Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston
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Prime Minister of the United Kingdom | |||||||||||
In office 12 June 1859 – 18 October 1865 | |||||||||||
Monarch | Victoria | ||||||||||
Preceded by | Edward Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby | ||||||||||
Succeeded by | John Russell, 1st Earl Russell | ||||||||||
In office 6 February 1855 – 19 February 1858 | |||||||||||
Monarch | Victoria | ||||||||||
Preceded by | George Hamilton-Gordon, 4th Earl of Aberdeen | ||||||||||
Succeeded by | Edward Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby | ||||||||||
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Personal details | |||||||||||
Born | Westminster, Middlesex, England | 20 October 1784||||||||||
Died | 18 October 1865 Brocket Hall, Hertfordshire, England | (aged 80)||||||||||
Resting place | Westminster Abbey | ||||||||||
Political party | |||||||||||
Spouse |
Emily Lamb (m. 1839) | ||||||||||
Parents | |||||||||||
Alma mater | |||||||||||
Signature | |||||||||||
Nickname | Harry[1] | ||||||||||
Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston,
Henry Temple succeeded to his father's Irish peerage (which did not entitle him to a seat in the House of Lords, leaving him eligible to sit in the House of Commons) as the 3rd Viscount Palmerston in 1802. He became a Tory MP in 1807. From 1809 to 1828 he served as Secretary at War, organising the finances of the army. He first attained Cabinet rank in 1827, when George Canning became prime minister, but like other Canningites, he resigned from office one year later. He served as Foreign Secretary 1830–1834, 1835–1841, and 1846–1851. In this office, Palmerston responded effectively to a series of conflicts in Europe.
In 1852,
Palmerston masterfully controlled public opinion by stimulating British nationalism. Although Queen Victoria and most of the political leadership distrusted him, he received and sustained the favour of the press and the populace, from whom he received the affectionate sobriquet "Pam". Palmerston's alleged weaknesses included mishandling of personal relations, and continual disagreements with the Queen over the royal role in determining foreign policy.[3]
Historians rank Palmerston as one of the greatest foreign secretaries, due to his handling of great crises, his commitment to the balance of power (which provided Britain with decisive agency in many conflicts), and his commitment to British interests. His policies in relation to India, China, Italy, Belgium, and Spain had extensive long-lasting beneficial consequences for Britain. This does not mean that Palmerston is completely without controversy. Palmerston's leadership during the Opium Wars was questioned and denounced by other prominent statesmen such as William Ewart Gladstone.[4] The consequences of the conquest of India may have, at first, seemed to benefit both Britain (in the sense of access to goods and gold) and India (by adding infrastructure and a stable justice system), but this view has been challenged by more recent scholarship. The burdens placed on India in being ruled by a distant nation, and on the British government in dealing with the anxiety of generations of officials on how to properly govern, produced a chaotic administration with minimal coherence.[5] The consequences of his policies toward France, the Ottoman Empire, and the United States proved more ephemeral.
Early life: 1784–1806
Henry John Temple was born in his family's
He was educated at Harrow School (1795–1800). Admiral Sir Augustus Clifford, 1st Bt., was a fag to Palmerston, Viscount Althorp and Viscount Duncannon and later remembered Palmerston as by far the most merciful of the three.[9] Temple was often engaged in school fights and fellow Old Harrovians remembered Temple as someone who stood up to bullies twice his size.[9] Henry Temple's father took him to the House of Commons in 1799, where the young Palmerston shook hands with the prime minister, William Pitt the Younger.[10]
Temple was then at the University of Edinburgh (1800–1803), where he learnt political economy from Dugald Stewart, a friend of the Scottish philosophers Adam Ferguson and Adam Smith.[11] Temple later described his time at Edinburgh as producing "whatever useful knowledge and habits of mind I possess".[12] Lord Minto wrote to the young Palmerston's parents that Henry Temple was well-mannered and charming. Stewart wrote to a friend, saying of Temple: "In point of temper and conduct he is everything his friends could wish. Indeed, I cannot say that I have ever seen a more faultless character at this time of life, or one possessed of more amiable dispositions."[13]
Henry Temple succeeded his father to the title of
After war was declared on France in 1803, Palmerston joined the
Early political career: 1806–1809
In February 1806, Palmerston was defeated in the election for the University of Cambridge constituency.[17] In November he was elected for Horsham but was unseated in January 1807, when the Whig majority in the Commons voted for a petition to unseat him.[18]
Due to the patronage of
Palmerston entered Parliament as Tory MP for the
On 3 February 1808, he spoke in support of confidentiality in the working of diplomacy, and of the bombardment of Copenhagen and the capture and destruction of the
it is defensible on the ground that the enormous power of France enables her to coerce the weaker state to become an enemy of England... It is the law of self-preservation that England appeals for the justification of her proceedings. It is admitted by the honourable gentleman and his supporters, that if Denmark had evidenced any hostility towards this country, then we should have been justified in measures of retaliation... Denmark coerced into hostility stands in the same position as Denmark voluntarily hostile, when the law of self-preservation comes into play...Does anyone believe that Buonaparte will be restrained by any considerations of justice from acting towards Denmark as he has done towards other countries? ... England, according to that law of self-preservation which is a fundamental principle of the law of nations, is justified in securing, and therefore enforcing, from Denmark a neutrality which France would by compulsion have converted into an active hostility.[24]
In a letter to a friend on 24 December 1807, he described the late Whig MP Edmund Burke as possessing "the palm of political prophecy".[25] This would become a metaphor for his own career in divining the course of imperial foreign policy.
Secretary at War: 1809–1828
Palmerston's speech was so successful that Spencer Perceval, who formed his government in 1809, asked him to become Chancellor of the Exchequer, then a less important office than it was to become later. But Palmerston preferred the non-cabinet office of Secretary at War, charged exclusively with the financial business of the army. He served in that post for almost 20 years.[26]
On 1 April 1818, a retired officer on half-pay, Lieutenant David Davies, who had a grievance about his application from the War Office for a pension and was also mentally ill, shot Palmerston as he walked up the stairs of the War Office. The bullet only grazed his back and the wound was slight. After learning of Davies' illness, Palmerston paid for his legal defence at the trial, and Davies was sent to Bethlem Royal Hospital.[27]
After the suicide of
Upon the retirement of Lord Liverpool in April 1827, Canning was called to be prime minister. The more conservative Tories, including Sir
The
On 26 February 1828, Palmerston delivered a speech in favour of Catholic emancipation. He felt that it was unseemly to relieve the "imaginary grievances" of the Dissenters from the established church while at the same time "real afflictions pressed upon the Catholics" of Great Britain.[29] Palmerston also supported parliamentary reform.[30] One of his biographers has stated that: "Like many Pittites, now labelled tories, he was a good whig at heart."[12] The Roman Catholic Relief Act 1829 finally passed Parliament in 1829 when Palmerston was in the opposition.[31] The Great Reform Act passed Parliament in 1832.
