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Maurice Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, OM, PC (10 February 1894 – 29 December 1986) was a British Conservative politician and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 10 January 1957 to 18 October 1963.

Nicknamed 'Supermac' and known for his pragmatism, wit and unflappability, Macmillan achieved notoriety before the Second World War as a Tory radical and critic of appeasement. Rising to high office as a protegé of wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill, he believed in the essential decency of the post-war settlement and the necessity of a mixed economy, and in his premiership pursued corporatist policies to develop the domestic market as the engine of growth. As a One Nation Tory of the Disraelian tradition, haunted by memories of the Great Depression, he championed a Keynesian strategy of public investment to maintain demand, winning a second term in 1959 on an electioneering budget. Benefiting from favourable international conditions, he presided over an age of affluence, marked by low unemployment and high if uneven growth. In his immortal Bedfordmarker speech of July 1957 he correctly told the nation they had 'never had it so good', but warned of the dangers of inflation, summing up the fragile prosperity of the 1950s.

In international affairs Macmillan rebuilt the special relationship with the United Statesmarker from the wreckage of Suez, and redrew the world map by decolonising sub-Saharan Africa. Reconfiguring the nation's defences to meet the realities of the nuclear age, he ended National Service, strengthened the nuclear deterrent by acquiring Polaris, and pioneered the Nuclear Test Ban with the United States and the Soviet Unionmarker. Belatedly recognising the dangers of strategic dependence, he sought a new role for Britain in Europe, but his unwillingness to disclose United States nuclear secrets to France contributed to a French veto of the United Kingdom's entry into the European Economic Community.

Macmillan's government in its final year was rocked by the Vassall and Profumo scandals, which seemed to symbolise for the rebellious youth of the 1960s the moral decay of the British establishment. Resigning prematurely after a medical misdiagnosis, Macmillan lived out a long retirement as an elder statesman of global stature. He was as trenchant a critic of his successors in his old age as he had been of his predecessors in his youth. When asked what represented the greatest challenge for a statesman, Macmillan replied: 'Events, my dear boy, events'.

Early life

Family

Harold Macmillan was born at 52 Cadogan Place in Chelseamarker, London, to Maurice Crawford Macmillan (1853–1936), publisher, and Helen (Nellie) Artie Tarleton Belles (1856–1937), artist and socialite, from Spencer, Indianamarker, USmarker. He had two brothers, Daniel, eight years his senior, and Arthur, four years his senior. His paternal grandfather, Daniel MacMillan (1813–1857), was the son of a Scottish crofter who founded Macmillan Publishers.

Education

Macmillan was first educated at Summer Fields Schoolmarker and then at Etonmarker but left during his first half after a serious attack of pneumonia. He also attended Balliol College, Oxfordmarker, although he only completed two years of the four-year course reading Greats before the outbreak of the First World War.

War service

Macmillan served with distinction as a captain in the Grenadier Guards during the war, and was wounded on three occasions. During the Battle of the Somme, he spent an entire day wounded and lying in a slit trench with a bullet in his pelvis, reading the classical Greek playwright Aeschylus in his original language. Macmillan spent the final two years of the war under anaesthetic in hospital undergoing a long series of operations, seeing no further active service. His hip wound took four years to heal completely, and left him with a slight shuffle to his walk (and a limp grip in his right hand from a separate hand wound) for the rest of his life. As was common for contemporary former officers, he continued to be known as 'Captain Macmillan' until the early 1930s.

Canadian aide-de-campship

Macmillan lost so many of his fellow students during the war that afterwards he refused to return to Oxfordmarker, saying the university would never be the same. He served instead in Ottawamarker, Canadamarker, in 1919 as ADC to Victor Cavendish, 9th Duke of Devonshire, then Governor General of Canada and future father-in-law.

Publishing

On his return to London in 1920 he joined the family firm Macmillan Publishers as a junior partner, remaining with the company until his appointment to ministerial office in 1940.

Marriage

Macmillan married Lady Dorothy Cavendish, daughter of the 9th Duke of Devonshire, on 21 April 1920. Her great-uncle was Spencer Cavendish, 8th Duke of Devonshire, who was leader of the Liberal Party in the 1870s, and a close colleague of William Gladstone, Joseph Chamberlain and Lord Salisbury. Lady Dorothy was also descended from William Cavendish, 4th Duke of Devonshire, who served as Prime Minister from 1756–1757 in communion with Newcastle and Pitt the Elder. Her nephew William Cavendish, Marquess of Hartington married Kathleen, a sister of John F. Kennedy. Between 1929 and 1935 Lady Dorothy had a long affair with the Conservative politician Robert Boothby, in full public view of Westminster and established society. Boothby was widely rumoured to have been the father of Macmillan's youngest daughter Sarah. The stress caused by this may have contributed to Macmillan's nervous breakdown in 1931. Lady Dorothy died on 21 May 1966, aged 65.

