View source for Hugh Cecil, 1st Baron Quickswood

{{Short description|British politician}}
{{Use British English|date=September 2014}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2021}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| honorific-prefix  = [[The Right Honourable]]
| name              = The Lord Quickswood
| honorific-suffix  = [[Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council|PC]]
| image             = Lord Hugh Cecil LCCN2014696089 (cropped).jpg
| caption           = Lord Hugh Cecil, circa 1914
|office14 = [[Member of the House of Lords]]<br />[[Lords Temporal|Lord Temporal]]
|term_start14 = 25 January 1941
|term_end14 = 10 December 1956<br />[[Hereditary peerage]]
|predecessor14 = ''Peerage created''
|successor14 = ''Peerage extinct''
|office15 = [[Member of Parliament (United Kingdom)|Member of Parliament]]<br />for [[Oxford University (UK Parliament constituency)|Oxford University]]
|term_start15 = 15 January 1910
|term_end15 = 23 February 1937
|predecessor15 = [[John Gilbert Talbot]]
|successor15 = [[Arthur Salter, 1st Baron Salter|Arthur Salter]]
|office16 = [[Member of Parliament (United Kingdom)|Member of Parliament]]<br />for [[Greenwich (UK Parliament constituency)|Greenwich]]
|term_start16 = 13 July 1895
|term_end16 = 8 February 1906
|predecessor16 = [[Thomas Boord]]
|successor16 = [[Richard Jackson (Liberal politician)|Richard Jackson]]
| birth_name        = Hugh Richard Heathcote Gascoyne-Cecil
| birth_date        = 14 October 1869
| birth_place       = [[Hertfordshire]], England
| death_date        = 10 December 1956 (aged 87)
| death_place       = [[Sussex]], England
| nationality       = British
| parents           = [[Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury]]<br />[[Georgina Alderson]]
| party             = [[Conservative Party (UK)|Conservative]]
| alma_mater        = [[University College, Oxford]]
}}
'''Hugh Richard Heathcote Gascoyne-Cecil, 1st Baron Quickswood''' [[Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council|PC]] (14 October 1869 – 10 December 1956), styled '''Lord Hugh Cecil''' until 1941, was a British [[Conservative Party (UK)|Conservative Party]] politician.<ref>[https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/people/lord-hugh-cecil/index.html Hansard person page online accessed May 2009]</ref>
==Background and education==
Cecil was the eighth and youngest child of [[Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury]], three times [[Prime Minister of the United Kingdom]], and [[Georgina Alderson]], daughter of Sir [[Edward Alderson (judge)|Edward Hall Alderson]]. He was the brother of [[James Gascoyne-Cecil, 4th Marquess of Salisbury]], [[Lord William Cecil (bishop)|Lord William Cecil]], [[Lord Cecil of Chelwood]] and [[Lord Edward Cecil]] and a first cousin of Prime Minister [[Arthur Balfour]]. He was educated at [[Eton College|Eton]] and [[University College, Oxford]]. He graduated with first-class honours in Modern History in 1891<ref>''Oxford University Calendar 1895'', p.271</ref> and was a fellow of [[Hertford College, Oxford]], from 1891 until 1936, when he considered that he could not be [[List of Provosts of Eton College|Provost of Eton College]] and simultaneously a Fellow of Hertford.<ref name="thepeerage.com">[http://thepeerage.com/p1642.htm#i16413 thepeerage.com Hugh Richard Heathcote Gascoyne-Cecil, 1st and last Baron Quickswood]</ref>
==Political career==
[[File:Hugh Cecil Vanity Fair 1900-10-18.jpg|thumb|left|upright|"[[Greenwich (UK Parliament constituency)|Greenwich]]". Cecil as caricatured by Spy ([[Leslie Ward]]) in ''[[Vanity Fair (British magazine)|Vanity Fair]]'', October 1900]]
After his graduation as BA in 1891, Cecil went to work in parliament. From 1891 to 1892 he was Assistant Private Secretary to his father, who was [[Foreign Secretary]].<ref name="thepeerage.com"/> Having paid his subscription he was elevated to [[MA (Oxon)|MA]] in 1894, and entered the [[House of Commons of the United Kingdom|Commons]] as Conservative [[Member of Parliament (United Kingdom)|Member of Parliament]] (MP) for [[Greenwich (UK Parliament constituency)|Greenwich]] in 1895.