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Sir Warren Fisher and the Coalition, 1919–1922

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Eunan O’Halpin
Eunan O’Halpin
Affiliation:
Churchill College, Cambridge
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Extract

It has been said of Lloyd George that ‘coming into the British system from outside, he had no respect for its traditions or accepted formalities… Most of all, he distrusted the permanent officials’. His reliance on the Garden Suburb, and what Milner described as his tendency ‘to settle things that really mattered, or unsettle them, in his own favourite way — by devious methods and through anything but the regular agents’, could be seen as evidence which supports this view. However, it was also during Lloyd George's premiership that two of the most influential officials of the interwar period, Sir Maurice Hankey and Sir Warren Fisher, acquired the standing which they held until their retirements in 1938 and 1939 respectively. Like the men of the Garden Suburb, they owed their success to Lloyd George and were personally devoted to him, but while the Garden Suburb came and went with its creator, Hankey and Fisher survived his departure. Lloyd George, the supreme individùalist as prime minister, bequeathed to his successors not the amorphous, ill-defined government machine which he had inherited from Asquith in 1916, but a reorganized and newly centralized public service.

Type
Articles
Information
The Historical Journal , Volume 24 , Issue 4 , December 1981 , pp. 907 - 927
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1981

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References

1 Taylor, A. J. P., Essays in English history (London, 1976), p. 257.Google Scholar

2 Note by Milner, 23 June 1921, Bodleian Library, Milner MSS Dept. 125.

3 Norman Fenwick Warren Fisher (1879–1948). Educated Winchester and Hertford College, Oxford. Entered civil service as clerk in the Secretaries’ Office of the Board of Inland Revenue, 1903. Private secretary to the chairman of the Board of Inland Revenue, 1908. Special commissioner of Income Tax, 1910. On loan to National Health Insurance Commission, 1912. Commissioner of Inland Revenue, 1913. Deputy chairman of the Board of Inland Revenue, 1914. Chairman of the Board of Inland Revenue, 1918. Permanent secretary to the Treasury and head of the civil service, 1919–39. Regional commissioner for the north western civil defence region, 1939–40. Special commissioner for London, 1940–42.

4 Treasury minute of 4 Sept., 1919, and Treasury circular of 15 Sept. 1919, Public Record Office (hereafter P.R.O.), T 199/50b.

5 Parl[iamentary] Deb[ates], H[ouse] of C[ommons], 5th series, vol. 192, cols. 518–20. Dale, H. E., The higher civil service (London, 1941), pp. 164–7, 224–7.Google Scholar

6 See, e.g. Gwatkin, Frank Ashton, The British Foreign Service (Syracuse, N.Y., undated), p. 26Google Scholar; SirSelby, Walford, Diplomatic twilight 1930–1940 (London, 1953), p. 184Google Scholar. See also Bourke, Alexander Legge, Master of the Offices (London, 1950)Google Scholar, and Murray, A. C., Reflections on some aspects of British foreign policy between the two world wars (London, 1946). The attacks on Fisher in these works were inspired principally by Sir Walford Selby, who was obsessed by him.Google Scholar

7 Fisher to Neville Chamberlain, Baldwin and MacDonald, 25 Nov. 1931, P.R.O., T 199/50b. There is insufficient space in this article to deal with the complicated story of how the 1919 reorganization came about. The scheme was drawn up by one of Fisher's predecessors, Sir John Bradbury.

8 Royal commission on the civil service 1912–14, Report, P[arliamentary] P[apers] (1914), XVI, 20; Ministry of Reconstruction, Report of the machinery of government committee, P.P. (1918), XII, 4–21.

