One of the younger generation recruited by William Pitt, Canning was soon in the prime minister’s complete confidence and proving himself an asset to the government in debate. He was under-secretary at the foreign office, Jan. 1796-Mar. 1799, when he was appointed a commissioner of the India board, which post he held in conjunction with that of joint paymaster-general from May 1800. The group of Members personally attached to him in the 1796 Parliament included four of his earliest and closest friends: Charles Rose Ellis; Lord Granville Leveson Gower; William Sturges Bourne, and Edward Wilbraham Bootle.

Canning resigned with Pitt in March 1801, when the Speaker, Henry Addington, became prime minister. For the next three years Canning worked towards securing the return to power of Pitt, who until March 1804 declined to turn against the ministry. In the 1802 Parliament, Canning had at one point 13 personal adherents, who included the Pittite country gentlemen, William Ralph Cartwright, Sir Robert Lawley and Sir John Wrottesley. On the renewal of war with France in the spring of 1803, he rallied this ginger group in an attempt to have Addington ousted for Pitt.

When Pitt formed his second administration in May 1804, a disillusioned Canning, whose hopes of a broad-based ministry were dashed by the king’s veto of Charles James Fox, reluctantly took office as treasurer of the navy. On Pitt’s death and the formation of the Grenville-Fox coalition government in January 1806, Canning went into opposition, aiming to provide the king with an alternative to ministers whom he disliked when the time was ripe. He rebuffed a number of attempts by Lord Grenville to recruit him, including an offer of the chancellorship of the exchequer in March 1807, when the debacle over the Catholic relief bill brought the government down. An important addition to his personal Commons squad in 1806 was the experienced Pittite administrator and financial expert William Huskisson, though he was by now a significant political figure in his own right, and neither a close friend nor an acolyte of Canning.

Canning became foreign secretary in the duke of Portland’s administration, but by October 1809 he was out of place, having fought a duel with his cabinet colleague Lord Castlereagh, the war secretary, lost out to Spencer Perceval for the premiership in succession to the dying Portland and resigned when Perceval persuaded Lord Wellesley to take the foreign office. At the opening of the 1810 session, when the new ministry faced a concerted opposition Whig attack on the disastrous Scheldt military expedition of the previous summer, he planned to act independently of existing parties, supporting or opposing ministers on specific questions as he judged fit, while generally upholding Tory principles against the reformers. At this point, his personal following numbered nine: Lord Binning; his cousin Colonel George Canning; John `Dog’ Dent; Ellis; Huskisson; Robert Holt Leigh; Leveson Gower; Sturges Bourne, and Wilbraham Bootle. During the course of the parliamentary proceedings on the Scheldt affair, 23 Jan.-30 Mar. 1810, he recruited to his `little senate’ Barrington Pope Blachford, Hylton Jolliffe and William Taylor. He directed the votes of his squad in the series of divisions on the Scheldt fiasco, though they were allowed some individual discretion and did not vote consistently as a bloc. Broadly speaking, they sided with government against the opposition amendment to the address, 23 Jan., cast mixed votes or stayed away when Lord Porchester moved successfully for inquiry into the expedition, 26 Jan., and divided with opposition in the divisions on the self-exculpatory narrative that Lord Chatham, who had commanded the enterprise, had sent to the king, 23 Feb. and 5 Mar. 1810. On Porchester’s censure motion, 30 Mar. (soon after Wellesley’s failed attempt to enforce his return to office), Canning, believing that he held the government’s fate in his hands, endorsed the policy of the expedition and persuaded Perceval to soften the government’s counter-resolution of exculpation, but moved an amendment of his own containing that part of his proposal that Perceval had rejected. He and almost all his followers divided with ministers, who secured satisfactory majorities, in the first three divisions, but for the last, on the resolution exonerating the Portland ministry from blame, he set his squad free, and seven of them voted against government.

Between then and the dissolution in September 1812 Canning and members of his `senate’ opposed the Perceval ministry on a number of issues, including sinecure reform (17 May 1810), the regency settlement (1 and 21 Jan. 1811) and the orders in council (3 Mar. 1812), but Canning spoke up for them on other questions, notably the conduct of the Peninsular war. During the 1812 session he secured additional recruits in the persons of George Bellas Greenough, Edward John Littleton and John William Ward, but Wilbraham Bootle gravitated to government. Throughout this period Canning, who formed an uneasy alliance with Wellesley and his five adherents, was being courted by both ministers and opposition. When Lord Liverpool formed his ministry after Perceval’s assassination in May 1812, Canning and Wellesley loomed large in the protracted negotiations, which ended with them still out of office, ostensibly because Canning and Castlereagh could not agree terms on which they could work together.

At the 1812 general election Bellas Greenough, Binning, Dent, Sturges Bourne and Taylor were not returned, but the treasury credited Canning with a dozen friends, including the new boys Thomas Bernard, George Abercrombie Robinson and Robert Percy `Bobus’ Smith. Canning, who won a personal triumph at Liverpool, continued his line of `mitigated hostility’ to government in the first session of the new Parliament; but in the 1813 summer recess, perceiving that the partisanship of his followers and the awkward alliance with Wellesley were restricting his options, he formally disbanded his `senate’ and terminated the connection with Wellesley. This smoothed the way for his return to the ministerial fold, first as ambassador to Portugal in 1814, when he secured places and honours for several of his friends, and as president of the India board with a seat in the cabinet in March 1816.