Opposition: 1828–1830
Following his move to opposition Palmerston appears to have focused closely on foreign policy. He had already urged Wellington into active interference in the Greek War of Independence, and he had made several visits to Paris, where he foresaw with great accuracy the impending overthrow of the Bourbons. On 1 June 1829 he made his first great speech on foreign affairs.[28]
Lord Palmerston was no orator; his language was unstudied, and his delivery somewhat embarrassed; but generally he found the words to say the right thing at the right time, and to address the House of Commons in the language best adapted to the capacity and the temper of his audience.
— "Lord Palmerston", Encyclopaedia Britannica 13th Edition
in September 1830, Wellington tried to induce Palmerston to re-enter the cabinet, but he refused to do so without Lord Lansdowne and Lord Grey, two notable Whigs. This can be said to be the point in 1830, when his party allegiance changed.[32] In November 1830 he accepted an offer from Lord Grey to join his new government as Foreign Secretary.
Foreign Secretary: 1830–1841
Palmerston entered the office of Foreign Secretary with great energy and continued to exert his influence there for twenty years; he held it from 1830 to 1834 (his apprentice years[33]), 1835 to 1841, and 1846 to 1851. Basically, Palmerston was responsible for the whole of British foreign policy from the time of the French and Belgian Revolutions of 1830 until December 1851. His abrasive style would earn him the nickname "Lord Pumice Stone", and his manner of dealing with foreign governments who crossed him, especially in his later years,[34] was the original "gunboat diplomacy".[35][36]
Crises of 1830
The
Palmerston's overall policy was to safeguard British interests, maintain peace, keep the balance of power, and retain the status quo in Europe. He had no grievance against Russia and while he privately sympathised with the Polish cause, in his role as foreign minister he rejected Polish demands. With serious trouble simultaneously taking place in Belgium and Italy, and lesser issues in Greece and Portugal, he sought to de-escalate European tensions rather than aggravate them, favouring a policy of universal non-interventionism.[39] He therefore focused chiefly on achieving a peaceful settlement of the crisis in Belgium.[40]
Belgium
William I of the Netherlands appealed to the great powers that had placed him on the throne after the Napoleonic Wars to maintain his rights. The London Conference of 1830 was called to address this question. The British solution involved the independence of Belgium, which Palmerston believed would greatly contribute to the security of Britain, but any solution was not straightforward. On the one hand, the reactionary powers were anxious to defend William I; on the other, many Belgian revolutionaries, like Charles de Brouckère and Charles Rogier, supported the reunion of the Belgian provinces to France, whereas Britain favoured Dutch, not French influence, on an independent state.[41]
The British policy which emerged was a close alliance with
Thereafter, despite a Dutch invasion and French counter-invasion in 1831, France and Britain framed and signed a treaty settlement between Belgium and the Netherlands, inducing the three reactionary powers to accede to it as well;[42] while in Palmerston's second period of office, as his authority grew, he was able to finally settle relations between Belgium and Holland with a treaty in 1838-9 - now asserting his (and British) independence by leaning rather more towards the Netherlands and the reactionary powers, and against the Belgium/French axis.[46]
France, Spain, and Portugal, 1830s
In 1833 and 1834, the youthful Queens
France had been a reluctant party to the treaty, and never executed its role in it with much zeal.
Balkans and Near East: defending Turkey, 1830s
Palmerston was greatly interested by the Eastern question. During the Greek War of Independence he had energetically supported the Greek cause and backed the Treaty of Constantinople that gave Greece its independence. However, from 1830 the defence of the Ottoman Empire became one of the cardinal objects of his policy. He believed in the regeneration of Turkey, as he wrote to Henry Bulwer (Lord Dalling): "All that we hear about the decay of the Turkish Empire, and its being a dead body or a sapless trunk, and so forth, is pure unadulterated nonsense."[49]
His two great aims were to prevent Russia establishing itself on the Bosporus and to prevent France doing likewise on the Nile. He regarded the maintenance of the authority of the Sublime Porte as the chief barrier against both these developments.[49]
Palmerston had long maintained a suspicious and hostile attitude towards Russia, whose autocratic government offended his liberal principles and whose ever-growing size challenged the strength of the British Empire. He was angered by the 1833 Treaty of Hünkâr İskelesi, a mutual assistance pact between Russia and the Ottomans, but was annoyed and hostile towards David Urquhart, the creator of the Vixen affair, running the Russian blockade of Circassia in the mid-1830s.[50]
For his part, David Urquhart considered Palmerston a "mercenary of Russia" and founded the "Free Press" magazine in London, where he constantly promoted these views. The permanent author of this magazine was Karl Marx, who stated "from the time of Peter the Great until the Crimean War, there was a secret agreement between the London and St. Petersburg offices, and that Palmerston was a corrupt tool of the Tsar's policy"[51]
Despite his popular reputation he was hesitant in 1831 about aiding the Sultan
Palmerston, irritated at France's Egyptian policy, signed the
In September 1838, Palmerston appointed a British consul in Jerusalem, without the conventional consultation of the Board of Trade, and gave instruction to assist with the construction of an Anglican church in the city, under the prompting influences of Lord Shaftesbury, a prominent Christian Zionist.[58]
China: First Opium War
Palmerston's biographer, Jasper Ridley, outlines the government's position:
- Conflict between China and Britain was inevitable. On the one side was a corrupt, decadent and caste-ridden despotism, with no desire or ability to wage war, which relied on custom much more than force for the enforcement of extreme privilege and discrimination, and which was blinded by a deep-rooted superiority complex into believing that they could assert their supremacy over Europeans without possessing military power. On the other side was the most economically advanced nation in the world, a nation of pushing, bustling traders, of self-help, free trade, and the pugnacious qualities of John Bull.[61]
An entirely opposite British viewpoint was promoted by humanitarians and reformers such as the Chartists and religious nonconformists led by young William Ewart Gladstone. They argued that Palmerston was only interested in the huge profits it would bring Britain, and was totally oblivious to the horrible moral evils of opium which the Chinese government was valiantly trying to stamp out.[62][63]
Meanwhile, he manipulated information and public opinion to enhance his control of his department, including controlling communications within the office and to other officials. He leaked secrets to the press, published selected documents, and released letters to give himself more control and more publicity, all the while stirring up British nationalism.[64] He feuded with The Times, edited by Thomas Barnes, which did not play along with his propaganda ploys.[65][66]
Marriage
In 1839, Palmerston married his mistress of many years, the noted Whig hostess
Emily's son-in-law, |Lord Shaftesbury wrote: "His attentions to Lady Palmerston, when they both of them were well stricken in years, were those of a perpetual courtship. The sentiment was reciprocal; and I have frequently seen them go out on a morning to plant some trees, almost believing that they would live to eat the fruit, or sit together under the shade.[69]
Young Queen Victoria found it unseemly that people in their 50s could marry, but the Cowper-Palmerston marriage according to biographer Gillian Gill:
- was an inspired political alliance as well as a stab at personal happiness. Harry and Emily were supremely well-matched. As the husband of a beautiful, charming, intelligent, rich woman whose friends were the best people in society, Palmerston at last had the money, the social setting, and the personal security he needed to get to the very top of British politics. Lady Palmerston made her husband happy, as he did her, and she was a political power in her own right. In the last and most successful decades of Palmerston's life, she was his best advisor and most trusted amanuensis. Theirs was one of the great marriages of the century.[70]
Opposition: 1841–1846
Within a few months
Palmerston's reputation as an interventionist and his unpopularity with the Queen were such that
Foreign Secretary: 1846–1851