9 Minutes of cabinet finance committee, 20 Aug. 1919, P.R.O., Cab. 27/71.

10 Fisher to Lloyd George, 16 June 1920, House of Lords Record Office, Lloyd George papers, F/17/1/1.

11 Cabinet conclusions, 11 Feb. 1920, Cab. 23/20.

12 Harwood (Treasury) to Leith-Ross, 23 Feb. 1920, P.R.O., T1 12564/20935.

13 Ibid.

14 F. C. 3, 20 August 1919, Cab. 27/71; minutes of finance committee, 30 Jan. 1920, Cab. 23/20.

15 Ibid.

16 Selby, Diplomatic twilight, pp. 3–4, 184.

17 Treasury minute of 17 Aug. 1920, P.R.O., T 162 24/E1552.

18 Note on ‘Treasury organisation’, dated Jan. 1924, P.R.O., T 199/50b.

19 Churchill to Lloyd George, 22 Apr. 1920, Lloyd George papers, F/9/2/27.

20 Same to same, 4 Mar. 1920, Lloyd George papers, F/9/2/11.

21 Fisher to Chamberlain, 26 Apr. 1920, Lloyd George papers, F/7/3/5a.

22 Same to same, undated, Lloyd George papers, F/7/3/6.

23 Fisher to MacDonald and to Haldane, 7 Feb. 1924, P.R.O., PRO 30/69/1/192.

24 Interview with Sir John Winnifrith, 5 Dec. 1979 (Sir John was a Treasury official from 1934 onwards); Liddell Hart's notes of a talk with Hore-Belisha, 26 Jan. 1938, King's College, London, Liddell Hart papers, 11/HB 1938/17b.

25 Curzon to Chamberlain, 12 Apr. 1920, P.R.O., T 1 12564/20935.

26 Chamberlain to Curzon, 23 Apr. 1920, Ibid. This reply was drafted by Fisher for Chamberlain's signature.

27 Curzon to Chamberlain, 3 May 1920, Ibid.

28 Chamberlain to Curzon, 5 May 1920, Ibid. It had been agreed that the new rule regarding financial responsibility should not apply in the Foreign Office.

29 Curzon to Lloyd George, J. T. Davies to Fisher, 4 Jan; Fisher to Davies, 13 Jan. 1921, P.R.O., T 162 24/E1551.

30 Eden, Anthony (the Earl of Avon), Memoirs. Facing the dictators (London, 1962), p. 319.Google Scholar

31 Fisher to Neville Chamberlain, 15 Sept. 1936, Birmingham University Library, Chamberlain papers, NC 7/11/29/19. In this minute, he told the chancellor that he would ask the government to make him permanent head of the Foreign Office if it was the only way of preventing Cadogan being appointed. Cadogan, for his part, was suitably wary of Fisher, who he thought ‘a slippery customer’. Churchill College, Cambridge, Cadogan papers, ACAD 1/6, diary entry of 22 Dec. 1937.

32 Vansittart, Lord, The mist procession (London, 1958), p. 350; Tyrell's speech in the Lords, 26 Nov. 1942, Parl. Deb., H. of L[ords], 5th series, vol. 125, col. 276; Peter Byrd to Sir Owen O’Malley, 11 May 1972, and enclosed material, National Library of Ireland, O’Malley papers, MS 21691 (5).Google Scholar

33 Royal commission on the civil service, 1929–1931, minutes of evidence, p. 1276, Fisher's evidence of 17 Dec. 1930.

34 Rumbold to Oliphant, 30 Mar. 1921, Bodleian, Rumbold MSS dep. 26.

35 Murray, Reflections, p. 6.

36 Acton to Rumbold, 20 May 1919, Rumbold MSS dep. 26.

37 Steiner, Z. and Dockrill, M., ’The Foreign Office reforms, 1919–21’ in The Historical Journal, xvii, 1 (1974), 131–2.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

38 Montgomery to Rumbold, 15 Dec. 1919, Rumbold MSS dep. 26.

39 Steiner and Dockrill, ‘The Foreign Office reforms’, p. 138.

40 Minutes of Royal Institute of International Affairs (R.I.I.A.) British Security group, 1 Jan. 1945, British Library of Economic and Political Science, Greaves papers, coll. misc. 462/6.

