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1. ‘The Committee of Council at the War-Office’: An Experiment in Cabinet Government Under Anne
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009
Extract
Dr J. H. Plumb'S recent paper to the Royal Historical Society produced positive proof that the ‘lords of the committee’ of the early eighteenth century were simply the members of the cabinet when meeting by themselves in Whitehall instead of in the presence of the queen at one of the royal palaces.1 With this identification now certain, an investigation is possible into those specialist sub-committees which appear to have been responsible for naval and military affairs at various times under Anne, and about which, in Dr Plumb's own words, ‘further evidence would be invaluable’.2 One such body was the ‘committee of council which sits at the war-office ‘, the existence of which is attested by two letters of 1711 from Henry St John, then secretary of state, to the duke of Marlborough.3 Almost nothing has been discovered about this committee, although its existence has been well known to historians for more than fifty years,4 but now a search of war-office and other records has produced sufficient evidence for the committee to be identified and its membership, procedure, function, and history ascertained.
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References
1 Plumb, J.H., ‘The Organisation of the Cabinet in the Reign of Queen Anne’, Trans. Royal Hist. Soc. 5th series, VII (1957), 137–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
2 Ibid. 154–5.
3 Parke, G., [Letters...of the Rt. Hon. Henry St. John, Lord Viscount] Bolingbroke (1798), 1, 166, 237.Google Scholar
4 St John’s allusions were noticed by William Anson, Sir, Law and Custom of the Constitution (1892), 11, 103Google Scholarn. 1, and his reference was quoted by Corbett, J.S., ‘Queen Anne’s Defence Committee’, Monthly Rev. (May 1904), 55–65Google Scholar, which was in turn used by H. W. V. Temperley in his contributions to the famous controversy over the origins of the cabinet, in E[nglish] H[istorical] R[eview], XXVII (1912) and XXXI (1916). E. R. Turner, taking part in the same controversy, made use of Anson for his article in E.H.R. XXXI.
5 P[ublic] R[ecord] O[ffice], S.P. 44/109, H. St John to the secretary at war, 2 March 1711, enclosing a copy of the minutes taken at the inaugural meeting. This important letter was noticed by Turner, Cabinet (1930), 1, 142, but he was utterly mistaken about its significance. B[ritish] M[useum] Add. MSS. 22264, fos. 63–4, is a copy of the minutes taken at four meetings in March 1711.
6 P.R.O., W.O. 4/10, 236–342; W.O. 4/12, 6–208; W.O. 71/2, 1–42; W.O. 26/13, section (iii), 10.
7 The earl of Rochester (lord president), the duke of Buckingham (lord steward), the duke of Ormonde (lord lieutenant of Ireland), and the three secretaries of state (the duke of Queens–bury, the earl of Dartmouth, and Henry St John), figure in both lists, while the duke of Shrewsbury (lord chamberlain) is included only in the first.
8 See Dr Plumb's comments upon members’ attendance at committees during this period, loc. cit. 142–5.
9 P.R.O., W.O. 4/12, 122, secretary at war to Adam Cardonnel (secretary to the duke of Marlborough), 29 May 1711:‘Enclosed are copies of the minutes of the lords of the committee...on the 14th and 16th instant with her majesty’s pleasure thereupon. The lords did not meet the 21st and 23rd, and those of yesterday's date have not yet been laid before her majesty.’
10 P.R.O., S.P. 44/109, St John to secretary at war, 27 Feb. 1711.
11 Ibid. St John to secretary at war, 2 March 1711.
12 Both Marlborough and St John remarked upon the decline in discipline, see G. M. Trevelyan, England under Queen Anne, III, The Peace and the Protestant Succession (1934), 44, Marlborough to Godolphin, c. 1710, and H[istorical] M[anuscripts] C[ommission], Portland IV, 655, St John to Harley, 17 Jan. 1711.
13 It had difficulty in producing a quorum (see, e.g. P.R.O., W.O. 71/1, 110, minutes of 23 Feb. 1708), and not surprisingly, since there was only one general officer established upon the forces in England, so that the holding of a board depended upon the chance presence in London of unemployed generals and those upon leave from commands overseas. The board had been given administrative functions which dealt with the supplying of army clothing and the hearing of complaints against officers engaged upon recruiting, and the tedium of this business made attendance unpopular.
14 H.M.C., Portland IV, 605, Orrery to Harley, c. Sept. 1710.
15 P.R.O., W.O. 4/12, 82, secretary at war to the duke of Marlborough, the earl of Portmore, the duke of Argyll, and Brigadier Hill, commanders-in-chief in Flanders, Portugal, Spain, and of the expedition to Canada respectively, and to the judge-advocate general for publication in the Great Room at the Horse-Guards.