Palmerston's years as foreign secretary, 1846–1851, involve dealing with violent upheavals all over Europe – he has been dubbed "the gunpowder minister" by biographer David Brown.[72]
France and Spain, 1845
The French government regarded the appointment of Palmerston as a certain sign of renewed hostilities. They availed themselves of a dispatch in which he had put forward the name of a Coburg prince as a candidate for the hand of the young queen of Spain as a justification for a departure from the engagements entered into between Guizot and Lord Aberdeen. However little the conduct of the French government in this transaction of the Spanish marriages can be vindicated, it is certain that it originated in the belief that in Palmerston France had a restless and subtle enemy. The efforts of the British minister to defeat the French marriages of the Spanish princesses, by an appeal to the
Historian David Brown rejects the traditional interpretation to the effect that Aberdeen had forged an entente cordiale with France in the early 1840s whereupon the belligerent Palmerston after 1846 destroyed that friendly relationship. Brown argues that as foreign secretary from 1846 to 1851 and subsequently as prime minister, Palmerston sought to maintain the balance of power in Europe, sometimes even aligning with France to do so.[74][75]
Irish Famine
As an
Support for revolutions abroad
The Revolutions of 1848 spread like a conflagration through Europe, and shook every throne on the Continent except those of Russian Empire, Ottoman Empire, Spain, and Belgium. Palmerston sympathised openly with the revolutionary party abroad.[49] In particular, he was a strong advocate of national self-determination, and stood firmly on the side of constitutional liberties on the Continent. Despite this, he was bitterly opposed to Irish independence, and deeply hostile to the Young Ireland movement.[79]
Italian independence
No state was regarded by him with more aversion than
Hungarian independence
In
Royal and parliamentary reaction to 1848
This state of things was regarded with the utmost annoyance by the British court and by most of the British ministers. On many occasions, Palmerston had taken important steps without their knowledge, which they disapproved. Over the
When Benjamin Disraeli attacked Palmerston's foreign policy, the foreign minister responded to a five-hour speech by Thomas Chisholm Anstey with a five-hour speech of his own, the first of two great speeches in which he laid out a comprehensive defence of his foreign policy and of liberal interventionism more generally. Arguing for domestic political effect, Palmerston declaimed:
- I hold that the real policy of England... is to be the champion of justice and right, pursuing that course with moderation and prudence, not becoming the Quixote of the world, but giving the weight of her moral sanction and support wherever she thinks that justice is, and whenever she thinks that wrong has been done.[85]
- (...)
- Therefore I say that it is a narrow policy to suppose that this country or that is to be marked out as the eternal ally or the perpetual enemy of England. We have no eternal allies, and we have no perpetual enemies. Our interests are eternal and perpetual, and those interests it is our duty to follow.[86]
Russell and the Queen both hoped that the other would take the initiative and dismiss Palmerston; the Queen was dissuaded by her husband Prince Albert, who took the limits of constitutional power very seriously, and Russell by Palmerston's prestige with the people and his competence in an otherwise remarkably inept Cabinet.
Don Pacifico affair
In 1847, the home of
After a memorable debate on 17 June, Palmerston's policy was condemned by a vote of the House of Lords. The House of Commons was moved by John Arthur Roebuck to reverse the rebuke, which it did on 29 June by a majority of 46, after having heard from Palmerston on 25 June. This was the most eloquent and powerful speech he ever delivered, wherein he sought to vindicate not only his claims on the Greek government for Don Pacifico, but his entire administration of foreign affairs.[90]
It was in this speech, which lasted for five hours, that Palmerston made the well-known declaration that a British subject ought everywhere to be protected by the strong arm of the British government against injustice and wrong;
Crossing the Queen and resigning, 1851
Notwithstanding his parliamentary triumph in the Don Pacifico affair, many of his own colleagues and supporters criticised the spirit in which the foreign relations of the Crown were carried on. The Queen addressed a minute to the Prime Minister in which she recorded her dissatisfaction at the manner in which Palmerston evaded the obligation to submit his measures for the royal sanction as failing in sincerity to the Crown. This minute was communicated to Palmerston, who accepted its criticisms.[90][92]
On 2 December 1851, Louis Napoleon – who had been elected President of France in 1848 – carried out a coup d'état by dissolving the National Assembly and arresting the leading republicans. Palmerston privately congratulated Napoleon on his triumph, noting that Britain's constitution was rooted in history but that France had had five revolutions since 1789, with the French Constitution of 1848 being a "day-before-yesterday tomfoolery which the scatterbrain heads of Marrast and Tocqueville invented for the torment and perplexity of the French nation".[93] However, the Cabinet decided that Britain must be neutral, and so Palmerston requested his officials to be diplomatic. Palmerston's widespread support among the press, educated public opinion, and ordinary Britons caused apprehension and distrust among other politicians and angered the Court. Prince Albert complained Palmerston had sent a dispatch without showing the sovereign. Protesting innocence, Palmerston resigned.[94] Palmerston was weakened because Parliament, where he had great support, was not in session. Palmerston continued to have wide approval among the newspapers, elite opinion, and the middle class voters. His popularity led to distrust among rivals and especially at the Royal Court. His fall demonstrates the lack of power of public opinion in a pre-democratic era. However, Palmerston kept his public support and the growing influence of public opinion steadily increased his political strength in the 1850s and 1860s.[95]
Home Secretary: 1852–1855
After a brief period of
Social reform
Palmerston passed the Factory Act 1853, which removed loopholes in previous
Penal reform
Palmerston reduced the period in which prisoners could be held in
Palmerston strongly opposed Lord John Russell's plans for giving the vote to sections of the urban working-classes. When the Cabinet agreed in December 1853 to introduce a bill during the next session of Parliament in the form which Russell wanted, Palmerston resigned. However, Aberdeen told him that no definite decision on reform had been taken and persuaded Palmerston to return to the Cabinet. The electoral Reform Bill did not pass Parliament that year.[103]
Crimean War
Palmerston's exile from his traditional realm of the Foreign Office meant he did not have full control over British policy during the events precipitating the Crimean War of 1853–1856. One of his biographers, Jasper Ridley, argues that had he been in control of foreign policy at this time, war in the Crimea would have been avoided.[97] Palmerston argued in Cabinet, after Russian troops concentrated on the Ottoman border in February 1853, that the Royal Navy should join the French fleet in the Dardanelles as a warning to Russia. He was overruled, however.
In May 1853, the Russians threatened to invade the principalities of
On 28 March 1854, Britain and France declared war on Russia for refusing to withdraw from the principalities. The war progressed slowly, with no Anglo-French gains in the Baltic and slow coalition gains in Crimea at the long Siege of Sevastopol (1854–1855). Dissatisfaction with the conduct of the war grew amongst the public in Britain and in other countries, aggravated by reports of fiascos and failures, especially the mismanagement of the heroic Charge of the Light Brigade at the Battle of Balaclava (25 October 1854). The health and living conditions of the British soldiers became notorious and the press, with correspondents in the field, made the most of the situation. Tories demanded an accounting of all soldiers, cavalry and sailors sent to the Crimea and accurate figures as to the number of casualties. When Parliament passed a bill to investigate by a vote of 305 to 148, Aberdeen said he had lost a vote of no confidence and resigned as prime minister on 30 January 1855.[107]
Queen Victoria deeply distrusted Palmerston and first asked
Prime Minister: 1855–1858
Aged 70 years, 109 days, Palmerston became the oldest person in British political history to be appointed Prime Minister for the first time. As of 2023 no Prime Minister entering 10 Downing Street for the first time since Palmerston has surpassed his record.