<ref>{{London Gazette |issue=26651 |date=9 August 1895 |page=4481}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.leighrayment.com/commons/Gcommons2.htm |title=leighrayment.com House of Commons: Gorbals to Guildford |access-date=14 August 2010 |url-status=usurped |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181003152539/http://www.leighrayment.com/commons/Gcommons2.htm |archive-date=3 October 2018 }}</ref> He took a keen interest in ecclesiastical questions and became an active member of the Church party, resisting attempts by [[Nonconformist (Protestantism)|nonconformists]] and [[secularists]] to take the discipline of the Church out of the hands of the archbishops and bishops, and to remove the bishops from their seats in the [[House of Lords]]. In a speech on the second reading of Balfour's [[Education Act 1902|Education Bill of 1902]], he maintained that for the final settlement of the religious difficulty there must be cooperation between the [[Church of England]] and nonconformity, which was the Church's natural ally; and that the only possible basis of agreement was that every child should be brought up in the belief of its parents. The ideal to be aimed at in education was the improvement of the national character. In the later stages of the Bill's progress, he strongly resented an amendment approved by the House and taken over by the Government giving the school managers (governors, in modern parlance), instead of the local vicar, control of religious education in voluntary, i.e. church, schools.{{efn|sometimes known at the time as non-provided schools as they had not been set up by the state under the [[Education Act 1870|Forster Act of 1870]]}} This was not the only point on which he showed considerable independence of the government of which Balfour, his cousin, was the head.<ref name=eb>{{cite EB1922|wstitle=Cecil, Lord Hugh Richard Heathcote}}</ref>
During the early 20th century, Cecil (known to his friends as "Linky") was the eponymous leader of the [[Hughligans]], a group of privileged young [[Tory]] Members of Parliament critical of their own party's leadership. Modelled after [[Lord Randolph Churchill]]'s [[Fourth Party]], the Hughligans included Cecil, [[F. E. Smith]], [[Arthur Stanley (politician)|Arthur Stanley]], [[Ian Malcolm (politician)|Ian Malcolm]] and, until 1904, [[Winston Churchill]]. Cecil was the [[best man]] at Churchill's wedding in 1908 and the latter greatly admired his eloquence in the House of Commons. As Churchill declared to a contemporary, [[Llewellyn Atherley-Jones]],"How I wish I had his powers; speech is a painful effort to me."<ref>L.A. Atherley-Jones, ''Looking Back: Reminiscences of a Political Career'' (London, 1925), p. 108</ref> Cecil dissented from the beginning from [[Joseph Chamberlain]]'s policy of [[tariff reform]], pleading in Parliament against any devaluation of the idea of empire to a "gigantic profit-sharing business". He took a prominent position among the "[[Unionist Free Food League|Free Food Unionists]]"; consequently he was attacked by the tariff reformers, and lost his seat at Greenwich in 1906.<ref name=eb/>
In 1910 Cecil became an MP for [[Oxford University (UK Parliament constituency)|Oxford University]], which he represented for the next 27 years.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.leighrayment.com/commons/Ocommons.htm |title=leighrayment.com House of Commons: Ochil to Oxford University |access-date=14 August 2010 |url-status=usurped |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110816023438/http://www.leighrayment.com/commons/Ocommons.htm |archive-date=16 August 2011 }}</ref> He immediately threw himself with passion into the struggle against the Ministerial Veto Resolutions, comparing the [[Liberal Government 1905–1915|Asquith government]] to "thimble riggers". In the next year, he was active in the resistance to the [[Parliament Act 1911|Parliament Bill]], treating [[Asquith]] as a "traitor" for his advice to the Crown to swamp the Conservative majority in the Lords by creating hundreds of Liberal peers, and taking a prominent part in the disturbance which prevented the Prime Minister from being heard on 24 July 1911. But he never quite regained the authority which he had possessed in the House in the early years of the century. He strongly opposed the [[Welsh Church Act 1914|Welsh Church Bill]], and he denounced the [[1914 Home Rule Bill]] as reducing [[Ireland]] from the status of a wife to that of a mistress — she was to be kept by [[John Bull]], not united to him.<ref name=eb/> In 1916 Cecil was part of the [[Special Commissions (Dardanelles and Mesopotamia) Act 1916|Mesopotamia Commission of Inquiry]]. He was sworn of the [[Privy Council (United Kingdom)|Privy Council]] on 16 January<ref name="ReferenceA">Burke's Peerage & Baronetage (106th ed.) (Salisbury)</ref> 1918.<ref>{{London Gazette |issue=30484 |date=18 January 1918 |page=983}}</ref>
Apart from his political career Cecil served as a [[Lieutenant]] in the [[Royal Flying Corps]] during the [[First World War]]. In that capacity, in debate in 1918, he severely censured the treatment of [[General Trenchard]] by the government.