D.R.F

Further Reading

Wendy Hinde, George Canning (1973)

A. Aspinall, `The Canningite Party’, Transactions of the Royal Historical Society (ser. 4), xvii (1934), 177-226; and `The Last of the Canningites’, English Historical Review, l (1935), 639-69

This is a revised version of the article ‘Canning’s ‘little senate’, 1798-1813′ by David R. Fisher, originally posted on historyofparliamentonline.org.

Even if the statues in Parliament Square are not ‘Made of Stone’, as the introductory music to our feature on Matt Chorley’s Radio 5live programme might suggest, the grand figures give an impression of timelessness. However, Parliament Square itself has developed in purpose and layout in the past 150 years, and of course the figures commemorated are complex and intriguing historical actors. I hope I’ve been able to thank on air my Victorian Commons colleagues, in particular Kathryn Rix, for their help in my research, and acknowledge in particular the work of Geoffrey Hicks, whose work on the square I have relied on.

Parliament Square first became a public memorial space in the 1860s, following the designs of Edward Barry, son of Charles, the architect of the rebuilt Palace of Westminster. As Hicks has argued, the initial aim of the Square was an ‘outdoor mausoleum’ and ‘sacred space’ for imperial Britain’s political leaders [Hicks, 165-67]. This was in the context of what historians have termed Victorian ‘Statue Mania’. Throughout the country, as Rix for example has recently discussed in an article describing public statues of politicians in the north and midlands, statues of ‘Great Men’ were erected as inspirational figures and decoration for new public spaces. Historians Terry Wyke and Donald Read have demonstrated the importance of the death of Prime Minister Robert Peel in starting this craze, which all seems rather strange in our more cynical political times.

The first five statues are squarely in this tradition: five prime ministers, all added in the decades after their deaths. First to be moved to the Square was George Canning (1770-1827), who until recently was the Prime Minister with the dubious honour to have been in office for the shortest time period. Nevertheless, our biography describes him as ‘One of the most singular and remarkable of the leading statesmen of his time’ [Stephen Farrell] – all the more fascinating given his relative lack of privilege for a political figure of his time. Canning’s statue, by Sir Richard Westmacott, had a difficult origin, falling off the hoist in the studio and killing an assistant sculptor in 1831, and moved from New Palace Yard in 1867 during works on Westminster ground station, to the area now known as Canning Green.

Next to follow Canning was a very different figure, a pillar of the establishment: Edward Stanley, 14^th Earl Derby (1799-1869). This statue, unveiled by his close political ally Benjamin Disraeli in 1874, has excellent reliefs by John Thomas on the plinth commemorating Derby’s political life. Henry John Temple, 3^rd Viscount Palmerston (1784-1865) by Thomas Woolner was added to the square in 1876, after earlier versions were considered too small. Palmerston’s colourful private life, despite being considered ‘the supreme epitome of Victorian pride, respectability and self-respect’ [Stephen Farrell] featured in our piece. Sir Robert Peel (1788-1850), whose statue was added fourth, also in 1876 (after an earlier version was rejected after MPs), led a political life so complex and interesting it was very difficult to squeeze any of it into 8 minutes! Benjamin Disraeli (1804-81) was the last of the Victorian leaders first added to the square, in 1883. The statue’s role as a shrine to Disraeli by the Primrose League, the Conservative grassroots organisation, in the years after his death demonstrated the extent these Victorian politicians were admired.

That, however, all changed with the First World War, as politicians were blamed for the catastrophe and commemoration shifted to honouring the war dead. However the sixth addition, a copy of Augustus Saint-Gardens’ statue of US President Abraham Lincoln in Chicago, was originally due for inclusion in 1914. Almost as soon as he arrived Lincoln left visitors (and Matt!) asking why he was there; the answer to celebrate Anglo-American friendship in the centenary after the end of the war of 1812-14. As Hicks argued, Lincoln was the first figure added to the square to present a different view of Britain to the wider world as its imperial power declined. [Hicks, p.172]

After the Second World War, Parliament Square was reorganised by the architect George Grey Wornum largely into the design we know today. Canning and Lincoln have remained in Canning Green, with the other four organised around a grassy central area. Two spaces were left for new additions, although the Ministry of Works rather felt that the Square was ‘finished.’ [Hicks, pp.174-5] No-one had told Winston Churchill, however, who on his return to government in 1951 proposed a statue to his friend and war cabinet member Jan Smuts (1870-1950). Smuts was probably the most difficult of the individuals on the square to talk about in a short slot on the radio. Reconciling Smuts, the defender of the Commonwealth and liberal world statesman who directly influenced both the League of Nations and the Preamble to the UN Charter, with Smuts as one of the leading figures and chief architects of a racially segregated South Africa is hard to do justice to in a short period of air time. Churchill (1874-1965) himself was added in 1973, apparently having chosen his prime slot close to the Commons in the 1950s (although this story is doubted by many of his biographers). In recent years the wartime leader has also become a controversial and contested figure.

