Lloyd George

Martin Pugh

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9780582552685
• eBook ISBN: 9781317869412
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: British History
• Index: History

An up-to-date synthesis and original interpretation of Lloyd George's life, personality and political career. This study challenges the traditional view of Lloyd George as an outsider in British politics, explains the political, economic and social achievements of his career and his role in effecting those changes.

Chapter 1

Escaping from Wales 1863 – 1898

From the perspective of late-twentieth-century Britain, David Lloyd George is a difficult man to place in social terms. His life’s progress from Davy Lloyd, the ‘cottage-bred boy’, to the titled magnificence of ‘Earl Lloyd George of Dwyfor’ makes a fascinating story; but such labels sit uncomfortably upon him. It was an unusual cottage that nurtured Lloyd George, and an unlikely hereditary peerage to which he attained in old age. If we are to understand the youth climbing the social ladder in late-Victorian Wales we must surely put aside the simplicities of English social class; for he can hardly be fitted neatly into any obvious category.

David’s father, William George, who died when David was only 17 months old, was by profession an elementary-school teacher who rose to become a headmaster at schools in Pwllheli and Manchester. However, in 1864 ill health forced him to abandon teaching in Lancashire to return to Pembrokeshire where he adopted his family’s traditional occupation of farming. Argumentative, politically aware, latitudinarian in his religion, and perennially attracted by the opportunities offered by England, William George had much in common with his elder son. But he differed in being of a sombre, thoughtful turn of mind, and he displayed a far less buoyant personality.

William died in 1864 leaving a widow, Elizabeth, a daughter, Mary, and a son, David. Elizabeth was also pregnant with a third child who was to be named William. Elizabeth’s brother, Richard Lloyd, came to her assistance by taking the family to live with him and his mother at Llanystumdwy in south Caernarfonshire. There, at the cottage known as Highgate, at the eastern end of the village street, was David’s boyhood home. In the context of rural Wales, it was by no means a humble home. Highgate was, in fact, a solid double-fronted stone house with three rooms downstairs, two up, a workshop to one side, and a large garden behind. Here Richard Lloyd pursued his father’s trade, shoemaking, assisted by his mother who had managed the business since her husband’s death. The work involved skilled manual labour on Richard’s part, but he also employed several assistants in the workshop. He was thus both working man and entrepreneur. Consequently the young David grew up in modest material comfort. At Llanystumdwy the children were always well fed and better clothed than most of their contemporaries in the village. Not until the period in which both David and his brother William were serving their articles did the family suffer financial hardship.

This home provided a stable, loving base for the future statesman. With his mother, grandmother, and elder sister on hand to pander to his needs, David grew up without learning how to look after himself. The notion that he was destined for higher things was powerfully reinforced by the father-figure of his uncle. For Richard Lloyd the prospect of a childless old age had suddenly evaporated before the reality of a ready-made family. A deeply religious man, he served as unpaid minister to the Campbellite Baptist Chapel near Criccieth until his death in 1917. Richard’s Christianity was not merely cerebral, it expressed itself in deeds; and the heavy responsibility of his sister’s children must have been profoundly satisfying to him. Moreover, he was a well-read, intellectually alert person, immersed in the Welsh cultural revival of the late nineteenth century, a keen student of politics and an ardent Liberal. But for the circumstances of his birth, he might easily have become more than a respected but parochial figure. In his intelligent, precocious nephew he quickly discerned the man who might translate his own unrealised dreams into proud reality. Thus David, in brother William’s words, became ‘the apple of Uncle Lloyd’s eye … [he] could do no wrong in Uncle Lloyd’s estimation’.¹ Even allowing for the natural chagrin of the brother whom the family took for granted, this is not an unjust view. Though not a spoilt child, David was cocooned in affection and fully aware of his own importance in the family. He thus grew up self-confident, easy in handling his fellow men, and sure of winning their loyalty and love.