Lord Hugh was a committed Anglican, and a member of [[House of Laity]] in the [[Church Assembly]] from 1919. He was awarded a [[Doctorate of Civil Law]] by Oxford University in 1924. He pleaded for lenient treatment of [[conscientious objector]]s, and endeavoured unsuccessfully to relieve them of disability.<ref name=eb/> He left the House of Commons in 1937 because the previous year he had been appointed Provost of Eton College, a post he retained until 1944.<ref name="thepeerage.com"/> On 25 January 1941 he was raised to the peerage as '''Baron Quickswood''', of Clothall in the County of Hertford.<ref>{{London Gazette |issue=35068 |date=7 February 1941 |page=752}}</ref> He was a Trustee of the [[London Library]], and an honorary Doctor of Civil Law at [[Durham University]]. He was also honorary [[Doctor of Law]]s at the [[University of Edinburgh]] in 1910, and at [[University of Cambridge|Cambridge]] in 1933. From 1944 until his death he had an honorary association with [[New College, Oxford]].<ref name="ReferenceA"/>
==Personal life==
Lord Quickswood never married. He died on 10 December 1956, aged 87, at which time the barony became extinct.<ref name="thepeerage.com"/>
==Arms==
{{Infobox COA wide
|image = [[File:Coronet of a British Baron.svg|centre|150px]] [[File:Quickswood Escutcheon.png|centre|200px]]
|escutcheon = Quarterly: 1st & 4th barry of ten Argent and Azure over all six escutcheons three two and one Sable each charged with a lion rampant of the first (Cecil); 2nd & 3rd Argent on a pale Sable a conger’s head erased and erect Or charged with an ermine spot (Gascoyne); an annulet for difference.
|crests = 1st six arrows in saltire Or barbed and feathered Argent banded Gules buckled and garnished Gold surmounted by a morion Proper (Cecil) 2nd a conger’s head erased and erect Or charged with an ermine spot.
|motto = Sero Sed Serio.<ref>{{cite book|title=Burke's Peerage |date=1956}}</ref>}}
==Publications==
* [https://archive.org/stream/politicalsociali00judg#page/n7/mode/2up "Presidential Address."] In ''Political Socialism, a Remonstrance'', edited by Mark H. Judge, London: P.S. King, 1908.
* [https://archive.org/stream/libertyauthority00ceci#page/n5/mode/2up ''Liberty and Authority''], London: Edward Arnold, 1910.
* [https://archive.org/stream/conservatism00ceciuoft#page/n7/mode/2up ''Conservatism''], London: Williams and Norgate, 1912.
* [https://archive.org/stream/rightsofcitizens00ansouoft#page/158/mode/2up "Second Chambers in the British Dominions and in Foreign Countries."] In ''Rights of Citizenship'', Chap. VII. London: Frederick Warne & Co., 1912.
* [https://archive.org/stream/churchandstate00unknuoft#page/292/mode/2up "The Position of the Incumbent in the Parochial Church Council."] In ''Church and State'', Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1916.
* "The Irish Question Again," ''The Living Age'', Vol. XIV, No. 301, 31 May 1919
* [https://archive.org/stream/cu31924030437499#page/n3/mode/2up ''Nationalism and Catholicism''], Macmillan & Co., Limited, 1919.
* "National Instinct, the Basis of Social Institutions," ''Burnett House Papers'', No. 9, Oxford University Press, 1926.
* [http://justus.anglican.org/resources/bcp/communion_might_be.htm The Communion Service As It Might Be, together with an Introduction and Notes]. London: Humphrey Milford, 1935 (digitized by Richard Mammana).