41 Larner, Christine, ’The amalgamation of the Diplomatic Service with the Foreign Office’, Journal of Contemporary History, vii (1972), 107, 116–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

42 Boadle, D. G., ’The formation of the Foreign Office economic relations section, 1930–1937’, The Historical Journal, xx, 4 (1977), 919–36CrossRefGoogle Scholar, examines the charge that Fisher prevented the Foreign Office from developing an effective economic section. This allegation and the supposed consequences are most succinctly stated by Gwatkin, FrankAshton in ’Thoughts on the Foreign Office: 1918–1939’ in The Contemporary Review, clxxxviii (Dec. 1955), 374–8.Google Scholar

43 Hardinge to Rumbold, 13 July 1920, Cambridge University Library, Hardinge MSS, 43/116–7.

44 Curzon to Lloyd George, 20 July 1920, Lloyd George papers, F/13/1/1–4.

45 Rumbold to Hardinge, 28 Aug. 1920, Hardinge MSS, 84–90.

46 See e.g. Bonar Law to H. A. Gwynne, 18 Nov. 1922, on Crewe's appointment to Paris, House of Lords Record Office, Bonar Law papers, 108/9/22; see also Hugh Dalton's diary, 1 and 4 Nov. 1929, British Library of Economic and Political Science, Dalton papers.

47 Hardinge to R. Graham (Cairo), undated, 1921(?), Hardinge MSS, 22/194–7.

48 Although Fisher had been appointed as sole permanent secretary to the Treasury and head of the civil service, Bradbury remained a permanent secretary to the Treasury for pension purposes until 30 June 1922, and after that date was paid £800 a year in compensation for abolition of his office. His Treasury salary was paid to him on the understanding that he would return it in full as it was received. He received a separate salary as head of the British delegation on the reparations commission. P.R.O., T 164 26/P20298. When he raised the question of compensation for loss of office, Fisher took the view that 'sir John Bradbury is not seconded’, but this was incorrect in so far as he still received a Treasury salary. The income tax authorities complicated the matter further, by insisting that Bradbury pay super tax in respect of this salary although he was paid it only to preserve his pension rights. P.R.O., T 162 56/E4508.

49 Bland (Foreign Office) to Rowe-Dutton (Treasury), 3 Mar. 1920, T 1 12503/11228.

50 Bradbury to Lloyd George, 5 May 1921, Lloyd George papers, F/27/6/50.

51 Chamberlain to Bradbury, 22 Mar. 1922, Chamberlain papers, AC 24/4/5.

52 Minutes of R.I.I.A. British Security group, 16 Oct. 1944, Greaves papers, coll. misc. 462/6.

53 Murray, Reflections, p. 7.

54 For a hostile view of Bradbury's activities, see Hardinge to Curzon, 12 Nov. 1921 and 29 Mar. 1922, Hardinge MSS, 44/267–9 and 45/64–5.

55 Curzon to Horne, 19 Nov. 1921, P.R.O., T 160 122/F4516.

56 Horne to Curzon, 22 Nov. 1921, Ibid.

57 Carlton, David, MacDonald versus Henderson (London, 1970), p. 23CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Skidelsky, Robert, Politicians and the slump (London, 1967), pp. 89, 283. Carlton relied heavily on Selby's Diplomatic twilight, an extremely unreliable and confused account. Selby believed that Fisher brought down the Labour governments of both 1924 and 1929—31 in order to thwart their foreign policy and to protect British investment in Germany. He wisely omitted these charges from his book, since even the most devout Fisher hater would have found them hard to swallow.Google Scholar

58 Long to Lloyd George, 21 May 1919, Lloyd George papers, F/33/2/45.

59 Lloyd George to Bonar Law, 30 Dec. 1919, Lloyd George papers, F/31/1/16. Townshend, Charles, The British campaign in Ireland, 1919–1921 (London, 1975), pp. 30, 45, gives a sketchy account of Byrne's removal, but casts little light on the reasons for it.Google Scholar

60 Philip Lloyd-Graeme's note of a meeting with Byrne, January 1920, Churchill College, Cambridge, Swinton papers, SWIN 270/2/21.