The Macmillans had four children:

Brother-in-law

On 26 November 1950, Lady Dorothy's brother Edward Cavendish, the 10th Duke of Devonshire had a heart attack and died in the presence of John Bodkin Adams, the suspected serial killer. Thirteen days before, Edith Alice Morrell, another patient of Adams, had also died. Adams was tried in 1957 for her murder but controversially acquitted. Political interference has been suspected and indeed, the case was prosecuted by a member of Macmillan's cabinet, Sir Reginald Manningham-Buller. Home office pathologist Francis Camps linked Adams to a total of 163 suspicious deaths.

Eileen O'Casey

Eileen Kathleen O'Casey (née Reynolds), the actress wife of Irish dramatist Seán O'Casey, had a close relationship with Macmillan, who had published her husband’s plays. There is disagreement over whether he proposed after she was widowed. According to her husband's biographer: 'Eileen and O'Casey's marriage had become celibate by the time she was in her fifties, now a strikingly handsome woman, notable for her warm wit, who, on her own candid admission, fulfilled her sexual needs outside marriage ... One ardent, lifelong admirer was Macmillan, who in later life gently broached to her the idea of marriage, which she declined.'

Eileen's obituary notice in the Evening Standard states: 'It was the death of Sean O'Casey in 1964, and of Dorothy Macmillan, two years later, that cemented Macmillan and Eileen’s intimacy. She became the light which illuminated his prime years, eventually even replacing Dorothy in his affections.' O'Casey's biographer notes that 'Eileen was the first woman whom Macmillan asked to sit in Lady Dorothy’s place at table in Birch Grove; he also took her out frequently to dine at Buck’s Club.'

Eileen's obituary in The Times records that 'she became one of Harold Macmillan's closest friends. The two grew even closer after the death of their respective spouses. That Macmillan never proposed marriage was a source of bewilderment to outsiders, although Eileen was understanding about his shyness....Her relationship with Macmillan, which only ended with his death in 1986, was a source of comfort to her in old age. For his part, he relied completely on her honest, outspoken Irish perspective. She recalled one lunch when Lord Home asked Macmillan to accept a peerage: "Harold turned to me and said 'What about that Eileen?' I told him I thought it nicer to keep the name Harold Macmillan to the end of his days and said, 'Titles are two-a-penny these days. Butchers and bakers and candlestick makers are all getting them.' I got the impression that Alec Home was a bit annoyed with me."

Political career (1924–1957)

Private Member (1924–1929, 1931–1940)

Elected to the House of Commonsmarker in 1924 for the depressed northern industrial constituency of Stockton-on-Tees, Macmillan lost his seat in 1929 in the face of high regional unemployment, but returned in 1931. He spent the 1930s on the backbenches, with his championing of economic planning, anti-appeasement ideals and sharp criticism of Stanley Baldwin and Neville Chamberlain serving to isolate him from the party leadership. During this time (1938) he published the first edition of his book The Middle Way, which advocated a broadly centrist political philosophy both domestically and internationally.

Supply Parliamentary Secretary (1940–1942)

In the Second World War Macmillan at last attained office, serving in the wartime coalition government as the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Supply from 1940 to 1942. The task of the department was to provide armaments and other equipment to the British Army and Royal Air Force. Macmillan travelled up and down the country to co-ordinate production, working with some success under Lord Beaverbrook to increase the supply and quality of armoured vehicles.

Colonial Under-Secretary (1942)

Macmillan was appointed as Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies in 1942, in his own words, 'leaving a madhouse in order to enter a mausoleum'. Though a junior minister he was sworn of the Privy Council and spoke in the House of Commonsmarker for successive Colonial Secretaries Lord Moyne and Lord Cranborne. Macmillan was given responsibility for increasing colonial production and trade, and signalled the future direction of British policy when in June 1942 he declared:

Minister Resident in the Mediterranean (1942–1945)

Macmillan attained real power and Cabinet rank upon being sent to North Africa in 1942 as British government representative to the Allies in the Mediterranean, reporting directly to Prime Minister Winston Churchill over the head of the Foreign Secretary, Anthony Eden. During this assignment Macmillan served as liaison and mediator between Churchill and US General Dwight D. Eisenhower in North Africa, building a rapport with the latter that would prove helpful in his later career.

As minister resident with a roving commission, Macmillan also the minister advising General Keightley of V Corps, the senior Allied commander in Austria responsible for Operation Keelhaul, which included the forced repatriation of up to 70,000 prisoners of war to the Soviet Unionmarker and Tito's Yugoslavia in 1945. The deportations and Macmillan's involvement later became a source of controversy because of the harsh treatment meted out to Nazi collaborators and anti-partisans by the receiving countries, and because in the confusion V Corps went beyond the terms agreed at Yaltamarker and AFHQ directives by repatriating 4000 White Russian troops and 11,000 civilian family members who could not properly be regarded as Soviet citizens.

