George Cornewall Lewis
Thomas H. Sotheron-Estcourt | |
---|---|
Succeeded by | Sir George Grey, Bt |
Secretary of State for War | |
In office 23 July 1861 – 13 April 1863 | |
Monarch | Victoria |
Prime Minister | The Viscount Palmerston |
Preceded by | Sidney Herbert |
Succeeded by | The Earl de Grey and Ripon |
Personal details | |
Born | 21 April 1806 London |
Died | 13 April 1863 | (aged 56)
Nationality | British |
Political party | Liberal |
Spouse |
Lady Maria Theresa Villiers (m. 1844) |
Alma mater | Christ Church, Oxford |
Sir George Cornewall Lewis, 2nd Baronet,
Early life
He was born in London, the son of
Lewis was educated at
Commissioner
In 1836, at the request of Charles Grant, 1st Baron Glenelg, Lewis accompanied John and Sarah Austin to Malta. They spent nearly two years reporting on the condition of the island and framing a new code of laws. One main object of both commissioners was to associate the Maltese in the responsible government of the island. On his return to Britain, Lewis succeeded his father as one of the principal poor-law commissioners.[3]
Government positions
The enquiry into the
Lewis was then returned as Member of Parliament for
In 1850 Lewis succeeded William Hayter as Financial Secretary to the Treasury.[3] From 1853 to 1854 he sat on Royal Commission on the City of London.[6]
Editor
On the dissolution of parliament which followed the resignation of Lord John Russell's ministry in 1852, Lewis sought re-election in the 1852 United Kingdom general election. He was defeated for Herefordshire and then for Peterborough. He accepted the editorship of the Edinburgh Review, and remained in the post until 1855. During this period he served on the Oxford commission, and on the commission to inquire into the government of London.[3]
Return to government
In 1855 Lewis succeeded his father in the baronetcy, and was elected member for the
After the change of ministry in 1859 Lewis became
Death
Lewis fell ill and shortly died, on 13 April 1863, at Harpton Court. He was buried in
Works
A major early work by Lewis was Remarks on the Use and Abuse of some Political Terms (London, 1832), written under the influence of John Austin. In Local Disturbances in Ireland, and the Irish Church Question (London, 1836), he condemned the existing connection between church and state, proposed a state provision for the Catholic clergy, and maintained the necessity of an efficient workhouse organization. It contains a detailed analysis of rural violence in Ireland.[1][3] The Essay on the Government of Dependencies (1841) was a systematic statement and discussion of the relations in which colonies may stand towards the mother country. About 1850, his Essay on the Influence of Authority in Matters of Opinion was published.[3]
Before leaving college Lewis published observations on
In the 1850s Lewis produced the Treatise on the Methods of Observation and Reasoning in Politics, and the Enquiry into the Credibility of the Early Roman History, in which he attacked the theory of epic lays and other theories on which Barthold Georg Niebuhr's reconstruction of that history was based. In 1859 Lewis published the Essay on Foreign Jurisdiction and the Extradition of Criminals, topical after the Orsini affair and the trial of Simon François Bernard. He advocated the extension of extradition treaties, and condemned the idea of Weltrechtsordnung which Robert von Mohl of Heidelberg had proposed.[3]
Lewis's final works were the Survey of the Astronomy of the Ancients, in which he applied sceptical analysis to the Egyptology of Christian Charles Josias von Bunsen; and the Dialogue on the Best Form of Government, in which, under the name of "Crito", the author points out that there is no one abstract government which is the best possible for all times and places.[3]
He translated
In 1846 Lewis edited a text of the Fables of Babrius. This venture into scholarship soured when he advised the British Museum on a purchase of manuscript copies by Konstantinos Minas (also known as Constantin Minadi, or Minoïde Mynas). When Lewis published in 1859 further fables, there was an outcry across Europe that he had validated what were forgeries. This (?) is no longer the accepted view.[1]
Associations
Lewis's large circle of friends included Edmund Walker Head, George and Harriet Grote, the Austins, Lord Stanhope, John Stuart Mill, Henry Hart Milman, and the Duff Gordons.[2] In public life he was described by Lord Aberdeen as notable "for candour, moderation, love of truth". According to Geoffrey Madan, although invited by Queen Victoria each year to stay at Balmoral, he never accepted.[9]
Legacy
A marble bust of Lewis, by Henry Weekes, stands in Westminster Abbey.[10] A large monument was built in his memory in the small village of New Radnor, Powys and still stands today, as does a statue in front of the Shirehall, Hereford.[2]
Family
In 1844 Lewis married the biographer Lady
References
- ^ doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/16585. (Subscription or UK public library membershiprequired.)
- ^ a b c Lee, Sidney, ed. (1893). . Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 33. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Lewis, Sir George Cornewall". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 16 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 522. One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the
- doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/12304. (Subscription or UK public library membershiprequired.)
- ISBN 978-0-19-822490-7.
- ^ "List of commissions and officials: 1850–1859 (nos. 53–94)". Office-Holders in Modern Britain: Volume 9. 1984. Retrieved 10 March 2008.
- ^ Howard Jones, Blue & Gray Diplomacy: A History of Union and Confederate Foreign Relations (2010).
- ^ Richard Shannon, "The virtues of unheroic government: the counterfactual case for Sir George Cornewall Lewis", The Transactions of the Radnorshire Society Vol 81: 2011
- ^ J. A. Gere and John Sparrow (ed.), Geoffrey Madan's Notebooks, Oxford University Press, 1981
- ^ Stanley, A.P., Historical Memorials of Westminster Abbey (London; John Murray; 1882), p. 249.
- doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/16595. (Subscription or UK public library membershiprequired.)