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1859

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 November 2009

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Extract

Since last I wrote the events of the Session, a change has taken place both as regard myself and the Government. We are no longer in Office though the length of the Session and the obstinacies of the new Ministry are matters of very considerable doubt and uncertainty. Palmerston is once more at the helm and the Tories though stronger as a party both numerically and from the prestige of a successful administration than they have been for many years, are again under the shade of opposition. It remains therefore only to note the main circumstances which have occurred up to the present date.

Type
Research Article
Information
Royal Historical Society Camden Fifth Series , Volume 35 , December 2009 , pp. 103 - 115
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Historical Society 2009

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References

39 Herman Merivale (1806–1874), Permanent Under-Secretary for the Colonial Office (1848–1859) and for the India Office (1859–1874).

40 Sir Thomas Elliot (1808–1880), Assistant Under-Secretary, Colonial Office (1847–1868).

41 For the list of ministers, see Hardinge, I, p. 123.

42 Sir Edmund Walker Head (1805–1868), Lieutenant-Governor, New Brunswick (1847–1854), Governor-General, Canada (1854–1861).

43 Sir George-Étienne Cartier (1814–1873), Member, Lower Canada Legislature (1848), Attorney-General, Canada East (1856), Prime Minister (1858–1862), Attorney-General (1864), Minister of Militia (1867–1873).

44 Alexander Tilloch Galt (1817–1893), Inspector-General (1858–1862), Minister of Finance, Canada (1867–1872), High Commissioner in England (1880–1883).

45 John Ross (1818–1871), Solicitor-General, Canada West (1851–1854), Leader and Speaker of the Legislative Council (1854–1856), Receiver-General (1858), President of the Executive Council and Minister of Agriculture (1858–1862).

46 Sir Charles Tupper (1821–1915), Con. Member, Legislative Council, Nova Scotia (1855), Prime Minister (1864–1867), member of the federal Cabinet (1870), Minister of Railways and Canals (1879–1884), Prime Minister of Canada (1896). Sir Albert James Smith (1822–1883), member of Executive Council, New Brunswick (1854–1862), Attorney-General (1861–1862). Charles Fisher (1808–1880), leader of the New Brunswick reform movement (from 1837), Prime Minister (1854–1861).

47 Drawn up by John Colborne (1778–1863), 1st Baron Seaton (1839), Governor, Ionian Islands (1843–1849) and Sir Henry Grey (1802–1894), Viscount Howick (1807), 3rd Earl Grey (1845), Colonial Secretary (1846–1852). The constitution of May 1849 established a new system of government, allowing for freedom of election to the Assembly, voting by ballot, and the reduction of qualifications for the franchise.

48 Sir John Young (1807–1876), Baron Lisgar (1870). Con. MP for Co. Cavan (1831–1835), Chief Secretary of State for Ireland (1852–1855), Lord High Commissioner, Ionian Islands (1855–1859); he opposed union with Greece.

49 Sir Robert Phillimore (1810–1885), Lib.-Con. MP for Tavistock (1852–1857), Judge, High Court of Admiralty (1867), created baronet (1883).

50 James Howard Harris (1807–1889), 3rd Earl of Malmesbury (1841). Foreign Secretary (1852, 1858–1859), Lord Privy Seal (1866–1868, 1874–1876), Con. Leader in the House of Lords (1868).

51 Carlo Poerio (1803–1867), politician, lawyer, and poet. Minister of Education, Naples (1848–1849); resigned, and then led parliamentary opposition to Ferdinand II. He was arrested and sentenced to nineteen years’ imprisonment in chains. Gladstone's report in 1851, drawing attention to the inhumane conditions under which Poeiro and the other political prisoners were being held, caused an international furore.

52 George Hamilton-Gordon (1784–1860), 4th Earl of Aberdeen (1801). Peelite Leader, House of Lords (from 1846), Prime Minister (1852–1855). For a fuller background of events leading to the offer to Gladstone, see Diary, 8 January 1884.

53 Thomas Walker (1822–1895), editor of the Daily News (1858–1869) and of the London Gazette (1869–1885). See ‘Mission of Mr Gladstone to the Ionian Islands’, Daily News, 5 November 1858, p. 4. The despatch was published in the paper on 12 November.

54 Arthur Charles Hamilton-Gordon (1829–1912), KCMG (1871), 1st Baron Stanmore (1893). Lib. MP for Beverley (1854–1857), Gladstone's private secretary (1858–1859), Lieutenant-Governor, New Brunswick (1861–1866), Governor of Trinidad (1866–1870), of Mauritius (1871–1874), of Fiji (1875–1878), and of Ceylon (1885–1890).

55 Sir Henry Knight Storks (1811–1874), High Commissioner, Ionian Islands (1859–1863), Governor of Malta (1864–1865) and of Jamaica (1865–1866), lieutenant-general (1871).

56 See Hansard, CLII, 17 February 1859, Carnarvon, cols 463–465, Grey, cols 463, 465–466. The Ionian Islands were evacuated and handed over to Greece on 2 June 1864.

57 Sir Philip Rose (1816–1883), 1st Baronet Rose (1874), Conservative Party agent. He wrote to Disraeli on 12 August 1858, ‘I had my first Reform interview with Lord Derby yesterday. It lasted for nearly three hours’ (Buckle, Disraeli, IV, p. 182).

58 The Jamaican Immigration Act, which had been framed by the Jamaican House of Assembly the previous year, encouraged immigration to the country. Stanley, then Colonial Secretary, had sent it back, but Carnarvon favoured the Act: Hansard, CLII, 8 February 1859, col. 170.

