Leo Amery

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Leopold Charles Maurice Stennett Amery CH, PC (22 November 1873 – 16 September 1955), usually known as Leo Amery or L. S. Amery, was a British Conservative Party politician and journalist, noted for his interest in military preparedness, India and the British Empire.

Contents 1 Early life and character 2 Journalism, starting a political career and his first two wars 3 Wilderness years 4 Rearmament and appeasement 5 India Secretary 6 Retirement from politics 7 Personal life 8 Footnotes 9 References

[edit] Early life and character

Leopold Amery was born in Gorakhpur, India to an English father and a Hungarian Jewish mother. His mother, who was the sister of the orientalist Gottlieb Wilhelm Leitner had come to India from England, where her parents had settled and converted to Protestantism. Amery's father, Charles F. Amery, of Middle Coombe, Lustleigh, Devon, an officer of the Indian Forest Department, deserted the family when the children were young, and their mother made great sacrifices to educate her two sons.

Leo Amery was educated at Harrow, where he was a contemporary of Winston Churchill. Their two lives were destined to interconnect repeatedly. There is a noted story of Churchill pushing the year-older Amery into the school swimming pool. Churchill made amends later, but the two were never close. Amery was multidimensional like Churchill, was just as intelligent and in his own way as great or greater a visionary. But he lacked Churchill's glamour, his oratorical ability and his brilliance as a writer. Amery was competent, hard working, honourable, honest and able, but had a tendency to become a bore on certain topics. He never built a core of supporters or a broad following. Nevertheless he was a great success in life, rising from difficult circumstances to become an outstanding student, a successful journalist and author, a great administrator, a successful businessman and an effective cabinet minister. Few people bear comparison to Winston Churchill.

Time Magazine, in its January 3, 1927 edition, described him thus:

"Even Mr. Amery's pugnacity and physical courage have not succeeded in making him a popular character. At one of his meetings, when someone called him a liar, he promptly leapt from the platform and knocked him down..."

"His public form is ...hard, arid, vitriolic."

"Ïf I were to name the most influential member of the Government, I should name the most dour, the most drab, the least popularly attractive figure in cabinet."

"The form his fanaticism takes is Imperialism."

"No lip service from him to that nonsence about the League of Nations."

Amery gained a First at Balliol College, Oxford. He was elected a fellow of All Souls College. Undoubtedly bright, he could speak Hindi at the age of three and could converse in French, German, Italian, Bulgarian, Turkish, Serbian and Hungarian.

[edit] Journalism, starting a political career and his first two wars

During the Second Boer War Amery was a correspondent for The Times. His articles in that paper in 1901 on the reform of the army in southern Africa which attacked British General Sir Redvers Henry Buller contributed to Buller's sacking. Amery later edited the Times History of the South African War. He was a member of the Coefficients dining club of social reformers set up in 1902 by the Fabian campaigners Sidney and Beatrice Webb.

In 1911, he was elected as a Liberal Unionist Member of Parliament (MP) for Birmingham South. One reason why Amery agreed to stand there under the Liberal Unionist label (they were to fully merge with the Conservatives the following year) was that he had been a long time political admirer of Joseph Chamberlain and was an ardent supporter of Tariff Reform and imperial federation.

During the Great War his language skills led to his employment as an Intelligence Officer in the Balkans. Later as an under-secretary in Lloyd George's national government he helped draft the Balfour Declaration (1917). He also encouraged Jabotinsky in the formation of the Jewish Legion of the British Army. He was First Lord of the Admiralty (1922 - 1924) under Andrew Bonar Law and Stanley Baldwin then later a very active Colonial Secretary (1924-1929).

[edit] Wilderness years

Throughout his political career, Amery was an exponent of Imperial unity, as he saw the British Empire as a force for justice and progress in the world. He strongly supported the evolution of the dominions into independent nations bound to Britain by ties of kinship, trade, defence and a common pride in the Empire. He also supported the gradual evolution of other colonies, particularly India, to the same status. In this he differed from Churchill, a free trader, who was less interested in the Empire as such, and more in Britain itself as a great power. Amery felt that Britain was too weak by itself to maintain its great power position.