Air Secretary (1945)

Macmillan returned to England after the European war and was Secretary of State for Air for two months in Churchill's caretaker government, 'much of which was taken up in electioneering', there being 'nothing much to be done in the way of forward planning'. He felt himself 'almost a stranger at home', and lost his seat in the landslide Labour victory of 1945, but soon returned to Parliament in a November 1945 by-election in Bromley.

Housing Minister (1951–1954)

With the Conservative victory in 1951 Macmillan became Minister of Housing under Churchill, who entrusted Macmillan with fulfilling the latter's conference promise to build 300,000 houses per year. 'It is a gamble—it will make or mar your political career,' Churchill said, 'but every humble home will bless your name if you succeed.' Macmillan achieved the target a year ahead of schedule.

Defence Minister (1954–1955)

Macmillan served as Minister of Defence from October 1954, but found his authority restricted by Churchill's personal involvement. In the opinion of The Economist: 'He gave the impression that his own undoubted capacity for imaginative running of his own show melted way when an august superior was breathing down his neck.'

A major theme of Macmillan's tenure at Defence was the ministry's growing reliance on the nuclear deterrent, in the view of some critics, to the detriment of conventional forces. The Defence White Paper of February 1955, announcing the decision to produce the hydrogen bomb, received bipartisan support.

By this time Macmillan had lost the wire-rimmed glasses, toothy grin and brylcreemed hair of wartime photographs, and instead grew his hair thick and glossy, had his teeth capped and walked with the ramrod bearing of a former Guards officer—acquiring the distinguished appearance of his later career.

Foreign Secretary (1955)

Macmillan served as Foreign Secretary in April-December 1955 in the government of Anthony Eden. Returning from the Geneva Summit of that year he made headlines by declaring: 'There ain’t gonna be no war.' Of the role of Foreign Secretary Macmillan famously observed:

Chancellor of the Exchequer (1955–1957)

Macmillan served as Chancellor of the Exchequer 1955–1957. In this office he insisted that Eden's de facto deputy Rab Butler not be treated as senior to him, and threatened resignation until he was allowed to cut bread and milk subsidies. One of Macmillan's innovations at the Treasurymarker was the introduction of premium bonds, announced in his budget of 17 April 1956. Although the Labour Opposition initially decried the sale as a 'squalid raffle', it proved an immediate hit with the public. During the Suez Crisis, according to Shadow Chancellor Harold Wilson, Macmillan was 'first in, first out': first very supportive of the invasion, then a prime mover in Britain's withdrawal in the wake of the financial crisis.

Prime Minister (1957–1963)

First government (1957–1959)

Harold Macmillan became Prime Minister and leader of the Conservative Party after Eden's resignation in January 1957, surprising observers with his appointment over the favourite, Rab Butler. The political situation after Suez was so desperate that on taking office on 10 January he told Queen Elizabeth II he could not guarantee his government would last "six weeks".

Macmillan populated his government with many who had studied at the same school as he: he filled government posts with 35 former Etonians, 7 of whom sat in Cabinet. He was also devoted to family members: when Andrew Cavendish, 11th Duke of Devonshire was later appointed (Minister for Colonial Affairs from 1963 to 1964 amongst other positions) he described his uncle's behaviour as "the greatest act of nepotism ever".

He was nicknamed Supermac in 1958 by cartoonist Victor 'Vicky' Weisz. It was intended as mockery, but backfired, coming to be used in a neutral or friendly fashion. Weisz tried to label him with other names, including "Mac the Knife" at the time of widespread cabinet changes in 1962, but none of these caught on.

Economy

Macmillan brought the monetary concerns of the Exchequer into office; the economy was his prime concern. His One Nation approach to the economy was to seek high or full employment. This contrasted with his mainly monetarist Treasury ministers who argued that the support of sterling required strict controls on money and hence an unavoidable rise in unemployment. Their advice was rejected and in January 1958 the three Treasury ministers Peter Thorneycroft, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Nigel Birch, Economic Secretary to the Treasury, and Enoch Powell, the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, resigned. Macmillan, away on a tour of the Commonwealth, brushed aside this incident as 'a little local difficulty'.

Foreign policy

Macmillan took close control of foreign policy. He worked to narrow the post-Suez rift with the United States, where his wartime friendship with Dwight D. Eisenhower was key; the two had a productive conference in Bermudamarker as early as March 1957.

In February 1959 Macmillan became the first Western leader to visit the Soviet Unionmarker since the Second World War. Talks with Nikita Khrushchev eased tensions in East-West relations over West Berlin and led to an agreement in principle to stop nuclear tests and to hold a further summit meeting of Alliedmarker and Soviet heads of government.

In the Middle East, faced by the 1958 collapse of the Baghdad Pact and the spread of Soviet influence, Macmillan acted decisively to restore the confidence of Gulfmarker allies, using the RAF and special forcesmarker to defeat a revolt backed by Saudi Arabiamarker and Egyptmarker against the Sultan of Omanmarker in July 1957, deploying airborne battalions to defend Jordanmarker against Syrianmarker subversion in July 1958, and deterring a threatened Iraqimarker invasion of Kuwaitmarker by landing a brigade group in July 1960.

