by Simon Heffer
Law and Davidson left for an aerodrome and flew to London; Davidson took the letter to the King at Buckingham Palace, which he entered ‘through crowds of cheering people.’129 It was 9.15, and the King had just finished dinner. He took the letter, which read:
Mr Lloyd George with his humble duty to Your Majesty has the honour to announce that the long and terrible war in which the British Empire has been engaged with the German Empire for more than four years and which has caused such suffering to mankind has been brought to an end this afternoon by the Treaty of Peace just signed in this hall.
He desires on behalf of all the Plenipotentiaries of Your Majesty’s Empire to send their heartfelt congratulations to Your Majesty on the signature of a Treaty which marks the victorious end of the terrible struggle which has lasted so long and in which Your Majesty’s subjects from all parts of the Empire have played so glorious a part.
The King, in the uniform of an Admiral of the Fleet, heard Davidson’s impressions of the Versailles ceremony, and – with a crowd now estimated at 100,000 outside – returned to exchange salutes with his people from the balcony. ‘Please God,’ he wrote in his diary, ‘this dear old country will soon settle down and march in unity.’130
1. The Illustrated London News imagines the diplomatic turmoil in the Foreign Office in July 1914: Sir Edward Grey is on the left, standing by the table; Count Benckendorff stands next to him; Paul Cambon is seated, engaging an unidentified man in conversation; opposite him, gripping his lapels, is Prince Lichnowsky; and the man sitting on the furthest right appears to be Sir Arthur Nicolson.
2. Henry and Margot Asquith just before the war, keeping up appearances.
3. Sir Edward Grey, later Viscount Grey of Fallodon, who saw the lamps going out all over Europe, painted by Sir James Guthrie.
4. Men queuing at the Whitehall recruiting office in London in the late summer of 1914: Mrs Asquith wanted a shelter built to protect them from the rain.
5. Viscount Haldane, whose mistake was to understand Germany, and Lord Kitchener, shortly to become a poster.
6. Sir John Jellicoe, who would command the Fleet and achieve a score-draw at Jutland.
7. To create a sense of the comforts of home at the front, the families of Tommies were urged to send them Oxo cubes.
8. Carl Hans Lody, the first German spy to be executed, in the dock at his trial in November 1914.
9. Ruins of the lifeboat station at Scarborough after being shelled by the German navy in December 1914: the raid provoked an outbreak of vulgarity from Churchill that distressed Mrs Asquith.
10. Bertrand Russell soaks up the sun at Garsington, Bloomsbury’s country club.
11. Lady Ottoline Morrell, chatelaine of Garsington, with her daughter Julian.
12. A three-man tribunal questions a conscientious objector and his adviser, watched by family and friends.
13. Horatio Bottomley, recruiter, demagogue, jingoist, swindler and charlatan extraordinaire.
14. The Earl of Derby, bearing an impression of the last artist to paint him, in this case Sir William Orpen.
15. A cartoon from John Bull by Frank Holland – who also drew for the Daily Mail – depicting the popular attitude to conscientious objectors.
16. Sir George (later Lord) Riddell, proprietor of the News of the World, and crony-in-chief and landlord of Lloyd George.
17. Lord Northcliffe, founder of the Daily Mail, owner of The Times, megalomaniac and possibly the most powerful man in Britain until Lloyd George supplanted him.
18. A shop in London’s east end advertises the nationality of its owners during the anti-German riots after the sinking of the Lusitania in May 1915.
19. Edith Cavell, whose execution became the ultimate example of German ‘frightfulness’.
20. The British sense of humour as propaganda: another Boche headed for the corpse factory.
21. The stark reality of the German U-boat war: a mass grave in Ireland of Lusitania victims.
22. Winston Churchill as First Lord of the Admiralty in his ‘delicious’ war.
23. David Lloyd George, the man who very nearly lost the war.
24. Maurice Hankey, the power behind two prime ministers – as he said himself.
25. Field Marshal Sir Douglas (later Earl) Haig, who committed suicide twenty-five years after his death.
26. John Redmond, leader of the Irish Nationalists, whose warnings went unheeded.
27. Sir Roger Casement, who blundered his way to the gallows.
28. Éamon de Valera, the face of fanaticism and of Ireland’s future.