Ending the Crimean War
Palmerston took a hard line on the war; he wanted to expand the fighting, especially in the Baltic where
Arrow controversy and the Second Opium War
In October 1856, the Chinese seized the pirate ship Arrow, and in the process, according to the local British official
In China, the Second Opium War (1856–1860) was another humiliating defeat for a Qing dynasty,[112] already reeling as a result of the domestic Taiping Rebellion.
Resignation
After the election, Palmerston passed the Matrimonial Causes Act 1857, which for the first time made it possible for courts to grant a divorce and removed divorce from the jurisdiction of the ecclesiastical courts. The opponents in Parliament, who included Gladstone, were the first in British history to try to kill a bill by filibuster. Nonetheless, Palmerston was determined to get the bill through, which he did. In June news came to Britain of the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Palmerston sent Sir Colin Campbell and reinforcements to India. Palmerston also agreed to transfer the authority of the East India Company to the Crown. This was enacted in the Government of India Act 1858. After the Italian republican Felice Orsini tried to assassinate the French emperor with a bomb made in Britain, the French were outraged (see Orsini affair). Palmerston introduced a Conspiracy to Murder bill, which made it a felony to plot in Britain to murder someone abroad. At first reading, the Conservatives voted for it but at second reading they voted against it. Palmerston lost by nineteen votes. Therefore, in February 1858 he was forced to resign.[113]
Opposition: 1858–1859
The Conservatives lacked a majority, and Russell introduced a resolution in March 1859 arguing for widening the franchise, which the Conservatives opposed but which was carried. Parliament was dissolved and a general election ensued, which the Whigs won. Palmerston rejected an offer from Disraeli to become Conservative leader, but he attended the meeting of 6 June 1859 in Willis's Rooms at St James's Street, where the Liberal Party was formed. The Queen asked Lord Granville to form a government, but although Palmerston agreed to serve under him, Russell did not. Therefore, on 12 June the Queen asked Palmerston to become prime minister. Russell and Gladstone agreed to serve under him.[114]
Prime Minister: 1859–1865
Historians usually regard Palmerston, starting in 1859, as the first Liberal prime minister.
Foreign policy continued to be his main strength; he thought that he could shape if not control all of European diplomacy, especially by using France as a vital ally and trade partner. However, historians often characterise his method as bluffing more than decisive action.[117]
Some people called Palmerston a womaniser; The Times named him Lord Cupid (on account of his youthful looks), and he was cited, at the age of 79, as co-respondent in an 1863 divorce case, although it emerged that the case was nothing more than an attempted blackmail.
Relationship with Gladstone
Although Palmerston and William Ewart Gladstone treated each other respectfully, they disagreed fundamentally over Church appointments, foreign affairs, defence and reform;[118] Palmerston's greatest problem during his last premiership was how to handle his Chancellor of the Exchequer. The MP Sir William Henry Gregory was told by a member of the Cabinet that "at the beginning of each session and after each holiday, Mr Gladstone used to come in charged to the muzzle with all sorts of schemes of all sorts of reforms which were absolutely necessary in his opinion to be immediately undertaken. Palmerston used to look fixedly at the paper before him, saying nothing until there was a lull in Gladstone's outpouring. He then rapped the table and said cheerfully: 'Now, my Lords and gentlemen, let us go to business'."[119] Palmerston told Lord Shaftesbury: "Gladstone will soon have it all his own way and whenever he gets my place we shall have strange doings". He told another friend that he thought Gladstone would wreck the Liberal Party and end up in a madhouse.[120]
When in May 1864 the MP Edward Baines introduced a Reform Bill in the Commons, Palmerston ordered Gladstone to not commit himself and the government to any particular scheme.[121] Instead Gladstone said in his speech in the Commons that he did not see why any man should not have the vote unless he was mentally incapacitated, but added that this would not come about unless the working class showed an interest in reform. Palmerston believed that this was incitement to the working class to begin agitating for reform and told Gladstone: "What every Man and Woman too have a Right to, is to be well governed and under just Laws, and they who propose a change ought to shew that the present organization does not accomplish those objects".[122]
Relationship with Lord Lyons
During the advent and occurrence of the
American Civil War
Palmerston's sympathies in the American Civil War (1861–65) were with the secessionist Confederate States of America. Although a professed opponent of the Atlantic slave trade and slavery, he held a lifelong hostility towards the United States, and believed a dissolution of the Union would enhance British power. Additionally, the Confederacy "would afford a valuable and extensive market for British manufactures".[125][126]
Britain issued a
"...the American War... has manifestly ceased to have any attainable object as far as the Northerns are concerned, except to get rid of some more thousand troublesome Irish and Germans. It must be owned, however, that the Anglo-Saxon race on both sides have shown courage and endurance highly honourable to their stock."[128]
The Trent Affair in November 1861 produced public outrage in Britain and a diplomatic crisis. A U.S. Navy warship stopped the British steamer Trent and seized two Confederate envoys en route to Europe. Palmerston called the action "a declared and gross insult", demanded the release of the two diplomats and ordered 3,000 troops to Canada. In a letter to Queen Victoria on 5 December 1861 he said that if his demands were not met:
"Great Britain is in a better state than at any former time to inflict a severe blow upon and to read a lesson to the United States which will not soon be forgotten."[129]
In another letter to his foreign secretary, he predicted war between Britain and the Union:
"It is difficult not to come to the conclusion that the rabid hatred of England which animates the exiled Irishmen who direct almost all the Northern newspapers, will so excite the masses as to make it impossible for Lincoln and Seward to grant our demands; and we must therefore look forward to war as the probable result."[129]
In fact, Irishmen did not control any major newspapers in the North, and the U.S. decided to release the prisoners rather than risk war. Palmerston was convinced the presence of troops in Canada persuaded the U.S. to acquiesce.[130] In reality, the British economy was heavily reliant on trade with the United States, most notably cheap grain imports which in the event of war, would be cut off by the Americans. Indeed, the Americans would launch an all-out naval war against the entire British merchant fleet.[131]
After President
The long-term issue between Britain and the United States was the
The raiding ship
Denmark
The Prussian Prime Minister Otto von Bismarck wanted to annex the Danish Duchy of Schleswig and the neighboring German Duchy of Holstein, whose Duke was the King of Denmark, chiefly for its port of Kiel, and had an alliance with Austria for this purpose. This was part of the longstanding Schleswig–Holstein question. In a speech to the Commons on 23 July 1863, Palmerston said the British government, like those of France and Russia, wished that "the independence, the integrity, and the rights of Denmark may be maintained. We are convinced—I am convinced at least—that if any violent attempt were made to overthrow those rights and interfere with that independence, those who made the attempt would find in the result that it would not be Denmark alone with which they would have to contend".[140] Palmerston's stance derived from the traditional belief that France was the greater threat to Britain and was much stronger than Austria and Prussia.[141] In any case, France and Britain were at odds over Poland, and Paris refused to cooperate with London on the Danish crisis.[142] Public opinion in Britain was strongly pro-Danish, thanks especially to the Danish princess who married the Prince of Wales. However Queen Victoria was intensely pro-German and strongly urged against threatening war.[143] Palmerston himself favoured Denmark but he also had long been pacifistic in this matter and did not want Britain to become militarily involved.[144]
For five months Bismarck did nothing. However, in November the Danish government instituted a new constitution whereby Schleswig was bound closer to Denmark. By the year's end, the Prussian and Austrian armies had occupied Holstein and were massing on the