Macmillan was also a major proponent and architect of decolonisation. The Gold Coast was granted independence as Ghanamarker, and Malayamarker and North Borneo as Malaysiamarker in 1957.

Nuclear deterrent

In April 1957 Macmillan reaffirmed his strong support for the British nuclear deterrent. A succession of prime ministers since the Second World War had been determined to persuade the United States to revive wartime co-operation in the area of nuclear weapons research. Macmillan believed that one way to encourage such co-operation would be for the United Kingdom to speed up the development of its own hydrogen bomb, which was successfully tested on 8 November 1957.

Macmillan's decision led to increased demands on the Windscale and (subsequently) Calder Hall nuclear plants to produce plutonium for military purposes. As a result the safety margins of the radioactive materials inside the Windscale reactor were eroded. This contributed to the Windscale accidentmarker on the night of 10 October 1957, in which a fire broke out in the plutonium plant of Pile No. 1, and nuclear contaminants travelled up a chimney where the filters blocked some but not all of the contaminated material. The radioactive cloud spread to south-east England and fallout reached mainland Europe. Although scientists had warned of the dangers of such an accident for some time, the government blamed the workers who had put out the fire for 'an error of judgement', rather than the political pressure for fast-tracking the megaton bomb.

Macmillan, concerned that public confidence in the nuclear programme might be shaken and that technical information might be misused by opponents of defence co-operation in the US Congress, withheld all but the summary of a report into the Windscale fire prepared for the Atomic Energy Authority by Sir William Penney, director of the Atomic Weapons Research Establishmentmarker. While subsequently released files show that 'Macmillan's cuts were few and covered up few technical details', and that even the full report at the time found no danger to public health, later official estimates acknowledged the release of polonium-210 may have led directly to 25 to 50 deaths, and anti-nuclear groups linked it to 1,000 fatal cancers.

On 25 March 1957 Macmillan also acceded to Eisenhower's request to base 60 Thor IRBM in England under joint control, to replace the nuclear bombers of the Strategic Air Command, which had been stationed under joint control in the country since 1948, and were approaching obsolescence. Partly as a consequence of this favour, in late October 1957, the US McMahon Act was eased to facilitate nuclear co-operation between the two governments, initially with a view to producing cleaner weapons and reducing the need for duplicate testing. The Mutual Defence Agreement followed on 3 July 1958, speeding up British ballistic missile development, notwithstanding unease expressed at the time about the impetus co-operation might give to atomic proliferation by arousing the jealousy of France and other allies.

Election campaign (1959)

Macmillan led the Conservatives to victory in the October 1959 general election, increasing his party's majority from 67 to 107 seats. The successful campaign was based on the economic improvements achieved; the slogan "Life's Better Under the Conservatives" was matched by Macmillan's own remark, "indeed let us be frank about it—most of our people have never had it so good.", usually paraphrased as "You've never had it so good". Such rhetoric reflected a new reality of working-class affluence; it has been argued: "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".

Critics contended that the actual economic growth rate was weak and distorted by increased defence spending.

Second government (1959–1963)

Economy

Britain's balance of payments problems led to the imposition of a wage freeze in 1961 and, amongst other factors, this caused the government to lose popularity and a series of by-elections in March 1962.

Fearing for his own position, Macmillan organised a major Cabinet change in July 1962—also named 'the night of long knives' as a symbol of his alleged betrayal of the Conservative party. Eight junior Ministers were sacked at the same time. The Cabinet changes were widely seen as a sign of panic, and the young Liberal MP Jeremy Thorpe said of Macmillan's dismissal of so many of his colleagues, 'greater love hath no man than this, than to lay down his friends for his life'.

Macmillan supported the creation of the National Incomes Commission as a means to institute controls on income as part of his growth-without-inflation policy. A further series of subtle indicators and controls were also introduced during his premiership.

Foreign policy

British decolonisation in Africa.
The special relationship with the United States continued after the election of President John F. Kennedy, whose sister had married a nephew of Macmillan's wife. The Prime Minister was supportive throughout the Cuban missile crisis of 1962 and Kennedy consulted him by telephone every day. The British Ambassador David Ormsby-Gore was a close family friend of the President and actively involved in White Housemarker discussions on how to resolve the crisis.

Macmillan's first government had seen the first phase of the sub-Saharan African independence movement, which accelerated under his second government. His celebrated 'wind of change' speech in Cape Townmarker on his African tour in February 1960 is considered a landmark in the process of decolonisation.

Nigeriamarker, the Southern Cameroons and British Somaliland were granted independence in 1960, Sierra Leonemarker and Tanganyika in 1961, Uganda in 1962, and Kenyamarker in 1963. Zanzibarmarker merged with Tanganyika to form Tanzania in 1963. All remained within the Commonwealth but British Somaliland, which merged with Italian Somaliland to form Somaliamarker.