29. British soldiers man a barricade in Dublin during the Easter Rising.
30. Andrew Bonar Law, who passed the keys of Downing Street from Asquith to Lloyd George.
31. Earl (later Marquess) Curzon of Kedleston, the grandest of Tory grandees.
32. Arthur Henderson, Labour leader and patriot.
33. Viscount Milner, Kindergarten manager turned cabinet minister.
34. General (later Field Marshal) Sir William Robertson, adversary of Lloyd George.
35. Lord Stamfordham, a courtier of the old school, and his master, King George V.
36. Major-General Sir Frederick Maurice, who believed prime ministers should tell the truth.
37. H. A. L. Fisher, intellectual dynast dedicated to building a better post-war world.
38. A game of two halves: the munitionettes’ football XI 1917–18 from the AEC factory at Beckton, Essex.
39. A ‘clippie’ on a London bus in the summer of 1918.
40. Mary S. Allen, a former prominent suffragette thrice imprisoned, inspects women police officers.
41. Three college girls pull their weight on a flax farm in Somerset.
Children pushed into the front line of the Glasgow rent strike, 1915.
42. A handbill encouraging attendance at a celebration of the Russian revolution, 1917.
43. Miners further the war effort by going on strike in South Wales in 1915.
44. Lord Rhondda, who survived the Lusitania to become ‘food dictator’ in 1917.
45. A woman worker selling tickets at a National Kitchen.
46. The menu for a dinner of 74 Squadron of the Royal Flying Corps before it returned to action, March 1918.
47. C. R. W. Nevinson’s uncensored depiction of a food queue, 1918.
48. An advertisement that appeared in the Sketch on 30 October 1918, at the height of the influenza epidemic.
49. A food ration book from the last days of the war.
50. Servicemen and VADs rejoice on Armistice Day, 11 November 1918.
51. Unforgotten: Nurse Cavell’s cortège passes the Palace of Westminster as crowds throng the streets, May 1919.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Primary Sources
Asquith Papers, Bodleian Library, Oxford
Balfour Papers, British Library
Beaverbrook Papers, Parliamentary Archives (PA)
Cabinet Papers, National Archives, Kew (NA)
Churchill Papers, Churchill College, Cambridge
Crewe Papers, Cambridge University Library
Esher Papers, Churchill College, Cambridge
George V Papers, Royal Archives, Windsor (RA)
Hankey Papers, Churchill College, Cambridge
Lansdowne Papers, British Library
Law Papers, Parliamentary Archives (PA)
Lloyd Papers, Churchill College, Cambridge
Lloyd George Papers, Parliamentary Archives (PA)
Northcliffe Papers, British Library
Parry Papers, Shulbrede Priory
Plunkett Papers, National Library of Ireland
Rayleigh Papers, owned privately by Lord Rayleigh
Stamfordham Papers, Royal Archives, Windsor (RA)
Secondary Sources
Adams I: Arms and the Wizard: Lloyd George and the Ministry of Munitions, 1915–1916, by R. J. Q. Adams (Cassell, 1978).
Adams II: Bonar Law, by R. J. Q. Adams (John Murray, 1999).
Ada
ms III: Balfour: The Last Grandee, by R. J. Q. Adams (John Murray, 2007).
Amery: The Leo Amery Diaries: Volume I: 1896–1929, edited by John Barnes and David Nicholson (Hutchinson, 1980).
Andrew: The Defence of the Realm: The Authorized History of MI5, by Christopher Andrew (Allen Lane, 2009).
AP: The Conscription Controversy in Great Britain, 1900–18, by R. J. Q. Adams and Philip P. Poirier (Macmillan, 1987).
Asquith C.: Diaries 1915–1918, by Lady Cynthia Asquith (Hutchinson, 1968).
Asquith, Diary: Margot Asquith’s Great War Diary 1914–1916: The View from Downing Street, edited by Michael and Eleanor Brock (Oxford University Press, 2014).
Asquith, MR: Memories and Reflections, 1852–1927, by the Earl of Oxford and Asquith KG (Cassell, 2 vols, 1928).
Asquith, VS: HH Asquith: Letters to Venetia Stanley, selected and edited by Michael and Eleanor Brock (Oxford University Press, 1982).
Barnett: The Collapse of British Power, by Correlli Barnett (Eyre Methuen, 1972).