This secure Welsh background has encouraged most of Lloyd George’s biographers, from the early days of Edwardian hagiography to the scholarly studies of more recent times, to present him as essentially the great outsider in modern British politics; radical, rebel, Welshman, Nonconformist, his whole career unfolds in a struggle with the might of the British Establishment. But if this is to be more than a platitude, Lloyd George must be compared with the many outsiders of the late Victorian and Edwardian period, whose attitude to the system ranged from defiance and parochialism on the one hand to sycophancy and immersion on the other. Where does Lloyd George stand in this continuum? Obviously, he was less of an outsider than a William Abraham or a Keir Hardie; but he maintained his radicalism and detachment far better than John Burns; and he resisted the charms of the Establishment far more effectively than Ramsay MacDonald. While undeniably outside the social stratum from which most politicians were then drawn, Lloyd George proved himself remarkably adaptive to the British system; yet, in adapting successfully, he always remained quite free of snobbery and side, which is surely one of his most attractive qualities. However, the very fact of his easy transition into British national politics – a rare accomplishment for a Welshman at this time – tells us something about his Welshness. The usual view of him tends to simplify what was really a most ambivalent and complicated relationship between Lloyd George and the society from which he sprang. Indeed, it seems essential to a balanced appreciation of him to recognise that from an early age he became acutely conscious of the conflicting pressures – Welsh and English – bearing upon him. As he learned to cope with these forces his very distinctive personality gradually developed.

Even as a boy, he showed a capacity for keeping a foot in two camps. For example, he attended the ‘National’ school in Llanystumdwy, an Anglican institution catering for a predominantly Nonconformist population. Welsh parents often resented their dependence on such schools since the brightest boys might be lured into Anglicanism by the offer of a pupil-teachership. At Llanystumdwy Lloyd George flourished under the excellent instruction and encouragement provided by his headmaster, David Evans – doubtless a source of mingled pride and anxiety for Uncle Lloyd. The most famous incident of these years was David’s attempt to incite his schoolfellows to refuse to recite the Anglican catechism on the annual visitation of the governors and clergy. Though thwarted on the day, his effort was apparently rewarded subsequently by the abandonment of the ritual. However, the significance of the episode is invariably missed. It is easy enough for a schoolboy to play the role of rebel; and almost as easy to be a diligent, model pupil. But to be both, which David contrived to be, indicates unusual qualities. For his acts of rebellion never led him to recoil from school work or schoolmasters; in due course he received the offer of a pupil-teachership, and continued to enjoy the support of David Evans in pursuing his career. In this way, the keynote of his whole life manifested itself at an early stage: he was the rebel who understood how to make the system work for him.

The Law, Marriage and Politics

The rejection of a teaching career raised the problem of David’s future. Family aspiration pointed away from manual occupations, but it was not clear where. Uncle Lloyd favoured the Nonconformist ministry, but his own small sect had no paid ministry. Medicine seemed attractive, but David was squeamish and shrank from the sight of blood. That left the law, to which they were encouraged by Thomas Goffey, a solicitor and family friend. Accordingly, David sat the Preliminary Law Examination in November 1877, began work for Messrs Breese, Jones, and Casson, solicitors of Porthmadog, in 1878, and was articled to Randall Casson in 1879 at the age of 16 at a cost of £100. By 1880 Uncle Lloyd had given up shoemaking through ill-health and the family moved to a small house in Criccieth. For several years, very little money came in, and they managed only by drawing upon the modest investments left to Elizabeth by William George, by borrowing from friends, and by taking lodgers in the summer.

These first steps towards his career intensified the conflicting pressures on David as represented by the Welsh Nonconformity of Uncle Lloyd and Criccieth on the one hand, and the English influence personified by Randall Casson on the other. When he began work David took lodgings in Porthmadog, which immediately offered an escape route from the strictness of village life. Finding his feet planted in two camps he relied upon all his natural charm and nimbleness to avoid a fall. For example, his uncle was a strict non-smoker and teetotaller, and David learned how to deliver a temperance lecture. But in the company of Casson he also learned to enjoy a drink – not an untypical accomplishment for the Victorian Liberal politician! It was doubtless through Casson’s example that he participated in the Porthmadog Volunteers, though apparently without telling the family. He sometimes covered his tracks skilfully. On Sundays he might go to Penmachno to preach – a perfect excuse to be out of Uncle Lloyd’s sight on the Sabbath – which gave the opportunity for youthful flirtations with the girls of another village!