Macmillan's policy overrode the hostility of white minorities and the Conservative Monday Club. South Africa left the multiracial Commonwealth in 1961 and Macmillan acquiesced to the dissolution of the Central African Federation by the end of 1963.

In East Asia, Singaporemarker became independent in 1963.

The speedy transfer of power maintained the goodwill of the new nations but critics contended it was premature. In justification Macmillan quoted Lord Macaulay in 1851:

Skybolt crisis

Macmillan cancelled the Blue Streak ballistic missile system in April 1960 over concerns about its vulnerability to a pre-emptive attack. Instead he opted to replace the existing Blue Steel stand-off bomb with the Skybolt missile system, to be developed jointly with the United States. From the same year Macmillan also permitted the US Navy to station Polaris submarines at Holy Loch, Scotland, as a replacement for Thor. When Skybolt was in turn unilaterally cancelled by US Defence Secretary Robert McNamara, Macmillan negotiated with US President John F. Kennedy the purchase of Polaris missiles from the United States under the Nassau agreement in December 1962.

Partial Test Ban Treaty (1962)

Macmillan was also a force in the successful negotiations leading to the signing of the 1962 Partial Test Ban Treaty by the United Kingdom, the United States and the Soviet Union. His previous attempt to create an agreement at the May 1960 summit in Paris had collapsed due to the U-2 Crisis of 1960.

Europe

Macmillan worked with states outside the European Economic Community (EEC) to form the European Free Trade Association (EFTA), which from 3 May 1960 established a free-trade area between the member countries. Macmillan also saw the value of rapprochement with the EEC, to which his government sought belated entry. In the event, Britain's application to join was vetoed by French president Charles de Gaulle on 29 January 1963, in part due to de Gaulle's fear that 'the end would be a colossal Atlantic Community dependent on America', and in part in anger at the Anglo-American nuclear deal, from which France, technologically lagging far behind, had been excluded.

Profumo affair

The Profumo affair of spring and summer 1963 permanently damaged the credibility of Macmillan's government. He survived a Parliamentary vote with a majority of 69, one less than had been thought necessary for his survival, and was afterwards joined in the smoking-room only by his son and son-in-law, not by any Cabinet minister. Nonetheless, Butler and Maudling (who was very popular with backbench MPs at that time) declined to push for his resignation, especially after a tide of support from Conservative activists around the country.

Retirement (1963–1986)

Resignation

The Profumo affair may have exacerbated Macmillan's ill-health. He was taken ill on the eve of the Conservative Party conference, diagnosed incorrectly with inoperable prostate cancer. Consequently, he resigned on 18 October 1963. He felt privately that he was being hounded from office by a backbench minority:

Succession

Macmillan was succeeded as Prime Minister by the Foreign Secretary Alec Douglas-Home in a controversial move; it was alleged that Macmillan had pulled strings and utilised the party's grandees, nicknamed 'The Magic Circle', to ensure that Butler was not chosen as his successor.

Macmillan initially refused a peerage and retired from politics in September 1964.

Oxford Chancellor (1960–1986)

Macmillan had been elected Chancellor of the University of Oxford in 1960, in a campaign masterminded by Hugh Trevor-Roper, and continued in this distinguished office for life, frequently presiding over college events, making speeches and tirelessly raising funds. According to Sir Patrick Neill QC, the vice-chancellor, Macmillan 'would talk late into the night with eager groups of students who were often startled by the radical views he put forward, well into his last decade.'

Return to publishing

In retirement Macmillan also took up the chairmanship of his family's publishing house, Macmillan Publishers, from 1964 to 1974. He brought out a six-volume autobiography:

  1. Winds of Change, 1914–1939 (1966) ISBN 0333066391
  2. The Blast of War, 1939–1945 (1967) ISBN 0333003586
  3. Tides of Fortune, 1945–1955 (1969) ISBN 0333040775
  4. Riding the Storm, 1956–1959 (1971) ISBN 0333103106
  5. Pointing the Way, 1959–1961 (1972) ISBN 0333124111
  6. At the End of the Day, 1961–1963 (1973) ISBN 0333124138


The read was described by Macmillan's political enemy Enoch Powell as inducing 'a sensation akin to that of chewing on cardboard'. His wartime diaries were better received.

  • War Diaries: Politics and War in the Mediterranean, January 1943 – May 1945 (London: St. Martin's Press, 1984) ISBN 0312855664


Political interventions

Macmillan made occasional political interventions in retirement. Responding to a remark made by Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson about not having boots in which to go to school, Macmillan retorted: 'If Mr Wilson did not have boots to go to school that is because he was too big for them.'

Macmillan accepted the distinction of the Order of Merit from the Queen in 1976. In October of that year he called for 'a Government of National Unity', including all parties, that could command the public support to resolve the economic crisis. Asked who could lead such a coalition, he replied: 'Mr Gladstone formed his last Government when he was eighty-three. I'm only eighty-two. You mustn't put temptation in my way.' His plea was interpreted by party leaders as a bid for power and rejected.

