The Most Honourable The Marquess of Salisbury KG PC FRS DL
The then-Viscount Cranborne in 1927
Ministerial offices Leader of the House of Lords In office 28 October 1951 – 29 March 1957 Monarchs George VI Elizabeth II Prime Minister Winston Churchill Anthony Eden Harold Macmillan Preceded by The Viscount Addison Succeeded by The Earl of Home In office 21 February 1942 – 26 July 1945 Monarch George VI Prime Minister Winston Churchill Preceded by The Lord Moyne Succeeded by The Viscount Addison Lord President of the Council In office 25 November 1952 – 29 March 1957 Monarch Elizabeth II Prime Minister Winston Churchill Anthony Eden Preceded by The Lord Woolton Succeeded by The Earl of Home Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations In office 12 March 1952 – 24 November 1952 Monarch Elizabeth II Prime Minister Winston Churchill Preceded by The Baron Ismay Succeeded by The Viscount Swinton Secretary of State for the Colonies In office 22 February 1942 – 22 November 1942 Monarch George VI Prime Minister Winston Churchill Preceded by The Lord Moyne Succeeded by Oliver Stanley Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal In office 28 October 1951 – 7 May 1952 Monarch George VI Prime Minister Winston Churchill Preceded by Richard Stokes Succeeded by Harry Crookshank In office 22 November 1942 – 24 September 1943 Monarch George VI Prime Minister Winston Churchill Preceded by Stafford Cripps Succeeded by The Lord Beaverbrook Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs In office 24 September 1943 – 26 July 1945 Monarch George VI Prime Minister Winston Churchill Preceded by Clement Attlee Succeeded by The Viscount Addison In office 3 October 1940 – 19 February 1942 Monarch George VI Prime Minister Winston Churchill Preceded by The Viscount Caldecote Succeeded by Clement Attlee Paymaster General In office 15 May 1940 – 3 October 1940 Monarch George VI Prime Minister Winston Churchill Preceded by The Earl Winterton Succeeded by Maurice Hankey Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs In office 18 June 1935 – 20 February 1938 Monarchs George V Edward VIII George VI Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin Neville Chamberlain Preceded by The Earl Stanhope Succeeded by The Earl Plymouth
Member of theHouse of Lords Lord Temporal
In office 4 April 1947 – 23 February 1972 Hereditary Peerage
Preceded by	The 4th Marquess of Salisbury
Succeeded by	The 6th Marquess of Salisbury
In office 21 January 1941 – 4 April 1947 asBaron Cecil of Essendon
Preceded by	James Gascoyne-Cecil (bywrit of acceleration)
Succeeded by	himself
Member of Parliament forSouth Dorset
In office 30 May 1929 – 21 January 1941
Preceded by	Robert Yerburgh
Succeeded by	Victor Montagu
Personal details
Born	(1893-08-27)27 August 1893
Died	23 February 1972(1972-02-23) (aged 78)
Nationality	British
Political party	Conservative
Spouse	Elizabeth Cavendish ​ (m. 1915)​
Children	Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 6th Marquess of Salisbury Michael Charles James Cecil Richard Hugh Cecil
Parent	James Gascoyne-Cecil, 4th Marquess of Salisbury (father)
Alma mater	Christ Church, Oxford

Robert Arthur James Gascoyne-Cecil, 5th Marquess of Salisbury (27 August 1893 – 23 February 1972), known asViscount Cranborne from 1903 to 1947, was a BritishConservativepolitician.^[1][2][3]

Nicknamed "Bobbety", Salisbury was the eldest son ofJames Gascoyne-Cecil, 4th Marquess of Salisbury, by his wife Lady Cicely Gore, daughter of the5th Earl of Arran, and the grandson of the3rd Marquess of Salisbury,Prime Minister 1895–1902. He was educated atEton andChrist Church, Oxford, receiving anhonoraryDoctorate of Civil Laws in 1951.

Salisbury served inthe Army during theFirst World War. He was commissioned as aLieutenant into theGrenadier Guards (SR) in 1915 and served until thewar's end. He was awarded theCroix de Guerre and ChevalierOrder of the Crown of Belgium. When the war ended, he worked at theWestminster Bank. In 1928, he was appointed a director and to theRoyal Commission on Historical Manuscripts; he was promoted to chairman of the commission in 1957.

Salisbury, as Viscount Cranborne, was elected as aConservative to theHouse of Commons asMP forSouth Dorset in1929. As Parliamentary Secretary to theLord Privy Seal in 1934 inRamsay MacDonald'sNational Government, he was promoted serving as JointParliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs from 1935 to 1938. He was madePaymaster General byWinston Churchill in May 1940 for the duration of theBattle of Britain but was appointedSecretary of State for Dominion Affairs from 1940 to 1942.