Amery was very active in imperial affairs during the 1920s and 1930s. He was in charge of colonial affairs and relations with the dominions from 1924 to 1929. In the 1930s he was a member of the Empire Industries Association and a chief organizer of the huge rally celebrating the Empire at the Royal Albert Hall in 1936 marking the centenary of Joseph Chamberlain's birth. Amery maintained a very busy speaking schedule, with almost 200 engagements between 1936 and 1938, many of them devoted to imperial topics, especially Imperial Preference.

Amery was not invited to join the National Government formed in the 1930s. He remained in Parliament, but joined the boards of several prominent corporations. This was necessary as he had no independent means and had depleted his savings during World War I and when he was a cabinet minister during the 1920s. Among his directorships were the boards of several German metal fabrication companies (representing British capital invested in the companies), of the British Southern Railway, the Gloucester Wagon Company, Marks and Spencer, the famous shipbuilding firm Cammell Laird, and the Trust and Loan of Canada. He was also chairman of the Iraq Currency Board.

In the course of his duties as a director of German metal fabrication companies, visiting factories, Amery gained a good understanding of German military potential. Hitler became alarmed at this situation and ordered a halt to non-German directors. Amery spent a lot of time in Germany during the 1930s in connection with his work. He was not allowed to send his director's fees out of the country, so he took his family on holiday in the Bavarian Alps. He had a lengthy meeting with Hitler on at least one occasion. He also met at length with the Czech leader, Benes, the Austrian leaders Dollfuss and Schuschnigg and Benito Mussolini of Italy.

[edit] Rearmament and appeasement

In the debates on the need for an increased effort to rearm British forces, Amery tended to focus on army affairs, with Churchill speaking more about air defence and Roger Keyes talking about naval affairs. Austen Chamberlain was, until his death, a member of this group as well. While there was no question that Churchill was the most prominent and effective, Amery's work was not insignificant. He was a driving force behind the creation of the Army League, a pressure group designed to keep the needs of the British Army before the public.

In the 1930s, Amery, along with Winston Churchill, was a bitter critic of the appeasement of Nazi Germany, often openly attacking his own party. Being a former Colonial and Dominions Secretary, he was very aware of the views of the dominions and strongly opposed giving Germany back her colonies, a proposal seriously considered by Neville Chamberlain.

On the rearmament question, Amery was consistent. He advocated a higher level of expenditure, but also a reappraisal of priorities through the creation of a top level cabinet position to develop overall defence strategy, so that the increased expenditures could be spent wisely. He thought that either he or Churchill should be given the post. When a ministry for the coordination of defence was finally created under a political lightweight, Sir Thomas Inskip, he regarded it as a joke. Churchill said the appointment was the most curious since Caligula made his horse a consul.

When the war came, Amery was one of the few anti-appeasers who was opposed to co-operation with the Soviet Union in order to defeat Nazi Germany. This came from a life-long fear of Communism.

It is commonly believed that, when Neville Chamberlain announced his flight to Munich to the cheers of the House, Amery was one of only four members who remained seated (the others were Churchill, Anthony Eden and Harold Nicolson). There is, however, some debate as to whether Amery did in fact remain seated, or whether he just appeared to because he was so short!

Amery differed from Churchill in hoping throughout the 1930s to foster an alliance with Italy to counter the rising strength of Nazi Germany. A united front of Britain, France and Italy would, he felt, have prevented a Nazi takeover of Austria, especially if supported by Czechoslovakia. For this reason he was in favour of appeasing Italy, by tacitly conceding her claims to Ethiopia. A start in this direction was made in the so-called Stresa Front of 1935, but the move by Britain to impose economic sanctions on Italy, after the Italian invasion of Ethiopia in 1936, drove Italy, he felt, into the arms of Germany.

Another feature of Amery's outlook was a significant distrust of the administration of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. This stemmed from the thrust of the American Secretary of State, Cordell Hull, to use all his influence to pressure Canada to oppose Empire Free Trade, perhaps Amery's most cherished project. While the pressure was unsuccessful with Canadian Conservative prime minister, Richard Bedford Bennett, his Liberal successor, William Lyon Mackenzie King, adopted a more pro-American stance.

Amery is famous for two moments of high drama in the House of Commons early in World War II. On 2 September 1939, Neville Chamberlain spoke in a Commons debate and said (in effect) that he was not declaring war on Germany immediately for having invaded Poland. This greatly angered Amery and was felt by many present to be out of touch with the temper of the British people. As Labour Party leader Clement Attlee was absent, Arthur Greenwood stood up in his place and announced that he was speaking for Labour. Amery called out to him across the floor, 'Speak for England Arthur!' -- which carried the undeniable implication that Chamberlain was not.