Macmillan still travelled widely, visiting Chinamarker in October 1979, where he held talks with its leader, senior Vice-Premier Deng Xiaoping.

Relations with Thatcher

Macmillan found himself drawn more actively into politics after Margaret Thatcher became Conservative leader and Prime Minister, and the record of his own premiership came under attack from the monetarists in the party, whose theories Thatcher supported. In a celebrated speech he wondered aloud where such theories had come from:

On Macmillan's advice in April 1982 Thatcher excluded the Treasurymarker from her Falklands War Cabinet. She later said: 'I never regretted following Harold Macmillan's advice. We were never tempted to compromise the security of our forces for financial reasons. Everything we did was governed by military necessity.'

Macmillan finally accepted a peerage in 1984 and was created Earl of Stockton and Viscount Macmillan of Ovenden. He took the title from his former parliamentary seat on the border of the Durham coalfields, and in his maiden speech in the House of Lordsmarker he criticised Thatcher's handling of the coal miners' strike and her characterisation of Marxist militants as 'the enemy within'. He received an unprecedented standing ovation for his oration which included the words:

As Chancellor of Oxford Lord Stockton also condemned the university's refusal in February 1985 to award Thatcher an honorary degree. He noted that the decision represented a break with tradition, and predicted that the snub would rebound on the university.

Stockton is widely supposed to have likened Thatcher's policy of privatisation to 'selling the family silver'. What he did say (at a dinner of the Tory Reform Group at the Royal Overseas League on 8 November 1985) was that the sale of assets was commonplace among individuals or states when they encountered financial difficulties: 'First of all the Georgian silver goes. And then all that nice furniture that used to be in the salon. Then the Canalettos go.' Profitable parts of the steel industry and the railways had been privatised, along with British Telecom: 'They were like two Rembrandts still left.'

Stockton's speech was much commented on and a few days later he made a speech in the House of Lordsmarker to clarify what he had meant:

In the last month of his life, he mournfully observed:

Death and funeral

Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, died on 29 December 1986, at Birch Grove, the Macmillan family mansion on the edge of Ashdown Forestmarker near Chelwood Gate in East Sussexmarker. He was aged 92 years and 322 days—the greatest age attained by a British Prime Minister until surpassed by James Callaghan on 14 February 2005.His grandson and heir Alexander, Viscount Macmillan of Ovenden, said: 'In the last 48 hours he was very weak but entirely reasonable and intelligent. His last words were, "I think I will go to sleep now".'

Thatcher, on receiving the news, hailed him as 'a very remarkable man and a very great patriot', and said that his dislike of 'selling the family silver' had never come between them. He was 'unique in the affection of the British people'.

Tributes came from around the world. US President Ronald Reagan said: 'The American people share in the loss of a voice of wisdom and humanity who, with eloquence and gentle wit, brought to the problems of today the experience of a long life of public service.' Outlawed ANC 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.' Commonwealth Secretary-General Sir Shridath Ramphal affirmed: 'His own leadership in providing from Britain a worthy response to African national consciousness shaped the post-war era and made the modern Commonwealth possible.'

A private funeral was held on 5 January 1987 at St Giles Church, Horsted Keynesmarker, West Sussexmarker, where Lord Stockton had regularly worshipped and read the lesson. Two hundred mourners attended, including 64 members of the Macmillan family, Thatcher and former premiers Lord Home of the Hirsel and Edward Heath, Lord Hailsham of St Marylebone, and 'scores of country neighbours'. The Prince of Wales sent a wreath 'in admiring memory'. Stockton was buried beside his wife, Lady Dorothy, and next to the graves of his parents and of his son, Maurice Macmillan.

The House of Commons paid its tribute on 12 January 1987, with much reference made to the dead statesman's book, The Middle Way. Thatcher said: 'In his retirement Harold Macmillan occupied a unique place in the nation's affections', while Labour leader Neil Kinnock struck a more critical note:

A public memorial service, attended by the Queen and thousands of mourners, was held on 10 February 1987 in Westminster Abbeymarker.

Stockton's son Maurice had become heir to the earldom, but predeceased him suddenly a month after his father's elevation. The 1st Earl was succeeded instead by his grandson, Maurice's son, Alexander, Lord Macmillan, who become the 2nd Earl of Stockton.

Titles from birth to death

  • Harold Macmillan, Esq (10 February 1894 – 29 October 1924)
  • Harold Macmillan, Esq, MP (29 October 1924 – 30 May 1929)
  • Harold Macmillan, Esq (30 May 1929 – 4 November 1931)
  • Harold Macmillan, Esq, MP (4 November 1931 – 1942)
  • The Right Honourable Harold Macmillan, MP (1942 – 26 July 1945)
  • The Right Honourable Harold Macmillan (26 July 1945 – November 1945)
  • The Right Honourable Harold Macmillan, MP (November 1945 – 15 September 1964)
  • The Right Honourable Harold Macmillan (15 September 1964 – 2 April 1976)
  • The Right Honourable Harold Macmillan, OM (2 April 1976 – 24 February 1984)
  • The Right Honourable The Earl of Stockton, OM, PC (24 February 1984 – 29 December 1986)


Cabinets

For a full list of Ministerial office-holders, see Conservative Government 1957-1964.