Beaverbrook I: Politicians and the War, 1914–1916, by the Rt Hon. Lord Beaverbrook (Thornton Butterworth, 1928, vol. I; Lane Publications, 1932, vol. II).
Beaverbrook II: Men and Power 1917–1918, by Lord Beaverbrook (Hutchinson, 1956).
Bell: Churchill and the Dardanelles, by Christopher M. Bell (Oxford University Press, 2017).
Bell Q.: Virginia Woolf: A Biography, by Quentin Bell (Hogarth Press, 2 vols, 1972).
Bilton: The Home Front in the Great War: Aspects of the Conflict 1914–1918, by David Bilton (Pen & Sword, 2004).
Blake: The Unknown Prime Minister: The Life and Times of Andrew Bonar Law, 1858–1923, by Robert Blake (Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1955).
Boothby: Recollections of a Rebel, by Robert Boothby (Hutchinson, 1978).
Brandon: The Spiritualists: The Passion for the Occult in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, by Ruth Brandon (Alfred A. Knopf, 1983).
Brooke, 1914: 1914 & Other Poems, by Rupert Brooke (Sidgwick & Jackson, 1915).
Brown: Essays in Anti-Labour History: Responses to the Rise of Labour in Britain, edited by Kenneth D. Brown (Macmillan, 1974).
Bullock: The Life and Times of Ernest Bevin, by Alan Bullock (Heinemann, 3 vols, 1960–83).
Callwell: Field Marshal Sir Henry Wilson Bart, GCB, DSO: His Life and Diaries, by Major General Sir C. E. Callwell KCB (Cassell, 2 vols, 1927).
Campbell: F. E. Smith, First Earl of Birkenhead, by John Campbell (Jonathan Cape, 1983).
Charman: The First World War on the Home Front, by Terry Charman (Andre Deutsch, 2014).
Chitty: Playing the Game: A Biography of Sir Henry Newbolt, by Susan Chitty (Quartet, 1997).
Churchill R.: Lord Derby, King of Lancashire: The Official Life of Edward, Seventeenth Earl of Derby, 1865–1948, by Randolph S. Churchill (Heinemann, 1959).
Churchill W.: The World Crisis, by Winston S. Churchill (Thornton Butterworth, 6 vols, 1923–29).
Clark: The Sleepwalkers: How Europe went to War in 1914, by Christopher Clark (Allen Lane, 2012).
Clark A.: Echoes of the Great War: The Diary of the Reverend Andrew Clark 1914–1919, edited by James Munson (Oxford, 1985).
Clarke: The Locomotive of War: Money, Empire, Power and Guilt, by Peter Clarke (Bloomsbury, 2017).
Cooper: Old Men Forget, by Duff Cooper (Rupert Hart-Davis, 1953).
Dangerfield: The Damnable Question: A Study in Anglo-Irish Relations, by George Dangerfield (Constable, 1977).
Darroch: Ottoline: The Life of Lady Ottoline Morrell, by Sandra Jobson Darroch (Chatto & Windus, 1976.)
Davidson: Memoirs of a Conservative: J. C. C. Davidson’s Memoirs and Papers, edited by Robert Rhodes James (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1969).
DeGroot I: Douglas Haig, 1861–1928, by Gerard J. DeGroot (Unwin Hyman, 1988).
DeGroot II: Back in Blighty: The British at Home in World War I, by Gerard DeGroot (Vintage Books, 2014).
Dilks: Neville Chamberlain: 1869–1929, by David Dilks (Cambridge University Press, 1984).
DNB 1961–70: The Dictionary of National Biography, 1961–70, edited by E. T. Williams and C. S. Nicholls (Oxford University Press, 1981).
E&H: All Quiet on the Home Front: An Oral History of Life in Britain during the First World War, by Richard Van Emden and Steve Humphries (Headline, 2003).
Ensor: England 1870–1914, by R. C. K. Ensor (Oxford University Press, 1936).
Ferriter: A Nation and not a Rabble: The Irish Revolution 1913–1923, by Diarmaid Ferriter (Profile Books, 2015).
Fox: British Art and the First World War, 1914–1924, by James Fox (Cambridge University Press, 2015).
G&T: British Documents on the Origins of the War 1898–1914, Vol. XI, edited by G. P. Gooch and Harold Temperley (HMSO, 1926).