59 Singapore. Resolution. Hansard, CLII, 10 March 1859, Carnarvon, cols 1605–1606.

60 The 1859 Reform Bill left the borough franchise unchanged, reduced the occupation franchise in counties from £50 to £10, transferred the right of voting in regard to town freehold from counties to towns where freeholds were located, and did nothing to enfranchise the working classes. On 21 March, in a heated debate in the House, Russell moved an amendment on the bill's second reading. Supported by Palmerston, it was carried on 1 April by 330 to 291 votes. Derby did not resign but decided to fight a general election, which proved to be indecisive. Five days after a meeting with the Liberal Party on 6 June, which cemented the Russell–Palmerston alliance, the Government resigned; Palmerston became the new Prime Minister. See S. Walpole, The Life of Lord John Russell, 2 vols (London, 1889), II, pp. 302–309; H.C.F. Bell, Lord Palmerston, 2 vols (London, 1936), II, pp. 206–207; J.H. Harris, 3rd Earl of Malmesbury, Memoirs of an Ex-Minister: an autobiography (London, 1885), pp. 490–492.

61 Joseph Warner Henley (1793–1884), Con. MP for Oxfordshire (1848–1871), President of the Board of Trade (1852, 1858–1859). Although it was inevitable that Henley and Walpole's dissatisfaction over the Reform Bill would lead to their resignation, they postponed taking this step, at Derby's request, until late February 1859.

62 John Arthur Roebuck (1801–1879), Lib. MP for Sheffield (1849–1869, 1874–1879).

63 Auberon Edward William Molyneux Herbert (1838–1906), Carnarvon's younger brother. Secretary to Stafford Northcote, President of the Board of Trade in Derby's 1866 administration, Lib. MP for Nottingham (1870–1874). Political philosopher and follower of Herbert Spencer. Beatrice Webb called him ‘an enthusiast, a Don Quixote of the nineteenth century, who had left the real battle of life to fight a strange ogre of his own imagination – an always immoral State interference’ (B. Webb, My Apprenticeship (Cambridge, 1979, facsimile of 1926 1st edition), p. 189.

64 Ambrose Lethbridge Goddard (1819–1898), Con. MP for Cricklade (1847–1868, 1874–1880).

65 Sir John Neeld (1805–1891), Con. MP for Cricklade (1835–1859) and for Chippenham (1865–1868).

66 The election was on 30 April. Goddard headed the poll with 745 votes; Lord Ashley, the Liberal candidate, was second with 743. Neeld attracted only 712 votes.

67 The new Parliament consisted of 353 Liberals and 302 Conservatives.

68 Henry Pelham Fiennes Pelham-Clinton (1811–1864), 5th Duke of Newcastle-under-Lyme (1851), Secretary of State for War and the Colonies (1852–1854), Colonial Secretary (1859–1864).

69 Sir George Grey (1812–1898), Governor-General of New Zealand (1845–1854, 1861–1867) and of Cape Colony (1854–1861).

70 Grey's autocratic behaviour and public speeches and actions, although popular with the colonies, were condemned by Parliament and officials. He told the South African legislature in 1856, ‘The Governor is, by virtue of his office, the Head of all the Departments. The Colonial Secretary, as far as his position has been defined, is merely the pen or mouth of His Excellency, acting by his orders, whatever his own opinions or advice may have been’ (J. Rutherford, Sir George Grey, K.C.B., 1812–1898: a study in colonial government (London, 1961), p. 295).

71 Lytton to Carnarvon, 30 May 1859: see Hardinge, I, pp. 128–129.

72 John Laird Mair Lawrence (1811–1879), 1st Baron Lawrence (1869), India Office (1859–1862), Viceroy of India (1863–1869).

73 After the change of ministry, Grey was reinstated by the Duke of Newcastle, on the understanding that his scheme for the federation of South Africa should be abandoned, and that he would obey instructions issued by the Colonial Office. See G.C. Henderson, Sir George Grey: pioneer of empire in southern lands (London, 1907), p. 183.

74 On the controversy with France over its demands to fish in the region see The Newfoundland Fisheries, Hansard, CLII, 10 March 1859, cols 1667–1676.

75 Sir Henry Drummond Wolff (1830–1908), private secretary to Lytton (February 1858), Secretary to High Commissioner, Ionian Islands (1859–1864), Con. MP for Christchurch (1878–1880) and for Portsmouth (1880–1885).

76 Wolff appreciated Lytton's relaxed approach to work, appointing ‘gentlemen’ rather than regular official subordinates ‘not liking to trouble his official secretaries with work’ (H. Drummond Wolff, Rambling Recollections, 2 vols (London, 1908), I, p. 178).

77 Sir Benjamin Pine (1809–1891), Governor of Natal (1849–1856, 1873–1875), of the Gold Coast (1856–1859), of St Kitts (1859–1869), and of the Leeward Islands (1869–1873).

78 The Hudson Bay Company had been granted a charter in 1670 for a monopoly of trade over the vast territories in the north of Canada. The Company's licence over the territory was due to expire in 1859, at the same time as the new colony of British Columbia was created. Shortly after leaving office, Carnarvon urged in the Lords that the privileges of the trading company should not be allowed to stand in the way of improved colonization and that the Government should provide means of good communication with Canada and British Columbia (Hansard, CLIV, 14 July 1859, Carnarvon, cols 1189–1193).

79 Benjamin Disraeli (1805–1881), 1st Earl of Beaconsfield (1876). Con. MP for Maidstone (1837–1841), for Shrewsbury (1841–1847), and for Buckinghamshire (1847–1876), Leader, House of Commons, and Chancellor of the Exchequer (1852, 1858–1859, 1866–1868), Lord Privy Seal (1876–1878), Prime Minister (1868, 1874–1880).