January 1957 – October 1959



Change
  • March 1957 - Lord Home succeeds Lord Salisbury as Lord President, remaining also Commonwealth Relations Secretary.
  • September 1957 - Lord Hailsham succeeds Lord Home as Lord President, Home remaining Commonwealth Relations Secretary. Geoffrey Lloyd succeeds Hailsham as Minister of Education. The Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Reginald Maudling, enters the Cabinet.
  • January 1958 - Derick Heathcoat Amory succeeds Peter Thorneycroft as Chancellor of the Exchequer. John Hare succeeds Amory as Minister of Agriculture.


October 1959 – July 1960



July 1960 – October 1961



October 1961 – July 1962



July 1962 – October 1963

In a radical reshuffle dubbed "The Night of the Long Knives", Macmillan sacked a third of his Cabinet and instituted many other changes.

Dramatic and comedic portrayals

Beyond the Fringe (1960–1966)

During his premiership in the early 1960s Macmillan was savagely satirised for his alleged decrepitude by the comedian Peter Cook in the stage review Beyond the Fringe. 'Even when insulted to his face attending the show,' a biographer notes, 'Macmillan felt it was better to be mocked than ignored.' One of the sketches was later revived by Cook for television.

Winston Churchill: The Wilderness Years (1981)

Macmillan appears as a supporting character, played by Ian Collier, in the 1981 miniseries Winston Churchill: The Wilderness Years produced by Southern Television for ITV.

A Letter of Resignation (1997–1998)

Set in 1963 during the Profumo scandal, Hugh Whitemore's play A Letter of Resignation, first staged at the Comedy Theatremarker in October 1997, dramatises the occasion when Harold Macmillan, staying with friends in Scotland, received a political bombshell, a letter of resignation from Profumo, his war minister.

Edward Fox portrayed Macmillan with uncanny accuracy. But the play also explores the involvement of MI5marker and the troubled relationship between Macmillan and his wife Dorothy (Clare Higgins) who had made no secret of her adultery with the wayward Tory MP, Robert Boothby. The play was directed by Christopher Morahan.

Eden's Empire (2006)

Macmillan was played by Kevin Quarmby in Gemma Fairlie's production of James Graham's stage play Eden's Empire, at the Finborough Theatremarker, Londonmarker, in 2006.

Never So Good (2008)

Never So Good is a four-act play by Howard Brenton, a portrait of Harold Macmillan set against a back-drop of fading Empire, two world wars, the Suez crisis, adultery and Tory politics at the Ritz.

Brenton paints the portrait of a brilliant, witty but complex man, tragically out of kilter with his times, an old Etonian who eventually loses his way in a world of shifting values.

The play was premiered at the National Theatremarker in March 2008, directed by Howard Davies with Jeremy Irons as Macmillan.

Additional reading

  • Macmillan A Publishing Tradition by Elizabeth James 2002 ISBN 0-333-73517-X
  • Britanica Online about Harold Macmillan
  • Riding the Storm, 1956-1959 by Harold Macmillan 1971 SBN (boards) 333 10310 6


