Apologies for the lack of posts for the last few days but I have been engrossed in, and entranced by, a book. One of my favourite periods of history is the Edwardian era and the run-up to WWI. It's far enough away to be properly historical but close enough for me to feel the resonances. In Britain it was an age of Big Men taking Big Decisions, and yet one of the biggest of them all is rarely mentioned except in passing. It is indicative that the ambiguous Asquith, the mercurial Lloyd George and the rumbustious Churchill have been more than well-served by biographers over the last 100 years, but when it comes to Sir Edward Grey, the man in charge of our foreign policy for eleven years starting in 1905, he has only two, the last written in 1971(*). Reading the latest one can see why. Grey, in comparison to the flamboyant characters around him, lives up to, or perhaps, down to, his name. A man of both public and private rectitude who abhorred publicity and only entered, and remained in, politics from a stern sense of duty. One is tempted to typecast him as the very model of an English country gentleman. He was from sound Northumberland stock, politically Whiggish, which took him into the Liberal party under Gladstone. Apart from an intense affection for Wordsworth, his only real love was the Northumberland countryside and the birds and fish that inhabited it. In this biography there is a particularly charming picture of him in old age, dressed in thick tweeds and country hat - with a robin perched on his head! He hated the Victorian revolution that had scoured his beloved England but recognised the reality and the inevitability of it and worked as hard as he could to alleviate the conditions of the people who worked in it.
His appointment as Foreign Secretary came despite himself rather than because of any obvious qualifications. For a start, Grey hardly ever traveled. For him there was nothing better than his family house at Fallodon in Northumberland, and his beloved birds, his breeding ducks and his fishing. As his biographer, Keith Robbins, puts it: Sharing neither the Teutonic proclivities of Haldane nor the Gallic delights of Campbell-Bannerman, he could judge the policies of continental powers unclouded by personal ties. Of course, his critics, then and now, used his insularity as a weapon against him, accusing him of naivety, or ignorance, or both. Oddly, the post-war German historians refused to swallow the line that Grey was just a simple country gentleman and assumed that he was an arch-Machiavel. Later German historians, at last acknowledging the truth that their brutal and stupid Prussian leadership were the main cause of WWI, have now placed Grey on a plinth as the very model of international political correctness. The answer, of course, lies somewhere in the middle.
In reading anything concerned with the lead-up to August 1914 it is essential that one constantly reminds oneself that whilst we, with the benefit of hindsight, know that war was coming, none of the participants did at the time. It is true that some of them at different times came to the conclusion that it was more rather than less likely - but none of them knew for certain. When Grey took over at the Foreign Office in 1905 he was laying down the foreign policy for the British empire, an empire so huge that the sun never set on it ... and yet, and yet ... to read his biography is to realise that already it was creaking at the joints and that its strength was waning and that faced with a plethora of threats from a variety of sources it was not possible always to act alone or even to act at all. Indeed, given that it might be deemed advantageous to severely biff country 'A', it had to be borne in mind that that would alarm country 'B' upon whom one was relying for support in dealing with country 'C', and so on, and on, and on. The saying is that 'to rule is to choose' and nowhere is this more difficult to do than in the foreign office of a global power - as today our American cousins are being reminded - yet again. Grey picked his way through this maze of equal and opposite forces never once losing sight of the main threat - Prussian-led Germany. In this he stands well ahead of Churchill and Lloyd George, both of whom fought against the huge increase in naval estimates required to keep Britain ahead of Tirpitz's new fleet, until late in the day they too saw the light in the tunnel and realised it was an oncoming, out-of-control, Prussian express train!
Regular readers will know of my tendency towards hero-worship. I try to keep it under control but I don't always succeed. I have never attempted it in the case of Sir Edward Grey, and now that I have read this superb biography, I see absolutely no need for it. In my opinion, Grey was a very great Englishman, a superb Foreign Secretary, an honorable politician and a true gentleman. It is indicative of his modesty that despite his years on the stage of international affairs there is only one of his utterances that has gone down in history. In August 1914, he looked out at the gas lights being turned down in the street outside his Foreign Office window and remarked with mordant but poetic accuracy: The lamps are going out all over Europe; we shall not see them lit again in ourlifetime. Indeed, we had to wait until 1945 for that to happen.
(*) Sir Edward Grey: A Biography of Lord Grey of Fallodon by Keith Robbins, Cassell, 1971
Great comment! Truly egaging. I run to abebooks to order the book. Thank you!
Posted by: ortega | Sunday, 01 June 2008 at 11:15
Ortega, for some reason the dealers with copies available are asking outrageous prices. I offered one of them £10 - he was asking over £20 as I recall - and got it.
Also, I would *highly* recommend:
"Dreadnought: Britain, Germany and the Coming of the Great War" by Robert K. Massie
I rate this as one of the best history books I have ever read. It's still in bookshops although Abebooks will certainly have second-hand copies. If you're not too familiar with the period I would start with Massie's book first.