Yet the demands of religion taxed David’s patience severely. He was known to refer privately to Uncle Lloyd as ‘the Bishop’; and even an innocent spot of gardening on a Sunday would cause an argument with his mother. While Nonconformity united the Welsh people against the English, it also divided them in their daily lives. The Lloyds were the only members of the ‘Campbellites’ or ‘Disciples of Christ’ in Llanystumdwy, and therefore had to tramp 4 miles to their chapel at Criccieth three times each Sunday. While David undoubtedly enjoyed vigorous hymn-singing and a powerful sermon, his religion was neither spiritual nor doctrinal. In fact, Sundays palled dreadfully for him. He complained of being obliged to sit through the ‘mumbling of musty prayers’, and could be driven to sarcasm by predictably pious sermonising:

Who raved most deliriously about the agonies of the wicked’s doom and about the bliss of every true Calvinist’s predestination?²

Nonconformist sectarianism even complicated his marriage prospects. The family of his future wife, Margaret Owen, were Calvinistic Methodists and thus, to a Campbellite, not far removed from Anglicanism. This resentment at being trapped explains his comment in his diary after his last night at Llanystumdwy that he left ‘without a feeling of regret, remorse or longing’.

Consequently, from an early age, Lloyd George took a very detached view of Welsh Nonconformist society. If in due course he became one of its spokesmen, he tended to regard himself as its victim too. Obliged to champion certain radical causes, he could never share the strict sectarian approach to education, temperance, or disestablishment. He could scarcely have imagined a worse fate than a lifetime spent in the obscurity of a country solicitor’s office and the committees of Caernarfonshire County Council, which was to be his brother’s lot. From his first visit to London in 1881 he revealed an almost physical longing for the South which, in later life, manifested itself in Mediterranean holidays and houses in Surrey. Complaining of the incessant damp, rain, and mist of north Wales, he responded exuberantly to the sun, warmth, and bright light of southern climes. Lloyd George’s love for his Welsh homeland was of a kind that waxed strong when he was safely removed from it, and deflated with physical proximity.

For some years, however, the exciting world of London remained but a distant prospect briefly glimpsed. Meanwhile he put in just enough work to pass his law examinations in 1884 with third-class honours, whereupon the firm offered him a post as managing clerk in their office in Dolgellau. He was only 21, and the position would have brought a regular income to his family, now supporting brother William’s legal training with some difficulty. But David had no desire to be tied to humdrum work in Dolgellau. Instead, he left promptly to open his own office in Criccieth, and subsequently in Blaenau Ffestiniog, Porthmadog, and Pwllheli. Consequently William came under severe pressure to qualify so that he, too, could abandon Breese, Jones, and Casson to join the new firm of ‘Lloyd George and George’.

By the early 1880s it was becoming clear that for David the law was less a career in itself than a springboard into politics. Since Mr Breese acted as the Liberal Agent for Merioneth and parts of Caernarfonshire, David soon gained experience of canvassing and parliamentary registration work, and appeared in the Revision Courts for the Liberals. Once he became a practising solicitor in his own right, he won attention by his outspoken and impertinent treatment of the local magistrates, especially when acting in cases involving landlords, poachers, and the clergy. By the late 1880s he had earned himself a reputation as a combative lawyer ready to stand up for the rights of the small man.

For an ambitious young radical, the general elections of 1880, 1885, and 1886 formed an exciting period. It began with Gladstone’s triumphant return to office after the Midlothian campaigns, it saw the emergence of Irish nationalism as a dominant element at Westminster, and it brought a trebling of the electorate in the Welsh counties. The new voters enhanced the prospects of success for Welsh radical causes, notably the disestablishment of the Church, the abolition of the tithe, and temperance reforms such as the local option and Sunday closing. Land reformers looked to the Irish precedent in the form of rent tribunals and security of tenure; while educationists agitated for university colleges in Wales, the provision of secondary education, and the training of Nonconformist teachers.