The final four figures in the Square were all added in the 21^st century, in a ‘reinvigorated’ political space, now as much as a place of protest as a ‘sacred’ space to honour parliamentary politics. The final additions were ‘radical politicians that do not proclaim too obviously the conservative nature of the project.’ [Hicks, p.180] Many of their predecessors would also have been shocked to see direct political opponents honoured in the same way they were! Nelson Mandela (1918-2013) and David Lloyd George (1863-1945) were unveiled within a few months of each other in 2007, Mahatma Ghandi (1869-1948) in 2015 and Millicent Fawcett (1847-1929) in 2018. As these figures are all much more familiar to a modern audience, the ‘Made in Stone’ recordings focused more on the campaigns for their commemoration. Mandela, Lloyd George and Fawcett all made it to the square after considerable public pressure; particularly Fawcett as the first, and so far only, woman.

Excitingly, we have more in store for those of you who have enjoyed the ‘Made in Stone’ series so far, as we have recently recorded another seven pieces on statues and memorials all around parliament, from Boudicca to George V. So keep tuning in for more!

E.P.

Catch up with the series so far on BBC Sounds.

Further Reading:

Geoffrey Hicks: ‘Parliament Square: The Making of a Political Space’ Landscapes 16:2 (2015) 164181

Donald Read, Peel and the Victorians

Kathryn Rix, ‘Living in Stone or Marble: The Public Commemoration of Victorian MPs’ in Memory and Modern British Politics: Commemoration, Tradition, Legacy ed. Matthew Roberts (Bloomsbury, 2024), 13970

Kathryn Rix: Parliaments, Politics and People Seminar: Dr Geoff Hicks on ‘Memorialising Britain’s politicians: the politics of Parliament Square’

Terry Wyke, ‘Memorial Mania: Remembering and forgetting Sir Robert Peel’ in People, places and identities: Themes in British social and cultural history, 1700s-1980s eds Alan Kidd and Melanie Tebbutt (MUP, 2017)

Tomorrow former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s funeral will take place at St Paul’s Cathedral. Public funerals for Prime Ministers have been fairly rare in recent years, but Baroness Thatcher is by no means alone in receiving this honour from the state.

The first Prime Minister to have a public funeral was William Pitt the Elder (1708-1778). The Commons agreed unanimously that the funeral should take place in Westminster Abbey, despite some calls for him to be buried in St Paul’s, and the cost covered by the public. Pitt lay in state for two days at Westminster and thousands came to pay their respects. His son, William Pitt the Younger, was honoured in the same way; after his sudden death in 1806 he too lay in state before being buried with his family in Westminster Abbey. In addition to the cost of the funeral itself, the public purse also covered his debts, which came to £40,000.

Westminster Abbey was also the venue for George Canning’s funeral in 1827, again attended by huge crowds, and for that of Lord Palmerston, who died from pneumonia in 1865.  You can view an image of his hearse leaving Brockett Hall on the St Albans museums website and read a full account of his funeral from the Brisbane Courier. The four-time Prime Minister William Gladstone, who died from cancer on 19 May 1898, was also buried in Westminster Abbey after three days of lying in state; simultaneous services were held across the Empire and world to mark his death. (For a full account of his funeral, see this article from H.C.G. Matthew).

Some of the largest state funerals were reserved for Prime Ministers who were also war leaders, such as Winston Churchill (1965) and the Duke of Wellington (1852). Both lay in state for several days, Churchill in Westminster Hall and Wellington at Walmer Castle and Chelsea Hospital, and millions turned out to pay their respects to both men. Wellington’s funeral was considered ‘probably the most ornate and spectacular funeral ever seen in England’, and he was buried at St Paul’s (for a longer account of Wellington’s ceremony and several images, see this article on the Victorian Web). After his state funeral, Churchill was buried in a private family service in the village of Bladon.

Other twentieth-century Prime Ministers honoured with a public funeral include Henry Campbell Bannerman, who died in 10 Downing Street in 1908. He received generous tributes in the House (you can read these in Hansard) , an ‘impressive’ service at Westminster Abbey and, again, crowds of mourners paying their respects before he was buried in Meigle churchyard. Parliament honoured his memory with a memorial in Westminster Abbey. Andrew Bonar Law, who died in 1923 after a short period as Prime Minister, was given a service in Westminster Abbey against his wishes (he had wanted to be buried with his wife in Helensburgh). This was not an uncontroversial move, as his old enemy Herbert Asquith was said to remark ‘we have buried the Unknown Prime Minister by the side of the Unknown Soldier.’

Finally, the first Labour Prime Minister, Ramsay MacDonald, was given a public funeral in Westminster Abbey after he died at sea in November 1937. Although his family were offered a place in the Abbey for his interment, his ashes were taken to Scotland and buried with the body of his wife. A memorial now stands in Westminster Abbey.

EP

All quotations thanks to the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, and thanks to Dr Paul Seaward and Dr Kathryn Rix for links and suggestions.