The second incident occurred during the notorious Norway Debate in 1940. After a string of military and naval disasters were announced, Amery famously attacked Chamberlain's government, quoting Oliver Cromwell:

You have sat too long here for any good you have been doing. Depart, I say, and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!^[1]

This debate led to 42 Conservative MPs voting against Chamberlain and 36 abstaining, leading to the downfall of the Conservative government and the formation of a national government under Churchill's premiership. Amery himself noted in his diary that he believed that his speech was one of his best received in the House, and that he had made a difference to the outcome of the debate.

[edit] India Secretary

During World War II he was Secretary of State for India, despite the fact that the fate of India had been a keen issue of dispute between Churchill and Amery for many years. Amery was disappointed not to be given a post in the War Cabinet, but he was determined to do all he could in the position he was offered. He was continually frustrated by Churchill's intransigence, and in his memoirs records that Churchill knew "as much of the Indian problem as George III did of the American colonies."

[edit] Retirement from politics

At the 1945 general election, he lost his seat to Labour's Percy Shurmer, a Post Office worker. He was offered but refused a peerage because this might, when he died, have cut short his son Julian's political career in the House of Commons. However, he was made a Companion of Honour. In retirement, Amery published his three volume autobiography, My Political Life (1953-5).

[edit] Personal life

Leo Amery was a noted outdoorsman, especially famous as a mountaineer. He continued to climb well into his sixties, especially in the Swiss Alps, but also in Bavaria, Austria, Yugoslavia and Italy as well as in the Canadian Rockies where Mt. Amery is named after him. He enjoyed skiing as well. He was a member of the Alpine Club (serving as its President, 1943–1945) and also of the Athenaeum and Carlton clubs. He was a Senior Knight Vice President of the Knights of The Round Table Club.^[2]

Leo Amery's elder son, John Amery (1912–1945), had a troubled early life. During the second world war he made pro-Nazi broadcasts from Berlin and attempted to recruit British prisoners of war to serve in uniform under the Nazis on the Eastern Front. After the war he was tried and hanged for treason. Leo Amery amended his entry in Who's Who to read "one s[on]".^[3] The playwright Ronald Harwood, who explores the relationship between Leo and John Amery in his play An English Tragedy (2008), considers it significant to John Amery's story that Leo Amery had apparently concealed his partly Jewish ancestry.

Amery's younger son, Julian Amery (1919–1996), became a Conservative politician and served in the cabinets of Harold Macmillan and Edward Heath.

[edit] Footnotes

[edit] References

• Amery, L.S., "Days of Fresh Air, Being Reminiscences of Outdoor Life" , Hutchinson Universal Book Club, London, 1940
• Amery, L.S., "My Political Life, Vol. 3 The Unforgiving Years: 1929-1940" , Hutchinson & Co,. Ltd, London, 1955
• Faber, David Speaking for England: Leo, Julian and John Amery: The Tragedy of a Political Family, Free Press, 2005, ISBN 0-7432-5688-3
• Independence Bibliography
• Nicolson, Harold & Nicolson, Nigel (ed.) (1967), The Diaries and Letters of Harold Nicolson, vol. II: The War Years, 1939-1945, New York: Atheneum, Library of Congress cat. 66-23571 
• Leopold Amery. Spartacus Educational. Retrieved on 2007-11-19.

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by Viscount Morpeth	Member of Parliament for Birmingham South 1911–1918	Succeeded by (constituency abolished)
Preceded by (new constituency)	Member of Parliament for Birmingham Sparkbrook 1918–1945	Succeeded by Percy Shurmer
Political offices
Preceded by William Hewins	Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies 1919–1921	Succeeded by Edward Wood
Preceded by The Lord Lee of Fareham	First Lord of the Admiralty 1922–1924	Succeeded by The Viscount Chelmsford
Preceded by James Henry Thomas	Colonial Secretary 1924–1929	Succeeded by The Lord Passfield
Preceded by —	Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs 1925–1929
Preceded by The Marquess of Zetland	Secretary of State for India and Burma 1940–1945	Succeeded by The Lord Pethick-Lawrence