In 1941, he was summoned to theHouse of Lords through awrit of acceleration in one of his father's titles as Baron Cecil of Essendon. He wasSecretary of State for the Colonies in February–November 1942,Lord Privy Seal between 1942 and 1943,Leader of the House of Lords between 1942 and 1945 and again Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs between 1943 and 1945. As a friend of Churchill, in 1943, he was appointed President of theEnglish-Speaking Union to promote the universality of the language throughout theBritish Empire. His final wartime appointment was as President of theUniversity College of the South West for a statutory ten years before it was converted to university status.

In 1947,King George VI made Salisbury aKnight of the Order of the Garter, and he succeeded his father in the marquessate shortly afterwards. He became High Steward ofHertfordshire, where he lived, in 1947, shortly before the office was abolished.

During the 1950s, when his party returned to office, successively, he served Churchill,Anthony Eden, andHarold Macmillan as Lord Privy Seal from 1951 to 1952; Leader of the House of Lords from 1951 to 1957;Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations in 1952 andLord President of the Council from December 1952 to 1957. During the period of the coronation ofElizabeth II, he was appointed Acting Foreign Secretary, as Eden was then seriously ill after a series of botched operations on hisbile duct.

In November 1951, he received an honorary doctorate of law from theUniversity of Liverpool.^[4]

Lord Salisbury was known as a hardlineimperialist. In 1952, asSecretary of State for Commonwealth Relations, he tried to make permanent the exile ofSeretse Khama,kgosi (leader) of theBamangwato people inBechuanaland, for marrying a white British woman. During the 1960s, Lord Salisbury continued to be a staunch defender of the white-dominated governments inSouth Africa and inSouthern Rhodesia (nowZimbabwe) and was granted the Freedom of the City ofSalisbury (which had been named after his grandfather) on a visit in 1956. He was also a fierce opponent of liberal-left attempts to reform the House of Lords, but he created what is known as theSalisbury Convention, under which the House of Lords will not oppose the second or third reading of any government legislation promised in its election manifesto.

In January 1957, Eden resigned as prime minister. The two candidates wereRab Butler andHarold Macmillan. The Queen took advice fromWinston Churchill (who backed Macmillan),Edward Heath (who, asChief Whip, was aware of backbench opinion), and Salisbury, who interviewed the Cabinet one by one and with his famous speech impediment, asked each one whether he was for "Wab or Hawold" (it is thought that only between one and three were for "Wab"). To the surprise of the media, the advice was overwhelmingly to appoint Macmillan asPrime Minister instead of Butler.

Lord Salisbury resigned from his position asLeader of the House of Lords in opposition to the Government's decision to releaseArchbishop Makarios from his detention inSeychelles. Makarios, theArchbishop of Cyprus, had been arrested because the British perceived that he was encouraging inter-communal violence and terrorism inCyprus during the so-called 'Cyprus Question'. He became the first president of the ConservativeMonday Club in January 1962, when he stated "there was never a greater need for true conservatism than there is today".^[5] He held the post until his death in 1972.

Salisbury's cultural pursuits were recognised when he was made a Fellow of theRoyal Academy of Arts that year.^[6] These artistic credentials were enhanced as a Trustee of theNational Gallery from 1960 to 1966.

Apart from his political career, Salisbury was Chancellor of theUniversity of Liverpool from 1951 until 1971. In 1970, students at the university staged an occupation at Senate House to demand his removal over his support forapartheid and other views.

Lord Salisbury married Elizabeth Vere Cavendish, daughter ofLord Richard Cavendish (grandson of the 7th Duke of Devonshire) and his wife Lady Moyra de Vere Beauclerk (a daughter ofThe 10th Duke of St Albans),^{[citation needed]} on 8 December 1915. They had three sons, two of whom predeceased their parents:^{[citation needed]}

• Robert Edward Peter Gascoyne-Cecil, 6th Marquess of Salisbury (born 24 October 1916, died 11 July 2003)
• Michael Charles James Gascoyne-Cecil (born 27 October 1918, died 27 October 1934)
• Richard Hugh Vere Gascoyne-Cecil (born 31 January 1924, aSergeant Pilot in theRAF who waskilled in action on 12 August 1944 during theSecond World War.

Lord Salisbury died in February 1972, at 78, and was succeeded by his eldest and only surviving son,Robert, who became the 6th Marquess. Lady Salisbury died on 5 June 1982.^[7]

• United Kingdom:
  • 3 December 1946: Knight of theMost Noble Order of the Garter (KG)^[8]

He is portrayed byClive Francis in theNetflix seriesThe Crown.

Wikimedia Commons has media related toRobert Gascoyne-Cecil, 5th Marquess of Salisbury.

• Simon Ball:The Guardsmen: Harold Macmillan, Three Friends and the World They Made. Harper Perennial, London 2005,ISBN 978-0-00-653163-0.

• Newspaper clippings about Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 5th Marquess of Salisbury in the20th Century Press Archives of theZBW
• works at WorldCat byRobert Gascoyne-Cecil Cecil of Chelwood, Viscount

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