abernon be continued in his post as Ambassador. This

letter, dated 16 September 1924, was answered by Lord Parmoor on 18 September from

Geneva. He said, in part: "I think that in the first instance Lord D'Abernon was persuaded

to go to Berlin especially in relation to financial and economic difficulties, but perhaps he

may be persuaded to stay on, and finish the good work he has begun. In any case your

letter is sure to be fully considered by our Foreign Minister, who is also our Prime

Minister." See E. Sutton, Gustav Stresemann: His Diaries, Letters, and Papers (New

York, 1935), I, 451-454.

6. This paragraph is largely based on J. H. Morgan, Assize of Arms (London, 1945),

especially 199, 42, and 268. It is worthy of note that H. A. L. Fisher consulted with both

Lord D'Abernon and General Morgan on his visit to Germany in 1923 and came away

accepting the ideas of the former. Furthermore, when Gilbert Murray went to Geneva in

1924 as League delegate from South Africa, Fisher wrote him instructions to this effect.

See D. Ogg, Herbert Fisher (London, 1947), 115-117.

7. On this organization see Institute of Politics, Williams College, The Institute of

Politics at Williamstown: Its First Decade (Williams/own, Mass., 1931).

8. Viscount Cecil of Chelwood, The Great Experiment (London, 1941), 166. The

quotations from Lord Esher’s Journals and Letters (4 vols., London, 1938) are in Vol.

IV, 227, 250, and 272.

9. Viscount Cecil of Chelwood, The Great Experiment (London, 1941), 250.

10. The whole memorandum and other valuable documents of this period will be

found in USSR, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Documents and Materials Relating to the

Eve of the Second World War (5 vole., 1948-1949), Vol. I, November 1937-1938. From

the Archives of the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 13-45. The authenticity of these

documents was challenged by an "unnamed spokesman" for the British Foreign Office

when they were first issued, but I am informed by the highest American authority on the

captured German documents that the ones published by the Russians are completely

authentic.

11. Keith Feiling, Life of Neville Chamberlain (London, 1941), 333. The author is a

Fellow of All Souls, close to the Milner Group, and wrote his book on the basis of the

late Prime Minister's papers, which were made available by the family.

12. See Lionel Curtis, Civitas Dei; The Commonwealth of God (London, 1938), 914-

930.

13. Robert J. Stopford, a close associate of the Milner Group whom we have already

mentioned on several occasions, went to Czechoslovakia with Runciman as a technical

adviser. See J. W. Wheeler-Bennett, Munich: Prologue to Tragedy (New York, 1948),

79, n. l.

14. The reference to Professor Schumann is in J. W. Wheeler-Bennett, Munich (New

York, 1948), 436, n.l. If Mr. Wheeler-Bennett had placed a little more credence in the

"pre-Munich plot," many of the facts which he cannot explain would be easily fitted into

the picture. Among them we might point out the mystifying (to Mr. Wheeler-Bennett)

fact that Lord Runciman's report of 16 September went further than either Hitler or

Henlein in demanding sacrifices from the Czechs (see Munich, p. 112). Or again he

would not have had to make such an about-face as that between page 96 and page 97 of

the book. On page 96, The Times's demand of 7 September was similar to the views of

Mr. Chamberlain, as expressed at Lady Astor's on 10 May, and "Geoffrey Dawson was a

personal friend of Lord Halifax." But on page 97, "The thoughtless irresponsibility of The

Times did not voice at that moment the views of His Majesty's Government. If Mr.

Wheeler-Bennett had added to his picture a few additional facts, such as a more accurate

version of German re-armaments, Runciman's letter of 2 September to Hitler, etc., he

would have found it even more difficult to make his picture of Munich stand up.

15. Count Helmuth lames von Moltke, a German of the Resistance (Johannesburg,

1947). See also Allen W. Dulles, Germany's Underground (New York, 1947), 85-90. The

additional letter added to the Johannesburg publication was written by von Moltke to his

wife just before his death. Curtis's name is mentioned in it.

16. On this whole movement, see Hans Rothfels, The German Opposition to Hitler

(Hinsdale, Illinois, 1948), and F. L. Ford, "The Twentieth of July in the History of the

German Resistance" in The American Historical Review (July 1946), LI, 609-626. On

Kordt's message to Lord Halifax, see Rothfels, 58-63.

17. A. C. Johnson, Viscount Halifax (New York, 1941), 531.

18. USSR Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Documents and Materials Relating to the Eve

of the Second World War. II Dirksen Papers (1938-1939) (Moscow, 1948), 126-131.

19. British Blue Book, Cmd. 6106.

20. All documents on these negotiations will be found in a Swedish Foreign Ministry

White Paper, Forspelet till det tyska angreppet pa Danmark och Norge den 9 April 1940

(Stockholm 1947).

Chapter 13

1. On the Ministry of Information during the war, see Great Britain, Central Office of

Information, First Annual Report, 1947-1948. This is Cmd. 7567.

2. This extract is printed in the Report of the Council of the Royal Institute of

International Affairs for 1938-1939.

3. The last important public act of the Milner Group was the drawing of the Italo-

Yugoslav boundary in 1946. The British Delegate on the Boundary Commission was C.

H. Waldock, now a Chichele Professor and Fellow of All Souls, assisted by R. J.

Stopford.