It was against this background that the young Lloyd George developed his political strategy; between 1880 and 1886 he changed from an enthusiastic 17-year-old to a mature and single-minded 23-year-old politician. In 1880 he began to write letters in the North Wales Express; he made his mark in the Porthmadog Debating Society, on temperance platforms, and as a lay preacher; and he gained prominence as secretary to the Anti-Tithe League in south Caernarfonshire.

His youthful speeches provide rather mixed evidence of the political ideas of the future statesman, and it would be rash to attribute too much significance to them. In his first published letter in the North Wales Express he loftily rebuked Lord Salisbury for reneging on the liberal Tory tradition of Canning in foreign affairs:

Toryism has not been barren of statesmen – real not charlatan – statesmen who prized the honour of England above the interests of party – who really hated oppression and demonstrated their detestation of it, not by pleading immunity from condign punishment for the instigation of foul and atrocious crimes, but by the laudable assistance which they rendered in the name of England to weak nationalities in their desperate struggles for Liberty – for freedom from the yoke of unhuman despots – for very existence.

Now throughout his life Lloyd George almost never spoke like this. The stilted language and convoluted sentences are quite out of character. His words reveal a precocious boy of 17 constructing his letter with immense care because it is his first communication to a newspaper and written in a foreign language! This perhaps minimises its significance. Yet it does give a tantalising glimpse of his breadth and subtlety. It hardly seems the work of a simple Welsh radical, but suggests one alive to wider concerns. The reference to the honour of England, rather than Britain, is particularly striking. Like all adolescent politicians, Lloyd George was posing, but his choice of pose is not what one would expect; already he is up above mere party interests on a cloud with English national statesmen.

On the other hand, his inaugural effort at the Porthmadog Debating Society showed the more familiar Welsh radical when, in an ‘argumentative and nervous speech’, he attacked the notion of paying compensation to Irish landlords who had suffered under the Land Act. Similarly, in 1882, when the society tackled the question of Britain’s recent occupation of Egypt, Lloyd George, now 19, denounced the wickedness of the enterprise and the injustice to a peasant people. Yet this preview of the anti-war radical is qualified by a good deal of inconsistency. With the advantage of William George’s notebooks and diary W. R. P. George reported that Lloyd George showed no opposition to the occupation of Egypt, and even declared, ‘I am rather glad of the splendid practice of our guns.’³ It is worth noting that the Debating Society voted its approval of the invasion by a large majority. Even in radical Wales it was difficult for a boy to grow up immune to the glamorous cause of empire and its military heroes, as Lloyd George’s own involvement with the Volunteers suggests. If he had mixed feelings about Egypt – taking pride in the success but regretting that it had occurred – then this should not be interpreted as insincerity, but as a typical reaction. A 19-year-old cannot be expected to have a consistent strategy for imperial development, and what seems a firm opinion one week may easily be jettisoned the next.

None the less, by 1885, when Lloyd George was beginning to be referred to as a future MP, a consistent party line had become a necessity for him. Although all but four of the Welsh seats were Liberal by 1880, Liberals felt some tension between Gladstone’s politics and those of his foremost critic, Joseph Chamberlain, who left the Cabinet in 1885 to campaign for his ‘Unauthorised Programme’ prior to his dramatic rupture with Gladstone over Irish Home Rule the following year. The young Lloyd George was evidently torn between the two leaders, but he greatly admired Chamberlain and enthusiastically espoused his programme, especially graduated taxation, death duties, and land reforms. On the Liberal victories of 1885 he observed: ‘Am convinced that this is all due to Chamberlain’s ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Preface
• Chapter 1. Escaping from Wales 1863–1898
• Chapter 2. In the Footsteps of Chamberlain 1899–1908
• Chapter 3. The New Liberalism 1908–1914
• Chapter 4. War and Peace 1908–1916
• Chapter 5. The Government of National Efficiency 1916–1918
• Chapter 6. The Failure of the Centre Party 1918–1922
• Chapter 7. The Rediscovery of Radicalism 1922–1945
• Conclusions: Lloyd George and the Centrist Tradition in Modern British Politics
• Bibliographical Essay
• Chronology
• Index