16 P.R.O., W.O. 26/12, section (iii), 49.
17 Normally an officer's rank corresponded to the appointment he held, but deserving officers awaiting a vacant appointment might receive promotion to the higher rank through the award of a ‘brevet’. It was vital for an ambitious lieutenant-colonel to receive promotion by this method for vacant colonelcies of regiments were few, since they could continue to be enjoyed, in effect as sinecures, by their holders after they had been promoted into the ranks of the general officers, or had retired from active service.
18 This last provision had the additional purpose of ensuring the complete removal from the army of generals Meredith, Macartney, and Honeywood, who had been obliged to sell their regimental colonelcies in Dec. 1710 for drinking a toast against the new ministry.
19 For the minutes for these meetings, see above, n. 5, p. 78.
20 P.R.O., W.O. 26/13, section (iii), 10.
21 P.R.O., W.O. 4/12, 53, secretary at war to W. Lowndes (secretary of the treasury), 23 April 1711.
22 P.R.O., S.P. 41/4, ‘A State of the matter relating to the Companies of Invalids, and how they came to be formed in 1711’. B.M., Loan 29/219, J. Howe (paymaster-general) to the earl of Oxford, 22 June 1711.
23 P.R.O., S.P. 34/14, Sir John Gibson (lieutenant-governor) to the secretary of state, 29 April 1711. The letter is endorsed ‘R. May 4th. Read May 6th at St James’s. Read May 7th at the War-office.’
24 P.R.O., W.O. 4/12, 187, secretary at war to treasury, 6 July 1711.
25 In the letter quoted above, n. 14, p. 79.
26 Miscellaneous State Papers....from the Collection of the Earl of Hardwicke (ed. Yorke, Philip, 1778), 11, 485–8.Google Scholar
27 The secretary at war was informed only on the day before that the meeting was to take place in his office, and the earl of Orkney, who was a Marlborough supporter and as yet still in England, did not attend the inaugural meeting.
28 Erle's part in the politics of this period deserves further investigation. He was a distinguished professional soldier who had been one of the first to join William of Orange in 1688 and had served under him in Ireland and Flanders. He was equally a very experienced military administrator, being commander-in-chief in Ireland from 1702 to 1705, and lieutenant-general of the ordnance and a privy councillor since 1705. He had returned to active service in 1706 to accompany Rivers's expedition as its second in command, and so found himself in Spain in 1707 where he commanded the foot at the battle of Almanza. In 1708 he was himself commander-in-chief of an expedition against the French coast, and upon his return was made commander of the forces in England. While Rivers and Argyll had personal grievances against Marlborough, Erle, a ‘queen's servant’ in politics though a Whig in his principles, appears to have supported Harley because of a genuine disagreement with the military policy of the Godolphin ministry, particularly that being pursued in Spain.
29 Sir G. Murray, [Letters and] Despatches [of John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough] (1845), v, 301, 7 April 1711 N.S.
30 He insisted, even after being informed by the secretary at war of the committee's recommendations, upon waiting for their formal institution by the queen as official regulations, before taking any action upon them, see letter just quoted.
31 Murray, , Despatches, V, 312Google Scholar, to Brydges, 14 April 1711 N.S.
32 Parke, , Bolingbroke, I, 166Google Scholar, 27 April 1711.
33 P.R.O., S.P. 44/111. written from Windsor.
34 The shortage of brigadiers in Flanders was due to the over-generous promotion of them in that theatre to the rank of major-general, and so to some extent Marlborough was the author of his own difficulties.
35 Murray, , Despatches, v, 412Google Scholar.
36 Ibid. 462 n., St John to Marlborough, 21 Aug. 1711.
37 P.R.O., W.O. 4/12, 283, secretary at war to Cardonnel, 26 Sept. 1711, and similarly to the judge-advocate-general and the various commanders-in-chief, cf. above, n. 15, p. 80. For the terms of the amendment, see P.R.O., W.O. 26/12, section (iii), 52, royal warrant of 7 Sept. 1711.
38 Parke, , Bolingbroke, I, 237Google Scholar, 8 June 1711.
39 P.R.O., W.O. 4/12, 204, secretary at war to Cardonnel, 27 July 1711.
40 Swift, Journal to Stella, 18 Feb. 1711.
41 Plumb, loc. cit. 142–3.