[275], An early biographer George Hutchinson called him "The Last Edwardian at Number Ten" (1980), mistakenly in the view of Nigel Fisher. Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories to read or reference later? [178] Macmillan feared for his own position and later (1 August) claimed to Lloyd that Butler, who sat for a rural East Anglian seat likely to suffer from EEC agricultural protectionism, had been planning to split the party over EEC entry (there is no evidence that this was so). [139], Macmillan filled government posts with 35 Old Etonians, seven of them in Cabinet. There was nothing for it but divorce: a grave step in those days. Over lunch with Lord Swinton on 30 September he favoured stepping down, but only if Baron Hailsham could be shoehorned in as his successor. [245], Macmillan still travelled widely, visiting China in October 1979, where he held talks with senior Vice-Premier Deng Xiaoping. She was convinced not least because she was constantly told so that she. [18][pageneeded] Harold resigned from the company on appointment to ministerial office in 1940. Nicknamed 'Supermac' and known for his pragmatism, wit and unflappability, Macmillan achieved note before the Second World War as a Tory radical and critic of appeasement. [68], Macmillan's job was to provide armaments and other equipment to the British Army and Royal Air Force. Her husband, who was created Earl of Stockton in 1984, outlived her by 20 years. As the EEC proved to be an economic success, membership of the EEC started to look more attractive compared to the EFTA. Boothby made several attempts to escape from Dorothy but his mistress's overwhelming jealousy, as well as his love for her, always prevented him. [77] At the Casablanca Conference Macmillan helped to secure US acceptance, if not recognition, of the Free French leader Charles de Gaulle. [191] The Thais wanted to change the voting procedure for SEATO from requiring unanimous consent to a three-quarter majority, a measure that Britain vetoed, causing the Thais to lose interest in SEATO. [131][132] He was also hinting that he would not serve under Butler. [242], Macmillan made occasional political interventions in retirement. We used to have battles and rows but they were quarrels. Southeast Asia was a region where racial-ethno-religious politics predominated, and the substantial Chinese minorities in the region were widely disliked on the account of their greater economic success. [133], Butler later recorded that during his period as acting Head of Government at Number Ten, he noticed constant comings and goings of ministers to Macmillan's study in Number 11 next doorand that those who attended all seemed to receive promotions when Macmillan became Prime Minister. A family rumour that Boothby was her natural father has been discounted by the most recent and detailed study. 'She was unable to have children herself as a result of an abortion the family made her go through with. in the House of Commons Chamber. [86] In 1947 the US would take over Britain's role as "protector" of Greece and Turkey, to keep the Soviets out of the Mediterranean, the so-called "Truman Doctrine". He was a member of the British delegation to the Consultative Assembly of the Council of Europe from 1949 to 1951, and played a prominent role - as a key aide and ally of Sir Winston Churchill - in pressing for greater European integration as a bulwark against Soviet totalitarianism and to prevent a recurrence of the horrors of Nazi rule. Macmillan took control of the magazine New Outlook and made sure it published political tracts rather than purely theoretical work. It is tempting to conclude that those were more civilised times. Baldwin later mentioned that he had survived by steering a middle course between Harold Macmillan and John Gretton, an extreme right-winger. He took the title from his former parliamentary seat on the edge of the Durham coalfields, and in his maiden speech in the House of Lords he criticised Thatcher's handling of the coal miners' strike and her characterisation of striking miners as 'the enemy within'. Macmillan initially refused a peerage and retired from politics in September 1964, a month before the 1964 election, which the Conservatives narrowly lost to Labour, now led by Harold Wilson. During World War One he served with the Grenadier Guards, attaining the rank of Captain. [258], Macmillan had often play-acted being an old man long before real old age set in. Macmillan supported the creation of the National Economic Development Council (NEDC, known as "Neddy"), which was announced in the summer of 1961 and first met in 1962. Impossible? [229] Macmillan was almost ready to leave hospital within ten days of the diagnosis and could easily have carried on, in the opinion of his doctor Sir John Richardson. Macmillan brought out a six-volume autobiography: Macmillan's biographer acknowledges that his memoirs were considered "heavy going". "Historians, the Penguin Specials and the 'State-of-the-Nation' Literature, 195864. The standard of living had risen enough that workers could participate in a consumer economy, shifting the working class concerns away from traditional Labour Party views. 4245 "Sent Down" is a university term for "expelled". Harold MacMillan: 2volume 2: 1957-1986. I am passionately in love with her. Maurice Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, OM, PC, FRS (10 February 1894 - 29 December 1986) was Conservative Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 10 January 1957 to 18 October 1963. Macmillan 1966, pp. [204] During the Malaya Emergency, the majority of the Communist guerrillas were ethnic Chinese, and British policies tended to favour the Muslim Malays whose willingness to follow their sultans and imams made them more anti-communist. Immediate Family: Daughter of Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, OM, PC and Dorothy Evelyn Macmillan. The campaign cost him about 200-300 out of his own pocket;[55] at that time candidates were often expected to fund their own election campaigns. He thought he had to build up the family publishing business to make himself worthy of her; he was star-struck by her. Her nephew William Cavendish, Marquess of Hartington, married Kathleen Kennedy, a sister of John F. Kennedy. The publishing firm remained in family hands until a majority share was purchased in 1995 by the Holtzbrinck Publishing Group; the imprint, however, persists. [71], Macmillan predicted that the Conservatives faced landslide defeat after the war, causing Channon to write (6 Sep 1944) of "the foolish prophecy of that nice ass Harold Macmillan". [11] From the age of six or seven he received introductory lessons in classical Latin and Greek at Mr Gladstone's day school, close by in Sloane Square. Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies. [214], Macmillan also saw the value of rapprochement with the EEC, to which his government sought belated entry, but Britain's application was vetoed by French president Charles de Gaulle on 29 January 1963. They are a band that in the end does not amount to more than 15 or 20 at the most.[235]. As Harold Macmillan concluded, Eden "was trained to win the Derby in 1938; unfortunately, he was not let out of the starting stalls until 1955. . He felt privately that he was being hounded from office by a backbench minority: Some few will be content with the success they have had in the assassination of their leader and will not care very much who the successor is. [76] Macmillan told Crossman: "We, my dear Crossman, are the Greeks in the American empire. [282], Dominic Sandbrook writes that Macmillan's final weeks were typical of his premiership, "devious, theatrical and self-seeking" although not without droll wit and intelligence. [206] Macmillan detested Sukarno, partly because he had been a Japanese collaborator in World War Two, and partly because of his fondness for elaborate uniforms despite never having personally fought in a war offended the World War I veteran Macmillan, who had a strong contempt for any man who had not seen combat. [153][pageneeded]. [214] As expected, the Beaverbrook newspapers whose readers tended to vote Conservative offered up ferocious criticism of Macmillan's application to join the EEC, accusing him of betrayal. [147], This period also saw the first stirrings of more active monetary policy. Such rhetoric reflected a new reality of working-class affluence; it has been argued that "the key factor in the Conservative victory was that average real pay for industrial workers had risen since Churchill's 1951 victory by over 20 per cent". [5] Near the end of his premiership, his government was rocked by the Vassall and Profumo scandals, which to cultural conservatives and supporters of opposing parties alike seemed to symbolise moral decay of the British establishment. He was assassinated in November, shortly after the end of Macmillan's premiership. '[243], Macmillan accepted the Order of Merit in 1976. Dorothy did her best to persuade her lover that the world would be well lost for her sake; but Boothby's political career would have been wrecked by a divorce and his means did not allow him to support her in anything like the style she took for granted. [41] As late as his North African posting of 194243 he reminded Churchill that he held the rank of captain in the Guards reserve.[42]. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. [6] Following his resignation, Macmillan lived out a long retirement as an elder statesman, being an active member of the House of Lords in his final years. [171] Macmillan believed that the American policies towards the Soviet Union were too rigid and confrontational, and favoured a policy of dtente with the aim of relaxing Cold War tensions. Macmillan failed to heed a warning from Secretary of State John Foster Dulles that whatever the British government did should wait until after the US presidential election on 6 November, and failed to report Dulles' remarks to Eden. He had been a very promising young man in the Tory party, but he always had his flaws. The Egyptian nationalisation of the Suez Canal by Nasser on 26 July 1956 prompted the British government and the French government of Guy Mollet to commence plans for invading Egypt, regaining the canal, and toppling Nasser. His affair with Lady Macmillan is said to have lasted nearly 30 years, ending only with her death in 1966. . 1, and nuclear contaminants travelled up a chimney where the filters blocked some, but not all, of the contaminated material. [116], In November 1956, Britain invaded Egypt in collusion with France and Israel in the Suez Crisis. Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1957 to 1963, Schooling, university and early political views, Parliamentary Secretary, Ministry of Supply (19401942), Minister Resident in the Mediterranean (19421945), Historians' assessments of Macmillan's premiership, Thorpe 2010, pp. [106] By the 1950s he had had his teeth capped, grew his hair in a more shapely style, wore Savile Row suits and walked with the ramrod bearing of a former Guards officer, acquiring the distinguished appearance of his later career. He had to have a plaster cast put on his face. [98], Macmillan achieved his housing target by the end of 1953, a year ahead of schedule. Within the fabric of the Commonwealth lies the future of the Colonial territories. [197] The two envoys who arrived in Moscow were W. Averell Harriman representing the United States and Lord Hailsham representing the United Kingdom. The incident prompted an inquiry from the War Office as to whether the Guards Reserve Battalion "could be relied on". [281], Campbell writes that: "a late developer who languished on the back benches in the 1930s, Macmillan seized his opportunity when it came with flair and ruthlessness, and [until about 1962] filled the highest office with compelling style". Macmillan also gave his surname to Dorothy's daughter Sarah who was born to Boothby in 1930. D. R. Thorpe argues that this, coming after the resignations of Labour ministers Aneurin Bevan, John Freeman and Harold Wilson in April 1951 (who