61 As in note 59 above.

62 Fisher to Chamberlain and Lloyd George, 18 Nov. 1921, Chamberlain papers, AC 23/2/16.

63 He was governor successively of the Seychelles, Sierre Leone and Kenya, but was apparently not a success in the last of these, as he ‘and his wife have given little satisfaction socially or in other capacities’. Ormsby-Gore to Brooke-Popham, 21 Oct. 1936, P.R.O., CO 967/60.

64 As in footnote 62 above.

65 Macready to Long, 23 Apr. 1920, Lloyd George papers, F/34/1/19.

66 Neville Macready, General Sir, Annals of an active life, II (London, 1925), 449.Google Scholar

67 Bonar Law to French, 17 and 20 Apr.; Fisher to Bonar Law, 27 Apr. 1920, Bonar Law papers, 103/2/10, 102/5/4, and 103/2/17.

68 Chamberlain to Bonar Law, 12 May; Fisher to Chamberlain, Bonar Law and Lloyd George, 12 May 1920, Lloyd George papers, F/31/1/32.

69 Ibid.

70 Extracts from a draft of an unpublished memoir entitled The life of a civil servant by George Chester Duggan, in my possession. Duggan was an unhappy junior in Dublin Castle from 1919 to 1922. He later became comptroller and auditor general of Northern Ireland.

71 Fisher to Chamberlain, Bonar Law and Lloyd George, 15 May 1920, Lloyd George papers, F/31/1/33.

72 H. A. L. Fisher's diary, 28 May 1920, Bodleian, Fisher papers, box 8A.

73 One of the men Fisher sent to Ireland, Mark Sturgis, kept a diary in which personalities and events in the Castle are vividly described. From time to time, Fisher had the diary typed up in the Treasury, and ‘will keep one copy so that something will survive if by chance all my papers are stolen or burnt in Ireland’. Sturgis diary, 30 Nov. 1920, P.R.O., PRO 30/59/1. Despite its semi-official status, the diary is very revealing on policy and personalities, including Fisher. P.R.O., PRO 30/59/1–4.

74 Memorandum by Fisher, 7 Aug. 1920, P.R.O., CO 904/188.

75 Fisher to Bonar Law, 17 July 1920, Bonar Law papers, 102/5/34.

76 Fisher to Francis Stevenson, with memorandum for Lloyd George, 11 Feb. 1921, Lloyd George papers, F/7/1/9.

77 Fisher to Neville Chamberlain, 24 June 1930, Chamberlain papers, NC 7/11/23/5.

78 The commissioner called it the special branch, Curzon and Long the secret service, and Thomson the directorate of intelligence. The circulation list on the forms on which the government code and cypher school issued decrypts of intercepted telegrams read ‘Prime Minister Lord Privy Seal S. of S. for Colonies IO DNI DMI [India Office, director of naval intelligence, director of military intelligence] Sir Basil Thomson’. Hardinge MSS, 45/80–2.

79 Reid, B. L., The lives of Roger Casement (New Haven, Conn., 1976), pp. 382–4.Google Scholar

80 Parl. Deb., H. of C, 5th series, vol. 146, cols. 1929–33, 3 Nov. 1921.

81 Curzon to Chamberlain, 5 Nov. 1921, Chamberlain papers, AC 23/2/11.

82 Long to Chamberlain, 2 Nov. 1921, Ibid., AC 23/2/1.

83 Sturgis diary, 13 Feb. 1921, PRO 30/59/2.

84 As in footnote 81 above.

85 Chamberlain to Curzon, 7 Nov. 1921, Chamberlain papers, AC 23/2/14.

86 Curzon to Bonar Law, 26 May 1920, on financial problems, Bonar Law papers, 99/1/19. The finances were somewhat tangled: Thomson told Long in October 1918 that ‘the whole of my Organisation outside London is paid for by the Ministry of Munitions, and… the money will stop as soon as Peace comes. Then we shall be left with no Home Intelligence at all except what the Ministry of Labour may get and that is very little’. Wiltshire Record Office, Long papers, WRO 947/672.