Gilbert, III: Winston S. Churchill: Volume: III: 1914–1916, by Martin Gilbert (Heinemann, 1971).
Gilbert, IV: Winston S. Churchill: Volume: IV: 1916–1922, by Martin Gilbert (Heinemann, 1975).
Gilbert, III(C): Winston S. Churchill: Volume III Companion (2 vols), by Martin Gilbert (Heinemann, 1972).
Gilbert, IV(C): Winston S. Churchill: Volume IV Companion (3 vols), by Martin Gilbert (Heinemann, 1977).
Gilmour: Curzon, by David Gilmour (John Murray, 1994).
Grey: Twenty-Five Years, 1892–1916, by Viscount Grey of Fallodon KG (Hodder & Stoughton, 2 vols, 1925).
Grigg I: Lloyd George: From Peace to War 1912–1916, by John Grigg (Methuen, 1985).
Grigg II: Lloyd George: War Leader 1916–1922, by John Grigg (Penguin Allen Lane, 2002).
Haig: The Private Papers of Douglas Haig, 1914–1919, edited by Robert Blake (Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1952).
Haldane: Autobiography, by Richard Burdon Haldane (Hodder & Stoughton, 1929).
Hamilton: Listening for the Drums, by General Sir Ian Hamilton (Faber & Faber, 1944).
Hammond: C. P. Scott of the Manchester Guardian, by J. L. Hammond (Bell, 1934).
Hankey: The Supreme Command, 1914–1918, by Lord Hankey (George Allen & Unwin, 2 vols, 1961).
Hardinge: Royal Commission on the Rebellion in Ireland: Report of Commission (HMSO, 1916).
Hart: The Somme, by Peter Hart (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2005).
Haste: Keep the Home Fires Burning: Propaganda in the First World War, by Cate Haste (Allen Lane, 1978).
Heffer, P&P: Power and Place: The Political Consequences of King Edward VII, by Simon Heffer (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1998).
Heffer, HM: High Minds: The Victorians and the Birth of Modern Britain, by Simon Heffer (Random House, 2013).
Heffer, AD: The Age of Decadence: Britain 1880 to 1914, by Simon Heffer (Random House, 2017).
Holmes: The Little Field Marshal: A Life of Sir John French, by Richard Holmes (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2nd edition, 2004).
Holroyd: Bernard Shaw, by Michael Holroyd (Chatto & Windus, 3 vols, 1988–91).
Hyman: The Rise and Fall of Horatio Bottomley: The Biography of a Swindler, by Alan Hyman (Cassell, 1972).
Hynes: A War Imagined: The First World War and English Culture, by Samuel Hynes (The Bodley Head, 1990).
Jeffery: Ireland and the Great War, by Keith Jeffery (Cambridge University Press, 2000).
Jellicoe: Jutland: The Unfinished Battle, by Nicholas Jellicoe (Seaforth Publishing, 2016).
Jolliffe: Raymond Asquith: Life and Letters, by John Jolliffe (Collins, 1980).
Judd: Lord Reading: Rufus Isaacs, First Marquess of Reading, Lord Chief Justice and Viceroy of India, 1860–1935, by Denis Judd (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1982).
Kerry: Lansdowne: The Last Great Whig, by Simon Kerry (Unicorn, 2017).
Keynes: The Economic Consequences of the Peace, by J. M. Keynes (Macmillan, 1920).
Kynaston: Till Time’s Last Stand: A History of the Bank of England 1694–2013, by David Kynaston (Bloomsbury, 2017).
LG: War Memoirs, by David Lloyd George (Odhams, 2 vols, New Edition, 1938 (Vol. I) and 1936 (Vol. II)).
Lee: A Good Innings: The Private Papers o
f Viscount Lee of Fareham PC, GCB, GSCI, GBE, edited by Alan Clark (John Murray, 1974).
Lloyd I: The Amritsar Massacre: The Untold Story of One Fateful Day, by Nick Lloyd (IB Tauris, 2011).
Lloyd II: Passchendaele: A New History, by Nick Lloyd (Viking, 2017).
Lodge: Raymond, or Life and Death: with Examples of the Evidence for Survival of Memory and Affection after Death, by Sir Oliver J. Lodge (George H. Doran, 1916).