had wanted higher expenditure), and the cuts made by Butler and Macmillan as Chancellors in 195556, was another step in the development of "stop-go" economics, as opposed to prudent medium-term management. His next publication, "The Next Five Years", was overshadowed by Lloyd George's proposed "New Deal" in 1935. [82] He was based at Caserta for the rest of the war. Many of the salacious revelations about the sex lives of "Establishment" figures during the Profumo affair damaged the image of "the Establishment" that Macmillan was seen as a part of, giving him the image by 1963 of a "failing representative of a decadent elite". [263] The Prince of Wales sent a wreath "in admiring memory". The report The Reshaping of British Railways[181] (or Beeching I report) was published on 27 March 1963. Lady Dorothy Cavendish, third daughter of the ninth Duke of Devonshire, was born in 1900 and brought up in the old tradition of great houses, nannies, governesses and noblesse oblige. [194], He was supportive throughout the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 and Kennedy consulted him by telephone every day. Official bank rate, which had been kept low since the 1930s, was hiked in September 1958. From the age of sixteen she lived with the family at Rideau Hall, Ottawa, where her father served as Governor General of Canada. [199], Macmillan's first government had seen the first phase of the sub-Saharan African independence movement, which accelerated under his second government. Macmillan married Lady Dorothy Cavendish, the daughter of the 9th Duke of Devonshire, on 21 April 1920. [48] John Campbell suggests that Macmillan's humiliation was first a major cause of his odd and rebellious behaviour in the 1930s then, in subsequent decades, made him a harder and more ruthless politician than his rivals Eden and Butler.[49]. [250]:27 In a celebrated speech he wondered aloud where such theories had come from: Was it America? [105] Petain, a successful French general in the First World War, had become senile while heading the pro-German Vichy Regime in the Second World War. [148], During his time as prime minister, average living standards steadily rose[149] while numerous social reforms were carried out. In one respect, things today are better then they were. Macmillan was appointed Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies in 1942, in his own words "leaving a madhouse to enter a mausoleum". He supported the welfare state and the necessity of a mixed economy with some nationalised industries and strong trade unions. [227][228], Macmillan was operated on at 11.30am on Thursday 10 October. "[237] Outlawed African National Congress president Oliver Tambo sent his condolences: 'As South Africans we shall always remember him for his efforts to encourage the apartheid regime to bow to the winds of change that continue to blow in South Africa. [209] Sukarno was the leader of the most populous nation in Southeast Asia and though officially neutral in the Cold War, tended to take anti-Western positions, and Kennedy favoured accommodating him to bring him closer to the West; for example, supporting Indonesia's claim to Dutch New Guinea even through the Netherlands was a NATO ally. March 1957 Lord Home succeeds Lord Salisbury as Lord President, remaining Commonwealth Relations Secretary. Sex was not yet openly discussed - not even between husband and wife - and to splash details of illicit affairs would probably have been counter-productive. The Ambassador David Ormsby-Gore was a close family friend of the President and actively involved in White House discussions on how to resolve the crisis. [59] In September 1932 he made his first visit to the USSR. [139], He became President of the Carlton Club in 1977 and would often stay at the club when he had to stay in London overnight. During the Second World War Macmillan's toothy grin, baggy trousers and rimless glasses had given him, as his biographer puts it, "an air of an early Bolshevik leader". He made the famous 'wind of change' speech in Cape Town on 3 February 1960. In particular, the railway system must be modelled to meet current needs, and the modernisation plan must be adapted to this new shape",[note 1] and with the premise that the railways should be run as a profitable business. Lady Catherine Macmillan Sarah Heath Maurice Macmillan. 'Sarah looked very much like Boothby and there's no doubt he was her father. [18][pageneeded] He served with distinction and was wounded on three occasions. For the replacement for Blue Steel he opted for Britain to join the American Skybolt missile project. Married Andrew Heath in 1953; two children. His disapproval handicapped Boothby's political prospects enormously. [97] In July 1953 Macmillan considered postponing his gall bladder operation in case Churchill, who had just suffered a serious stroke while Eden was also in hospital, had to step down. I'm only eighty-two. Contemporaries have described Macmillan as 'a cold and unfeeling man, especially where sex was concerned'. After Butler's downbeat remarks, ten minutes or so in length, Macmillan delivered a stirring thirty-five minute speech described by Enoch Powell as "one of the most horrible things that I remember in politics (Macmillan) with all the skill of the old actor manager succeeded in false-footing Rab. Edward Heath (1970-1974): Her Majesty and Heath's relationship was a difficult one, particularly because their views differed immensely. [70] Though a junior minister he was a member of the Privy Council, and he spoke in the House of Commons for Colonial Secretaries Lord Moyne and Lord Cranborne. [35] However, at the end of 1918 Macmillan joined the Guards Reserve Battalion at Chelsea Barracks for "light duties". [189] Kennedy for his part wanted Britain to commit forces to Laos if the United States did for political reasons. He wondered aloud where such theories had come from: was it America of... Mixed economy with some nationalised industries and strong trade unions the magazine New and. 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