Posted by: David Duff | Sunday, 01 June 2008 at 13:29
"One of my favourite periods of history is the Edwardian era and the run-up to WWI."
Ditto. I particularly like the fact that, for all the intrigue and movements of power, there were still some gentlemen in influential positions. (It is hard to imagine nowadays a man like Edward Goschen being ambassador to a rival nation.) Good character -- even eccentricity -- still held its own against professionalism.
Have you read The Quest for C: Mansfield Cumming and the Founding of the Secret Service by Alan Judd? It is excellent for the history of British espionage -- fake beards and all -- leading up to WWI.
Posted by: Deogolwulf | Sunday, 01 June 2008 at 14:56
Ah yes, the original 'C'! Actually I have (yet) another book on my pile of waiting-to-be-read books on the subject of another man who might claim to be the founder of the British secret service - Francis Walsingham. Of course, in those far off days such things were more a matter of private enterprise than state endeavour. I suspect Walsingham was in Shakespeare's mind when he wrote these terrific lines from 'T&C':
"The providence that's in a watchful state
Knows almost every grain of Pluto's gold,
Finds bottom in th' uncomprehensive deeps,
Keeps place with thought and almost like the gods
Does thoughts unveil in their dumb cradles.
There is a mystery, with whom relation
Durst never meddle, in the soul of state, which hath an operation more divine
Than breath or pen can give expressure to."
Sounds like a good, if overlong, motto for MI5 or 6!
Posted by: David Duff | Sunday, 01 June 2008 at 18:13
I've been to abebooks. 40 pounds the cheapest !!! (sight).
Thank you for your sugestion of Massie's books. I'll start by it.
Most kind of you.
Posted by: ortega | Sunday, 01 June 2008 at 23:09
David
A great post. i'll see if they have a reasonably priced version on this side fo the pond
Posted by: Hank | Monday, 02 June 2008 at 03:05
Ortega, just e-mail the dealers and offer them £10. Sooner or later one of them will decide he would rather have the money than the book! Even so, unless you are already very familiar with the period, start with Massie's book first. Unlike Marxist historians he recognises the importance of personality and he brings all the main actors to life in a very vivid way, as well as explaining the politics very clearly.
You make me curious, Ortega. You appear not to be English (or Prussian!) and I wonder why this particular period of Anglo-German history interests you so much?
Hank, same goes for you if you have not read him already Massie's (he's an American) book is terrific.
Posted by: David Duff | Monday, 02 June 2008 at 08:45
I won't comment on Sir Edward Grey's excellence (or otherwise) as Foreign Secretary, however one of my father's favourite books which happened to be on one of his (my father's) favourite pastimes was that by Sir Edward on fly fishing.
On another matter - which might belong in the comments to a later posting of yours - no-one with a knowledge of the history of the German Empire could reasonably claim that our fighting WW1 was a waste of time. I would agree with the speculation that in 500 years time - if history is still studied - WW1 plus WW2 will be viewed as one war, fought by the world to prevent German hegemony, certainly in Europe and probably in the world. The constant pre-WW1 references among politicians and the General Staff in Germany to "Der Tag" - the day when Germany would attack the British Empire - is a pointer to what German policy was aimed and what the British decided to resist.
Posted by: Umbongo | Monday, 02 June 2008 at 12:12
There is an argument to be made that we could, and should, have stayed out of WWI and proponents of that view point to the almost literally crippling cost to us in blood and treasure. It is, of course, one of those 'what if' debates that can never be settled for good and all. I think I will post on the subject later on because the principles involved are still with us today.
Posted by: David Duff | Monday, 02 June 2008 at 12:37
DD
"There is an argument to be made . . . " Absolutely - that's what's so fascinating about "what if?". I won't try to preempt your posting on this one but I would say that it is arguable that, in the end, more blood and more treasure would have been spilled and spent if we had given Germany a free hand in Europe in 1914.
Posted by: Umbongo | Monday, 02 June 2008 at 13:52
No, I'm not english (nor prussian). With my name and this awful english, it is not very difficult to see.
I'm spanish and also a reader of history, all kinds as long as the book is good. I´m quite interested in the Germany between wars (do you know the books by Sebastian Haffner?) and your recomendation seemed a good complement.
I'll try your suggestion and bargain with the dealers. Thank you again !
Posted by: ortega | Monday, 02 June 2008 at 19:05
Ortego, I guessed you were Spanish but people appear here under a variety of names so it is best not to assume anything! No, I had not heard of Haffner but I have just 'Googled' him and he sounds very interesting particularly as he was a German who appears to have gained a shrewd insight into British political life. Thanks for the tip and please feel free to comment again.
Posted by: David Duff | Monday, 02 June 2008 at 19:52
Umbongo, stand-by, or leave the country, I am winding myself up for a post on the 'what ifs'!
Posted by: David Duff | Monday, 02 June 2008 at 19:54