==Footnotes==
{{notelist}}
==References==
{{Reflist}}
==Sources==
* {{cite journal|last=Annan|first=Noel|date=1955|title=The Intellectual Aristocracy|editor=H. Plumb|journal=Studies in Social History: A Tribute to G. M. Trevelyan|place=London|publisher=Longmans, Green & Co}}
* {{cite book|last=Gardiner|first= A. G.|date=1913|chapter-url=https://archive.org/stream/pillarsofsociety00gardiala#page/38/mode/2up |title=Pillars of Society |chapter=Hugh Cecil|publisher=James Nisbet & Co., Limited}}
* {{cite web|last=Griffith-Boscawen|first=A. S. T.|date=1907|url=https://archive.org/stream/fourteenyearsinp00grifiala#page/n5/mode/2up|title=Fourteen Years in Parliament|place=London|publisher=John Murray}}
* {{cite journal|last=Lucy|first=Henry|date=1917|title=Lord Hugh Cecil|journal=The Nation|volume=CIV|issue=2705}}
* {{cite web|author=Quigley, Carroll|author-link=Carroll Quigley|date=1981|url=http://www.carrollquigley.net/pdf/The_Anglo-American_Establishment.pdf|title=The Cecil Bloc: The Anglo-American Establishment: From Rhodes to Cliveden|place=New York|publisher=Books in Focus}}
* {{cite journal|last=Rempel|first=Richard|title=Lord Hugh Cecil's Parliamentary Career Promise Unfulfilled|journal=Journal of British Studies|volume=XI|date=May 1972}}
* {{cite book|last=Rose|first=Kenneth|date=1975|title=The Later Cecils|place=London|publisher=Macmillan}}
==External links==
{{Commons category|Hugh Cecil, 1st Baron Quickswood}}
* {{Hansard-contribs | lord-hugh-cecil | Lord Quickswood }}
* [https://archive.org/stream/sep1909steads00melbuoft#page/32/mode/2up Character Sketch: Lord Hugh Cecil]
{{s-start}}
{{s-par|uk}}
{{succession box
| title  = [[Member of Parliament (United Kingdom)|Member of Parliament]] for [[Greenwich (UK Parliament constituency)|Greenwich]]
| years  = [[1895 United Kingdom general election|1895]] – [[1906 United Kingdom general election|1906]]
| before = [[Sir Thomas Boord, 1st Baronet|Sir Thomas Boord]]
| after  = [[Richard Jackson (Liberal politician)|Richard Jackson]]
}}
{{succession box
| title  = [[Member of Parliament (United Kingdom)|Member of Parliament]] for [[Oxford University (UK Parliament constituency)|Oxford University]]
| with   = [[Sir William Anson, 3rd Baronet|Sir William Anson, Bt]] 1910–1914
| with2  = [[Rowland Prothero, 1st Baron Ernle|Rowland Prothero]] 1914–1919
| with3  = [[Charles Oman|Sir Charles Oman]] 1919–1935
| with4  = [[A. P. Herbert|Sir A. P. Herbert]] 1935–1937
| years  = [[January 1910 United Kingdom general election|Jan. 1910]] – [[1937 Oxford University by-election|1937]]
| before = [[Sir William Anson, 3rd Baronet|Sir William Anson, Bt]]<br />[[John Gilbert Talbot]]
| after  = [[Alan Patrick Herbert|Sir A. P. Herbert]]<br />[[Arthur Salter, 1st Baron Salter|Sir Arthur Salter]]
}}
{{s-aca}}
{{succession box | title=[[Provost of Eton]] | before=[[M. R. James]] | after=[[Henry Marten (educator)|Henry Marten]] | years=1936–1944}}
{{s-reg|uk}}
{{s-new|Creation}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[Baron Quickswood]]|years=1941–1956}}
{{s-non|reason=Extinct}}
{{s-end}}
{{Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury|state=collapsed}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Quickswood, Hugh Cecil, 1st Baron}}
[[Category:1869 births]]
[[Category:1956 deaths]]
[[Category:Fellows of Hertford College, Oxford]]
[[Category:Alumni of University College, Oxford]]
[[Category:Members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom]]
[[Category:British Army personnel of World War I]]
[[Category:Royal Flying Corps officers]]
[[Category:Younger sons of marquesses|Cecil, Lord Hugh]]
[[Category:Conservative Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies|Cecil, Hugh]]
[[Category:Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for the University of Oxford|Cecil, Hugh]]
[[Category:UK MPs 1895–1900|Cecil, Hugh]]
[[Category:UK MPs 1900–1906|Cecil, Hugh]]
[[Category:UK MPs 1910|Cecil, Hugh]]
[[Category:UK MPs 1910–1918|Cecil, Hugh]]
[[Category:UK MPs 1918–1922|Cecil, Hugh]]
[[Category:UK MPs 1922–1923|Cecil, Hugh]]
[[Category:UK MPs 1923–1924|Cecil, Hugh]]
[[Category:UK MPs 1924–1929|Cecil, Hugh]]
[[Category:UK MPs 1929–1931|Cecil, Hugh]]
[[Category:UK MPs 1931–1935|Cecil, Hugh]]
[[Category:UK MPs 1935–1945|Cecil, Hugh]]
[[Category:UK MPs who were granted peerages]]
[[Category:Cecil family|Hugh Cecil, 1st Baron Quickswood]]
[[Category:Barons created by George VI]]
[[Category:People educated at Eton College]]
[[Category:Provosts of Eton College]]
[[Category:Children of Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury]]