Palmerston replied that the fleet could not do much to assist the Danes in Copenhagen and that nothing should be done to persuade Napoleon to cross the Rhine. Britain had a small army and it had no powerful ally to help.[141] Bismarck remarked that the Royal Navy lacked wheels—it was powerless on land where the war would be fought.[145] In April Austria's navy was on its way to attack Copenhagen. Palmerston told the Austrian ambassador that if his fleet entered the Baltic to attack Denmark the result would be war with Britain. The ambassador replied that the Austrian navy would not enter the Baltic and it did not do so.[146]
Palmerston accepted Russell's suggestion that the war should be settled at a conference, but at the ensuing London Conference of 1864 in May and June the Danes refused to accept their loss of Schleswig-Holstein. The armistice ended on 26 June and Prussian-Austrian troops quickly invaded more of Denmark. On 25 June the Cabinet was against going to war to save Denmark, and Russell's suggestion to send the Royal Navy to defend Copenhagen was only carried by Palmerston's vote. Palmerston, however, said the fleet could not be sent in view of the deep division in the Cabinet.[146]
On 27 June, Palmerston gave his statement to the Commons and said Britain would not go to war with the German powers unless the existence of Denmark as an independent power was at stake or Denmark's capital was threatened. The Conservatives replied that Palmerston had betrayed the Danes and a vote of censure in the House of Lords was carried by nine votes. In the debate in the Commons the Conservative MP General Jonathan Peel said: "It is come to this, that the words of the Prime Minister of England [sic], uttered in the Parliament of England [sic], are to be regarded as mere idle menaces to be laughed at and despised by foreign powers." Palmerston replied in the last night of the debate: "I say that England stands as high as she ever did and those who say she had fallen in the estimation of the world are not the men to whom the honour and dignity of England should be confided".[147]
The vote of censure was defeated by 313 votes to 295, with Palmerston's old enemies in the pacifist camp, Cobden and Bright, voting for him. The result of the vote was announced at 2:30 in the morning, and when Palmerston heard the news he ran up the stairs to the Ladies' Gallery and embraced his wife. Disraeli wrote: "What pluck to mount those dreadful stairs at three o'clock in the morning, and eighty years of age!"[148]
In a speech at his constituency at Tiverton in August, Palmerston told his constituents:
I am sure every Englishman who has a heart in his breast and a feeling of justice in his mind, sympathizes with those unfortunate Danes (cheers), and wishes that this country could have been able to draw the sword successfully in their defence (continued cheers); but I am satisfied that those who reflect on the season of the year when that war broke out, on the means which this country could have applied for deciding in one sense that issue, I am satisfied that those who make these reflections will think that we acted wisely in not embarking in that dispute. (Cheers.) To have sent a fleet in midwinter to the Baltic every sailor would tell you was an impossibility, but if it could have gone it would have been attended by no effectual result. Ships sailing on the sea cannot stop armies on land, and to have attempted to stop the progress of an army by sending a fleet to the Baltic would have been attempting to do that which it was not possible to accomplish. (Hear, hear.) If England could have sent an army, and although we all know how admirable that army is on the peace establishment, we must acknowledge that we have no means of sending out a force at all equal to cope with the 300,000 or 400,000 men whom the 30,000,000 or 40,000,000 of Germany could have pitted against us, and that such an attempt would only have insured a disgraceful discomfiture—not to the army, indeed, but to the Government which sent out an inferior force and expected it to cope successfully with a force so vastly superior. (Cheers.) ... we did not think that the Danish cause would be considered as sufficiently British, and as sufficiently bearing on the interests and the security and the honour of England, as to make it justifiable to ask the country to make those exertions which such a war would render necessary.[149]
Europe's leaders were unable to settle the matter by peaceful compromise. Palmerston's biographer William Baring Pemberton argued that his "failure to understand Bismarck lies at the root of his misunderstanding of the Schleswig-Holstein question, and it derived from an old man's inability to adapt himself to a changing world".[150] Thus Britain was militarily unable to stop Bismarck's armies and misunderstood Bismarck's ambitions. Russian historian V. N. Vinogradov writes: "In place of the former insight came bias in judgments and stubbornness in defending outdated views. Palmerston continued to consider Prussia 'an instrument in the hands of Austria', its army weak and doomed to defeat, and its public to consist of romantically minded students and dreamy professors. And Otto von Bismarck quietly annexed the two Duchies to Prussia, and at the same time the County of Lauenburg".[151][verification needed]
Electoral victory
Palmerston won another
The American assault on Ireland under the name of Fenianism may be now held to have failed, but the snake is only scotched and not killed. It is far from impossible that the American conspirators may try and obtain in our North American provinces compensation for their defeat in Ireland.[153]
He advised that more armaments be sent to Canada and more troops be sent to Ireland. During these last few weeks of his life, Palmerston pondered on developments in foreign affairs. He began thinking of a new friendship with France as "a sort of preliminary defensive alliance" against the United States and looked forward to Prussia becoming more powerful as this would balance against the growing threat from Russia. In a letter to Russell he warned that Russia "will in due time become a power almost as great as the old Roman Empire ... Germany ought to be strong in order to resist Russian aggression."[154]
Death
Palmerston enjoyed robust health in old age,
Queen Victoria wrote after his death that though she regretted his passing, she had never liked or respected him: "Strange, and solemn to think of that strong, determined man, with so much worldly ambition – gone! He had often worried and distressed us, though as Pr. Minister he had behaved very well."[158] Florence Nightingale reacted differently upon hearing of his death: "He will be a great loss to us. Tho' he made a joke when asked to do the right thing, he always did it. No one else will be able to carry things thro' the Cabinet as he did. I shall lose a powerful protector...He was so much more in earnest than he appeared. He did not do himself justice."[158]
Having no male heir, his Irish viscountcy became extinct upon his death, but his property was inherited by his stepson William Cowper-Temple (later created the 1st Baron Mount Temple), whose inheritance included a 10,000-acre (4,000-hectare) estate in the north of County Sligo in the west of Ireland, on which his stepfather had commissioned the building of the incomplete Classiebawn Castle.[159]
Legacy
As the exemplar of British nationalism, he was "the defining political personality of his age."[160]
Historian Norman Gash endorses Jasper Ridley's characterisation of Palmerston:
- Fundamentally he was a professional politician, shrewd, cynical, resilient; tough and sometimes unscrupulous; quick to seize opportunities; always ready either to abandon an impossible cause or bide his time for a more favourable opportunity. He liked power, he needed his salary, he enjoyed office, he worked hard. In later life he took an increasing pleasure in the game of politics, and ultimately became an adroit and successful prime minister.... in the end he became one of the great Victorian public personalities, a legend in his own lifetime, the personification of an England that was already passing away.[161]
Historian Algernon Cecil summed up his greatness:
- Palmerston placed his trust... in the Press which he was at pains to manipulate; in Parliament, which he learnt better than any man then living to manage; and the Country, whose temper he knew how to catch and the weight of his name and resources he brought to bear upon every negotiation with a patriotic effrontry that has never been excelled.[162]
Palmerston has traditionally been viewed as "a Conservative at home and a Liberal abroad".[163] He believed that the British constitution as secured by the Glorious Revolution of 1688 was the best which human hands had made, with a constitutional monarchy subject to the laws of the land but retaining some political power. He supported the rule of law and opposed further democratisation after the Reform Act 1832. He wished to see this liberal system of a mixed constitution in-between the two extremes of absolute monarchy and republican democracy replace the absolute monarchies on the Continent.[164] More recently some historians have seen his domestic policies as prime minister as not merely liberal but genuinely progressive by the standards of his era.[165]
It is in foreign affairs that Palmerston is chiefly remembered. Palmerston's principal aim in foreign policy was to advance British national interests.