References

  • Theatre Record (1997 for Hugh Whitemore's A Letter of Resignation; 2008 for Howard Brenton's Never So Good)
  1. Roger Middleton, Government versus the Market: The growth of the public sector, economic management and British economic performance, c. 1890–1979 (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 1996), pp. 422–23.
  2. Middleton, Government versus the Market, pp. 422–23.
  3. Middleton, Government versus the Market, p. 422.
  4. Peter Hennessy, Having It So Good: Britain in the Fifties (London: Allen Lane, 2006), pp. 533–34.
  5. Richard Lamb, The Macmillan Years 1957–1963: The Emerging Truth (London: John Murray, 1995), pp. 14-15.
  6. Never Had It So Good: A History of Britain from Suez to the Beatles.
  7. Nigel Fisher, Harold Macmillan (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1982), p. 2.
  8. Horne, Macmillan, Volume I, p. 9.
  9. Alistair Horne, Macmillan, 1894–1956: Volume I of the Official Biography (London: Macmillan, 1988) p. 16.
  10. Simon Ball, The Guardsmen, Harold Macmillan, Three Friends and the World They Made, (London, Harper Collins), 2004, p. 19.
  11. Ball Guardsmen, p. 64.
  12. Horne, Macmillan, Volume I, p. 49.
  13. Horne, Macmillan, Volume I, p. 52.
  14. Rodney Hallworth, Mark Williams, "Where there's a will... The sensational life of Dr John Bodkin Adams", 1983, Capstan Press
  15. Cullen, Pamela V., "A Stranger in Blood: The Case Files on Dr John Bodkin Adams", London, Elliott & Thompson, 2006, ISBN 1-904027-19-9
  16. Garry O'Connor, 'Obituary - Eileen O’Casey', The Guardian (12 April 1995), p. 13.
  17. Edward Marriott, 'Obituary - Eileen O'Casey', Evening Standard (London, 18 April 1995).
  18. Garry O'Connor, Sean O’Casey: A Life, Hodder and Stoughton (1988) ISBN 0340385987
  19. "Eileen O'Casey; Obituary." The Times (11 April 1995), p. 19.
  20. Fisher, Harold Macmillan, pp. 78–79.
  21. Harold Macmillan, The Blast of War, 1939–45 (London: Macmillan, 1967), p. 161.
  22. Alistair Horne, Macmillan, 1894–1956: Volume I of the Official Biography (London: Macmillan, 1988) p. 158.
  23. Horne, Macmillan, Volume I, pp. 251–86.
  24. Sir Curtis Keeble, 'Macmillan and the Soviet Union', in Richard Aldous and Sabine Lee (eds), Harold Macmillan: Aspects of a Political Life (London: Macmillan, 1999), pp. 199–200.
  25. Harold Macmillan, Tides of Fortune (London: Macmillan, 1969), pp. 28–29.
  26. Macmillan, Tides of Fortune, p. 29.
  27. Macmillan, Tides of Fortune, p. 364.
  28. Fisher, Harold Macmillan, p. 139.
  29. Fisher, Harold Macmillan, p. 143.
  30. The Economist (16 April 1955).
  31. Fisher, Harold Macmillan, pp. 144, 145.
  32. Fisher, Harold Macmillan, p. 145.
  33. Nigel Fisher, Harold Macmillan (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1982), p. 150.
  34. 18 April 1956: Macmillan unveils premium bond scheme, BBC News, 'On This Day 1950–2005'.
  35. Horne, Macmillan, Volume I, p. 383.
  36. Harold Macmillan, The Macmillan Diaries, The Cabinet Years, 1950-1957;;, ed. Peter Catterall (London: Macmillan, 2003).
  37. David Butler, Twentieth Century British Political Facts 1900–2000, Macmillan, 8th edition, 2000.
  38. Fisher, Harold Macmillan, p. 213.
  39. Fisher, Harold Macmillan, p. 214.
  40. Fisher, Harold Macmillan, p. 193.
  41. Horne, Macmillan, Volume II, pp. 94–95.
  42. Horne, Macmillan, Volume II, pp. 419.
  43. Nick Rufford, 'A-bomb links kept secret from Queen', Sunday Times (3 January 1988).
  44. 'Windscale: Britain's Biggest Nuclear Disaster', broadcast on Monday, 8 October 2007, at 2100 BST on BBC Two.
  45. Paddy Shennan, 'Britain's Biggest Nuclear Disaster', Liverpool Echo (13 October 2007), p. 26.
  46. John Hunt. 'Cabinet Papers For 1957: Windscale Fire Danger Disclosed', Financial Times (2 January 1988).
  47. David Walker, 'Focus on 1957: Macmillan ordered Windscale censorship', The Times (1 January 1988).
  48. Jean McSorley, 'Contaminated evidence: The secrecy and political cover-ups that followed the fire in a British nuclear reactor 50 years ago still resonate in public concerns', The Guardian (10 October 2007), p. 8.
  49. John Gray, 'Accident disclosures bring calls for review of U.K. secrecy laws', Globe and Mail (Toronto, 4 January 1988).
  50. Richard Gott, 'The Evolution of the Independent British Deterrent', International Affairs, 39/2 (April 1963), p. 246.
  51. Gott, 'Independent British Deterrent', p. 247.
  52. The Times (4 July US Navy).
  53. http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/july/20/newsid_3728000/3728225.stm Harold Macmillan, Speech in Bedford, 20 July 1957
  54. Lamb, Macmillan Years, p. 62.
  55. Lamb, Macmillan Years, pp. 164–65; Chapters 14 and 15.
  56. 'The Wit and Wisdom Inside No 10', Daily Express (27 March 2008), p. 13.
  57. Fisher, Harold Macmillan, pp. 359–60.
  58. Fisher, Harold Macmillan, p. 355.
  59. Margaret Thatcher, The Downing Street Years (London: HarperCollins, 1993), p. 188.
  60. Thatcher, Downing Street Years, p. 370.
  61. Alan Watkins, A Conservative Coup (London: Duckworth, 1992), p. 105.
  62. Memorial service for Harold Macmillan, First Earl of Stockton, O.M., P.C.: Tuesday 10 February 1987 12, noon (London: Westminster Abbey, 1987).
  63. Horne, Macmillan, vol. II, p. 454.
  64. D R Thorpe, 'A Psychologically Interesting Prime Minister', Premiere of Never So Good (London: National Theatre, 2008).


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