George Lloyd, 1st Baron Lloyd

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George Ambrose Lloyd, 1st Baron Lloyd, GCSI, GCIE, DSO, PC (1879 – February 4, 1941) was a British Conservative politician strongly associated with the "Diehard" wing of the party.

Educated at Eton College and Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1901 he joined the family firm Stewarts & Lloyds as its youngest director. In 1903 he first became involved with the tariff reform movement of Joseph Chamberlain.

In 1905 he turned down an offer by Stewart& Lloyds of a steady position in London and chose to embark on a study of the East in the British Empire. Through the efforts of his friends Samuel Pepys Cockerell, working in the commercial department of the Foreign Office, and Gertrude Bell who he had come to know, he started work as an unpaid honorary attaché in Constantinople. At "Old Stamboul"^[1]as he came to remember the Embassy of Sir Nicholas O'Conor he worked together with Laurence Oliphant, Percy Loraine and Alexander Cadogan. There also he first met Mark Sykes and Aubrey Herbert. In April 1906 Aubrey Herbert joined him on an exploration of the state of the Baghdad Railway.^[2]. His confidential memorandum of November 1906 on the Hejaz railway gave a detailed account of many economic problems. This, and other papers- on Turkish finance, for example-led to his apointement in January 1907 as a special commissioner to investigate trading prospects around the Persian Gulf.

At the January 1910 general election he was elected as a Liberal Unionist Member of Parliament (MP) for West Staffordshire, marrying Blanche Lascelles the following year.

During World War I he served on the staff of Sir Ian Hamilton at Gallipoli landing with the ANZACs on the first day of that campaign and, after a time in Cairo, with T. E. Lawrence and the Arab Bureau in Hejaz, the Negev and the Sinai desert. He reached the rank of Captain and was awarded the Distinguished Service Order in 1917.

In conjunction with Edward Wood (later Earl of Halifax) he wrote The Great Opportunity in 1918. This book was meant to be a Conservative challenge to the Lloyd George coalition and stressed devolution of power from Westminster and the importance of reviving English industry and agriculture.

In December 1918 he was appointed Governor of Bombay and made KCIE. His principal activities while Governor were reclaiming land for housing in the Back Bay area of the city of Bombay and building the Sukkur Barrage an irrigation scheme both of which were funded by loans raised in India instead of in England. Lloyd's administration was the first to raise such funds locally. He completed his term as Governor in 1922 and was made a Privy Counsellor and GCSI.

In the 1920s he served as High Commissioner to Egypt until his resignation was forced by Foreign Secretary Arthur Henderson. He returned to Parliament again for Eastbourne in 1924, serving until 1925, when he was made Baron Lloyd. During the 1930s he was one of the most prominent opponents of proposals to grant Indian Home Rule, working alongside Winston Churchill against the National Government. When Churchill became Prime Minister in May 1940, he appointed Lloyd as Secretary of State for the Colonies and in December of that year he conferred the additional job of Leader of the House of Lords. However Lloyd died in office two months later.

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[edit] Biography

Lord Lloyd and the decline of the British Empire, John Charmley, Weidenfeld 1987

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by Henry McLaren	Member of Parliament for West Staffordshire January 1910–1918	Succeeded by (constituency abolished)
Preceded by Rupert Sackville Gwynne	Member of Parliament for Eastbourne 1929–1925	Succeeded by William Reginald Hall
Political offices
Preceded by The Lord Willingdon	Governor of Bombay 1918-1923	Succeeded by Leslie Orme Wilson
Preceded by The Viscount Allenby	British High Commissioner in Egypt 1925–1929	Succeeded by Sir Percy Loraine
Preceded by Malcolm MacDonald	Secretary of State for the Colonies 1940–1941	Succeeded by The Lord Moyne
Preceded by The Viscount Halifax	Leader of the House of Lords 1940–1941
Peerage of the United Kingdom
Preceded by (new creation)	Baron Lloyd 1925–1941	Succeeded by Alexander Lloyd

Persondata
NAME	Lloyd, George Ambrose
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	1st Baron Lloyd
SHORT DESCRIPTION	British Conservative politician. Governor of Bombay, Secretary of State for the Colonies, Leader of the House of Lords
DATE OF BIRTH	1879
PLACE OF BIRTH
DATE OF DEATH	4 February 1941
PLACE OF DEATH