When in 1886 Lord Rosebery became foreign secretary in the Third Gladstone ministry, John Bright, a longstanding radical critic of Palmerston, asked Rosebery if he had read about Palmerston's policies as foreign secretary. Rosebery replied that he had. "Then", said Bright, "you know what to avoid. Do the exact opposite of what he did. His administration at the Foreign Office was one long crime."[168]
In contrast the Marquess of Lorne, a son-in-law of Queen Victoria, said of Palmerston in 1866: "He loved his country and his country loved him. He lived for her honour, and she will cherish his memory."[169]
In 1889, Gladstone recounted a story of when "a Frenchman, thinking to be highly complimentary, said to Palmerston: 'If I were not a Frenchman, I should wish to be an Englishman'; to which Pam coolly replied: 'If I were not an Englishman, I should wish to be an Englishman.'"[166] When Winston Churchill campaigned for rearmament in the 1930s, he was compared to Palmerston in warning the nation to look to its defences.[170] The policy of appeasement led General Jan Smuts to write in 1936 that "we are afraid of our shadows. I sometimes long for a ruffian like Palmerston or any man who would be more than a string of platitudes and apologies."[171]
He was an avowed abolitionist whose attempts to abolish the slave trade was one of the most consistent elements of his foreign policy. His opposition to the slave trade created tensions with South American countries and the United States over his insistence that the Royal Navy had the right to search the vessels of any country if they suspected the vessels were being used in the Atlantic slave trade.[172][173]
Historian A. J. P. Taylor has summarised his career by emphasising the paradoxes:
- For twenty years junior minister in a Tory government, he became the most successful of Whig Foreign Secretaries; though always a Conservative, he ended his life by presiding over the transition from Whiggism to Liberalism. He was the exponent of British strength, yet was driven from office for truckling to a foreign despot; he preached the Balance of Power, yet helped to inaugurate the policy of isolation and of British withdrawal from Europe. Irresponsible and flippant, he became the first hero of the serious middle-class electorate. He reached high office solely through an irregular family connection; he retained it through skilful use of the press—the only Prime Minister to become an accomplished leader-writer.[174]
Palmerston is also remembered for his light-hearted approach to government. He is once said to have claimed of a particularly intractable problem relating to
The Life of Lord Palmerston up to 1847 was written by Henry Bulwer, 1st Baron Dalling and Bulwer, volumes I and II (1870), volume III edited and partly written by Evelyn Ashley (1874), after the author's death. Ashley completed the biography in two more volumes (1876). The whole work was reissued in a revised and slightly abridged form by Ashley in 2 volumes in 1879, with the title The Life and Correspondence of Henry John Temple, Viscount Palmerston; the letters are judiciously curtailed, but unfortunately without indicating where the excisions occur; the appendices of the original work are omitted, but much fresh matter is added, and this edition is undoubtedly the standard biography.[176]
The popular Victorian novelist Anthony Trollope published a very readable memoir of Palmerston, one of his political heroes, in 1882.
Places named after Palmerston
- Palmerston Lodge, Fairburn, North Yorkshire, hunting lodge built by Lord Palmerston in Fairburn, Yorkshire.
- The Town of Palmerston located in Southwestern Ontario, Canada was founded and named after Palmerston in 1875. Palmerston is now part of the amalgamated town of Minto.
- The former township of Palmerston in Frontenac County in Eastern Ontario, now part of the amalgamated township of North Frontenac
- In New Zealand, the town of Palmerston, in Otago in the South Island, and the city of Palmerston North, in Manawatu in the North Island.
- The Australian city of Darwin was previously named Palmerston in honour of the Viscount. A satellite city called Palmerston was established adjacent to Darwin in 1971.
- Palmerston Atollis the most northerly of the Southern Group of the Cook Islands in the South Pacific Ocean. Amongst the 15 or so islands of the atoll, Palmerston Island is the only one which is inhabited.
- In the Rathmines area of Dublin 6 in the southern suburbs, villas are named after Palmerston, as well as Temple Road and Palmerston Road. Both are quasi-translated variously as Bóthar an Stiguaire, Bóthar P(h)almerston, Bóthar Baile an Phámar and Bóthar an Teampaill.
- Palmerston Forts
- Several places in Portsmouth are named after Palmerston – notably Southsea's main shopping precinct, Palmerston Road.
- Palmerston Road in East Sheen, London, SW14.
- Palmerston Place in the West End, Edinburgh, EH12.
- Palmerston Road in Walthamstow, London & The Lord Palmerston Pub at the junction of Palmerston Road and Forest Road.
- The Lord Palmerston public house in Dartmouth Park, London, NW5 is named after Palmerston.
- Palmerston Park and the Palmerston Hotel in Tiverton, Devon, Palmerston's constituency, are named after him.
- Palmerston Road in Bournemouth
- Palmerston Park, Southampton was named after him, as was nearby Palmerston Road. A seven-foot high marble statue of Palmerston was erected in the park and unveiled on 2 June 1869.[177] Temple street in Sligo is also called after him
- Palmerston Street in Derby.
- Palmerston Street in Bedford.
- Palmerston Road and Palmerston Park in east Belfast.
- Palmerston Boulevard and Palmerston Avenue in Toronto are named for him.
- Palmerston Street in Romsey, Hampshire; there is also a statue of him in the market place.
Cultural references
- Indian rebellion of 1857 is about to break out.[178]
- 1862 – Palmerston is featured in the alternate history novel by Robert Conroy, depicting an American Civil War in which Great Britain allies itself with the Confederacy after the Trent Affair at the direction of Palmerston.[179]
- Stars and Stripes trilogy – Palmerston is featured in the alternate history novel by Harry Harrison, depicting an American Civil War in which Great Britain invades both the United States and the Confederacy after the Trent Affair.