87 Chamberlain to Curzon, 7 Nov., and to Long, 4 Nov. 1921, Chamberlain papers, AC 23/2/14 and 3.

88 Hardinge to Rumbold, 21 Feb. 1920, Rumbold MSS dep. 26; Parl. Deb., H. of C, 5th series, vol. 146, col. 2063, 3 Nov. 1921. It was said that the papers were later found locked in a cupboard in Riga.

89 Thomson to Gwynne, 2 July 1920, Bodleian, Gwynne MS 22. For Strachey's intelligence gathering activities concerning Ireland, see papers in the House of Lords Record Office, St Loe Strachey papers, S/21/2/5 and 6. In return for Gwynne's help, Thomson pandered to the editor's anti-semitic fantasies by providing him with translations of Hebrew and Russian pamphlets. See Thomson to Gwynne, 12 Nov. 1917, 29 Oct. 1919, Gwynne MS 22, and Gwynne to Thomson, 27 Oct. 1919, Gwynne MS 7.

90 Memorandum by Harwood, 26 Oct. 1921, Lloyd George papers, F/28/1/6.

91 Thomson to Gwynne, 2 Nov. 1921, Gwynne MS 22. In fact, Thomson got a special pension as calculated under section 25(5) of the Police Pensions Act, 1921. It was quite legal, but was more generous than he would have been entitled to under the Police Act of 1890. P.R.O., T 164 16/P11618. On 5 Oct. 1928, Fisher wrote that he had insisted on this provision in the 1921 act. P.R.O., T 164 78/P71229.

92 St Loe Strachey to Thomson, 4 Nov. 1921, St Loe Strachey papers, S/19/3/12.

93 Fisher to Chamberlain, Bonar Law and Lloyd George, 18 Nov. 1921, Lloyd George papers, F/7/4/33.

94 Parl. Deb., H. of C, vol. 150, cols. 1208–9, 16 Feb. 1922.

95 Long to Chamberlain, 2 Nov. 1921, Chamberlain papers, AC 23/2/1; Long to Thomson, 28 Oct. 1921, Long papers, WRO 947/855.

96 Anderson (Home Office) to Fisher, 5 Oct. 1928, P.R.O., T 164 78/P71229.

97 Chamberlain to Long, 10 Nov. 1921, Chamberlain papers, AC 23/2/7.

98 His Labour foes did not forget him. G.D.H. and Margaret Cole poked fun both at him and his successor in The death of a millionaire (London, 1925).Google Scholar

99 Thomson to Gwynne, 2 Nov. 1921, Gwynne MS 22.

100 Bridge, Ann, Permission to resign (London, 1971) gives a highly coloured but interesting account of how Fisher helped her husband, Owen O’Malley. She also gives a useful though condescending description of Fisher himself. The Times and the Manchester Guardian of 2 Apr. 1942 contain accounts of Fisher's dismissal by Herbert Morrison following a letter to the Manchester Guardian in which Fisher questioned Morrison's treatment of Colonel Blatherwick, an official of the north western civil defence region.Google Scholar

101 Boyle, Andrew, Trenchard (London, 1962), pp. 591–2.Google Scholar

102 Morgan, K. O., Consensus and disunity: the Lloyd George coalition government, 1918–1922 (Oxford, 1979), pp. 52, 94.Google Scholar

103 Murray, Reflections, pp. 6–8.