- CS Forester, Horatio Hornblower meets a young Palmerston on returning to England.[180]
- Wagons West! - Palmerston is portrayed early in the book series in opposition to American settlement of Oregon Country.[181]
- The Simpsons - in "Homer at the Bat", Barney Gumble argues with Wade Boggs that Palmerston was the greatest prime minister, with Boggs arguing for Pitt the Elder.[182]
- Palmerston, the resident Chief Mouser of the Foreign & Commonwealth Office since 13 April 2016, was named after Palmerston.[183]
- Victoria (2019); the series dramatises his turbulent period as foreign secretary.[184]
Palmerston's First Cabinet, February 1855 – February 1858
- Lord Palmerston – First Lord of the Treasury and Leader of the House of Commons[185]
- Robert Rolfe, 1st Baron Cranworth – Lord Chancellor
- Granville Leveson-Gower, 2nd Earl Granville – Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Lords
- George Douglas Campbell, 8th Duke of Argyll – Lord Privy Seal
- Secretary of State for the Home Department
- Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs
- Sidney Herbert – Secretary of State for the Colonies
- Lord Panmure – Secretary of State for War
- Sir James Graham, 2nd Baronet – First Lord of the Admiralty
- William Ewart Gladstone – Chancellor of the Exchequer
- Sir Charles Wood – President of the Board of Control
- Edward Stanley, 2nd Baron Stanley of Alderley – President of the Board of Trade
- Dudley Ryder, 2nd Earl of Harrowby – Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
- Sir William Molesworth, 8th Baronet – First Commissioner of Works
- Postmaster-General
- Henry Petty-FitzMaurice, 3rd Marquess of Lansdowne – Minister without Portfolio
Changes
- Later in February 1855 – Sir R.V. Smithsucceeds Wood as President of the Board of Control
- July 1855 – Sir William Molesworth succeeds Russell as Colonial Secretary. Molesworth's successor as First Commissioner of Works is not in the Cabinet.
- November 1855 – Henry Labouchere succeeds Molesworth as Colonial Secretary
- December 1855 – The Duke of Argyll succeeds Lord Canning as Postmaster-General. Lord Harrowby succeeds Argyll as Lord Privy Seal. Harrowby's successor as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster is not in the Cabinet
- 1857 – Matthew Talbot Baines, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, enters the Cabinet.
- February 1858 – Ulick de Burgh, 1st Marquess of Clanricarde succeeds Harrowby as Lord Privy Seal.
Palmerston's Second Cabinet, June 1859 – October 1865
- Lord Palmerston – First Lord of the Treasury and Leader of the House of Commons[186]
- John Campbell, 1st Baron Campbell of St Andrews – Lord Chancellor
- Granville George Leveson-Gower, 2nd Earl Granville – Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Lords
- The George Douglas Campbell, 8th Duke of Argyll – Lord Privy Seal
- Sir Secretary of State for the Home Department
- Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs
- Henry Pelham-Clinton, 5th Duke of Newcastle – Secretary of State for the Colonies
- Sidney Herbert – Secretary of State for War
- Sir Charles Wood – Secretary of State for India
- Edward Adolphus Seymour, 12th Duke of Somerset – First Lord of the Admiralty
- William Ewart Gladstone – Chancellor of the Exchequer
- Edward Cardwell – Chief Secretary for Ireland
- Poor Law Board
- Sir George Grey, 2nd Baronet – Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
- Postmaster-General
Changes
- July 1859 – President of the Poor Law Board(Milner-Gibson remains at the Board of Trade)
- May 1860 – Edward Stanley, 2nd Baron Stanley of Alderley succeeds Lord Elgin as Postmaster-General
- June 1861 – Richard Bethell, 1st Baron Westbury succeeds Lord Campbell as Lord Chancellor
- July 1861 – Sir George Cornewall Lewis succeeds Herbert as Secretary for War. Sir George Grey succeeds Lewis as Home Secretary. Edward Cardwell succeeds Grey as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. Cardwell's successor as Chief Secretary for Ireland is not in the Cabinet.
- April 1863 – Lord de Grey becomes Secretary for War following Sir George Lewis's death.
- April 1864 – Edward Cardwell succeeds the Duke of Newcastle as Colonial Secretary. George Villiers, 4th Earl of Clarendon succeeds Cardwell as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.
- July 1865 – Robert Rolfe, 1st Baron Cranworth succeeds Lord Westbury as Lord Chancellor
Arms
|
See also
- History of the foreign relations of the United Kingdom
- International relations (1814–1919)
- Timeline of British diplomatic history
References
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- ^ Ridley, p. 579.
- ^ Ridley, p. 581.
- ^ Ridley, p. 582.
- ^ Hibbert, Christopher Disraeli: A Personal History (2004) p. 256
- ^ a b Ridley, p. 583.
- ^ Stanley, A.P., Historical Memorials of Westminster Abbey (London; John Murray; 1882), p. 247.
- ^ a b Ridley, p. 584.
- ^ "Profile of an Irish Village-Palmerston and the Conquest, Colonisation and Evolution of Mullaghmore, Co. Sligo". Retrieved 26 September 2013.
- ^ Jonathan Parry, The Rise and Fall of Liberal Government in Victorian Britain (1993) p. 194.
- ^ Norman Gash, ‘’The English Historical Review’’ (Jan. 1972) 87#342, p. 136 online
- ^ Algernon Cecil, British Foreign Secretaries, 1807–1916 (1927) p. 139
- ^ Ridley, p. 587.
- ^ Ridley, p. 588.
- ^ David Steele, Palmerston and Liberalism, 1855–1865 (Cambridge University Press, 1991).
- ^ a b c Ridley, p. 589.
- ^ The Times (10 November 1865), p. 7.
- ^ Ridley, p. 591.
- ^ Edinburgh Review. 1866. p. 275.
- ^ Martin Gilbert, Winston Churchill. The Wilderness Years (London: Book Club Associates, 1981), pp. 106–107.
- ^ W. K. Hancock, Smuts. Volume II: The Fields of Force. 1919–1950 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1968), p. 281.
- ^ J. R. Oldfield, "Palmerston and Anti-Slavery" Palmerston Studies 2 (2007): 24-38.
- ^ Leslie M. Bethell, "Britain, Portugal and the suppression of the Brazilian slave trade: the origins of Lord Palmerston's Act of 1839." English historical review 80.317 (1965): 761-784 online.
- ^ A. J. P. Taylor, "Lord Palmerston," History Today Jan 1991, Vol. 41#1 p. 1
- ISBN 978-0-297-85851-5.
- ^ Stanley Lane-Poole, 'Temple, Henry John', Dictionary of National Biography, 1885–1900, Volume 56.
- ^ "Palmerston Park". City Centre Parks. Southampton City Council. Archived from the original on 21 April 2012. Retrieved 22 June 2012.
- ISBN 9781573560665.
- ISBN 9781317383239.
- ISBN 978-1-61886-037-8.
- ^ Frank McLynn (2007). Wagons West: The Epic Story of America's Overland Trails. Open Road. p. 122.
- ISBN 9780307366092.
- ^ Helena Horton (13 April 2016). "Palmerston the cat arrives for work at the Foreign Office". The Daily Telegraph. Archived from the original on 12 January 2022. Retrieved 13 April 2016.
- ^ See "Laurence Fox is Palmerston" (2019)
- ISBN 9781134240357.
- ISBN 9781134240357.
- ^ Debrett's Peerage. 1865. p. 268.
Bibliography
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- Bailey, Frank E. "The Economics of British Foreign Policy, 1825-50." Journal of Modern History 12.4 (1940): 449–484. online
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- Bourne, Kenneth (1961). "The Clayton-Bulwer Treaty and the Decline of British Opposition to the Territorial Expansion of the United States, 1857–60". Journal of Modern History. 33 (3): 287–291. S2CID 154863763.
- Brown, David. "Lord Palmerston" Historian (Winter 2002) 76:33–35; historiography
- Brown, David (2010). Palmerston. Yale UP. JSTOR j.ctt5vks3x.
- Brown, David (2002). Palmerston and the politics of foreign policy, 1846–55 (PDF). Manchester University Press. Archived from the original (PDF) on 29 November 2014.
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ignored (help) - Brown, David. "Palmerston and Anglo–French Relations, 1846–1865." Diplomacy and Statecraft 17.4 (2006): 675–692.
- Brown, David (2001). "Compelling but not Controlling?: Palmerston and the Press, 1846–1855". History. 86#201 (281): 41–61. .
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- Brown, David and Miles Taylor, eds. Palmerston Studies I and II (Southampton: Harrley Institute, 2007); pp. 203, 207; essays by scholars
- Cecil, Algernon. British Foreign Secretaries 1807-1916 (1927) pp. 131–226. online
- Chamberlain, Muriel Evelyn. British foreign policy in the age of Palmerston (Longman, 1980).
- Chambers, James. Palmerston. 'The People's Darling' (John Murray, 2004).
- Fenton, Laurence (2010). "Origins of Animosity: Lord Palmerston and The Times, 1830–41". Media History. 16#4: 365–378. S2CID 153007113.
- Fenton, Laurence (2013). Palmerston and The Times: Foreign Policy, the Press and Public Opinion in Mid-Victorian Britain. IB Tauris. excerpt
- Friedman, Isaiah. "Lord Palmerston and the protection of Jews in Palestine 1839-1851." Jewish Social Studies (1968): 23–41. JSTOR 4466386
- Fuller, Howard J. (2014). Technology and the Mid-Victorian Royal Navy Ironclad: Royal Navy Crisis in the Age of Palmerston. Routledge. Excerpt
- Golicz, Roman. "Napoleon III, Lord Palmerston and the Entente Cordiale." History Today 50.12 (2000): 10–17.
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- Hoppen, K. Theodore (1998). The Mid-Victorian Generation, 1846–1886., wide-ranging scholarly survey
- Kingston, Klari. "Gunboat Liberalism? Palmerston, Europe and 1848" History Today 47#2 (1997) 37–43.
- Leonard, Dick Nineteenth Century British Premieres: Pitt to Roseberry (2008) pp. 245–65.
- Macknight, Thomas. Thirty Years of Foreign Policy, a History of the Secretaryships of the Earl of Aberdeen and Viscount Palmerston (1855), Online free
- Martin, Kingsley (1963). The Triumph of Lord Palmerston: a study of public opinion in England before the Crimean War. Online free
- Paul, Herbert. History of Modern England, 1904-6 (5 vols) vol 2 online 1855–1865
- Judd, Denis. Palmerston (Bloomsbury, 2015).
- Morse, Hosea Ballou. International Relations of the Chinese Empire: The Period of Conflict: 1834-1860. (1910) online
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- Rodkey, Frederick Stanley. "Lord Palmerston and the rejuvenation of Turkey, 1830-41." Journal of Modern History 1.4 (1929): 570-593. online
- Rodkey, Frederick Stanley. "Lord Palmerston and the Rejuvenation of Turkey, 1830-41: Part II, 1839-41." Journal of Modern History 2.2 (1930): 193-225. JSTOR 1872311
- Rodkey, Frederick Stanley. "Lord Palmerston and the Rejuvenation of Turkey, 1830-41: Part II, 1839-41." Journal of Modern History 2.2 (1930): 193-225.
- Seton-Watson, R. W. Britain in Europe, 1789–1914: A survey of foreign policy (1937) pp. 241–300, 400–63. online
- Southgate, Donald (1966). 'The Most English Minister': the Policies and Politics of Palmerston. London: Macmillan.
- Steele, E.D. Palmerston and Liberalism, 1855–1865 (1991)
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- Taylor, A. J. P. "Lord Palmerston" History Today (July 1951) 1#7 pp. 35–41 online
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- Webster, Charles. The Foreign Policy of Palmerston. 1830-1841 (2v. 1951) a major study
- Weigall, David. Britain and the World, 1815–1986: A Dictionary of International relations (1989)
- Ward, A.W. and G. P. Gooch, eds. The Cambridge History of British Foreign Policy, 1783–1919 (3 vol, 1921–23), Volume II: 1815–66
- Williams, Chris, ed. A Companion to 19th-Century Britain (2006). Chapters 1 to 4, pp. 15–92;
- Wolffe, John (2005). "Lord Palmerston and religion: a reappraisal". English Historical Review. 120 (488): 907–936. .
Primary sources
- Bourne, Kenneth (1979). The Letters of the Third Viscount Palmerston to Laurence and Elizabeth Sulivan. 1804–1863. London: The Royal Historical Society..
- Bourne, Kenneth, ed/ Foreign Policy of Victorian England, 1830-1902 (1970) Long introduction, +147 primary source documents, many by Palmerston.
- Francis, George Henry (1852). Opinions and Policy of The Right Honourable Viscount Palmerston, G.C.B., M.P., &c. as Minister, Diplomatist, and Statesman, During More Than Forty Years of Public Life. London: Colburn and Co.
- Philip Guedalla, ed. (1928). Gladstone and Palmerston, being the Correspondence of Lord Palmerston with Mr. Gladstone 1851–1865. London: Victor Gollancz. Archived from the original on 25 May 2019. Retrieved 16 May 2019.
- Lord, Sudley ed. The Lieven Palmerston Correspondence 1828-1856 (1943) online
- Partridge, Michael, and Richard Gaunt. Lives of Victorian Political Figures Part 1: Palmerston, Disraeli and Gladstone (4 vol. Pickering & Chatto. 2006) reprints 19 original pamphlets on Palmerston.
- Temperley, Harold and L.M. Penson, eds. Foundations of British Foreign Policy: From Pitt (1792) to Salisbury (1902) (1938), primary sources pp. 88–304 online
Other sources
- public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Palmerston, Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 20 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 645–649. This article incorporates text from a publication now in the
External links
- Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Viscount Palmerston
- Viscount Palmerston 1784–1865 biography from the Liberal Democrat History Group
- More about Viscount Palmerston on the Downing Street website.
- "Archival material relating to Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston". UK National Archives.
- Papers of Henry John Temple, third Viscount Palmerston. University of Southampton.
- Portraits of Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston at the National Portrait Gallery, London
- Edward J. Davies, "The Ancestry of Lord Palmerston", The Genealogist, 22(2008):62–77