The Baroness Asquith of Yarnbury | |
|---|---|
 Carter in 1915 | |
| President of the Liberal Party | |
| In office 1945–1947 | |
| Preceded by | James Meston |
| Succeeded by | Isaac Foot |
| President of the Women's Liberal Federation | |
| In office 1923–1925 | |
| Preceded by | Viscountess Cowdray |
| Succeeded by | Margaret Wintringham |
| Member of theHouse of Lords Lord Temporal | |
| In office 21 December 1964 – 19 February 1969 Life Peerage | |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Helen Violet Asquith (1887-04-15)15 April 1887 Hampstead, London, England[1] |
| Died | 19 February 1969(1969-02-19) (aged 81) London, England |
| Cause of death | Myocardial infarction |
| Resting place | St Andrew's Church, Mells |
| Political party | Liberal |
| Spouse | |
| Children |
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| Parents |
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| Relatives |
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Helen Violet Bonham Carter, Baroness Asquith of Yarnbury,DBE (15 April 1887 – 19 February 1969), known until her marriage asViolet Asquith, was a Britishpolitician anddiarist. She was the daughter ofH. H. Asquith, Prime Minister from 1908 to 1916, and she was known as Lady Violet, acourtesy title, after her father's elevation to the peerage asEarl of Oxford and Asquith in 1925. Later she became active inLiberal politics herself, and was a leading opponent ofappeasement. She stood for Parliament and became alife peer.
She was also involved in arts and literature. Her diaries cover her father's premiership before and during theFirst World War and continue until the 1960s. She wasSir Winston Churchill's closest female friend, apart from his wife. Her grandchildren include the actressHelena Bonham Carter.
Violet Asquith was born inHampstead, London, England, and grew up with politics. She lived in10 Downing Street from 1908, when her father occupied it. She was educated at home bygovernesses, and later sent toParis to improve her languages. In 1903 she attended afinishing school inDresden.[2]
Her mother, Helen Kelsall Melland, died oftyphoid fever when Violet was four years old. Her stepmother from 1894 wasMargot Tennant: their relationship has been described as "stormy".[3] Her four brothers wereRaymond,Herbert,Arthur, andCyril. Violet's best friend when she was young wasVenetia Stanley, who later had an intense emotional relationship with her father.
Presented at court in 1905, Violet Asquith entered the social world of parties in her firstLondon season.[4][5]Sir Charles Tennant, 1st Baronet, Margot's father, hosted with his wife Marguerite a dance inGrosvenor Square for Violet and his granddaughter Frances Tennant, who married in 1912 Guy Lawrence Charteris and was mother ofAnn Fleming.[6][7][8] Guy's sisterCynthia was one of Violet's close friends, and married her brother Herbert in 1910.[9]
In October 1907 Violet had a proposal of marriage fromArnold Ward, a college friend of her brother Raymond. She turned it down. Sutherland suggests her parents were against the match: financial matters were probably a factor, and the Wards were Tories.[10][11]
Raymond Asquith belonged toThe Coterie. By 1908 this group of the younger generation was being noticed in social gossip, and a press story included Violet:
Mrs. Raymond Asquith [...] was the leading spirit of the coterie of "Young Souls" which comprised as its membersLady Marjorie andLady Violet Manners, Miss Cicely Horner, Miss Violet Asquith, and MissViola Tree.[12]
Violet was close toWinston Churchill, promoted to the Liberal Cabinet in 1908: Churchill said later they were "practically engaged", and they were friends for life.[13] He actually became engaged that year toClementine Hozier, whom Violet thought "as stupid as an owl". In late August, between his engagement and his marriage, Churchill spent a holiday with the Asquith family atNew Slains Castle on the Scottish coast. Some days after his departure, but while Arnold Ward remained a guest, Violet went out one evening, to look for a book left on the rocks. She was discovered after a search of several hours, lying uninjured but unconscious near the coastal path.Michael Shelden suggests Violet's experience may have been "an unhappy young woman's cry for attention".[14][15]
Violet became engaged to Archibald Gordon (Archie), son ofJohn Hamilton-Gordon, 1st Marquess of Aberdeen and Temair and his wifeIshbel in 1909, after he had had a car accident and was on what became his deathbed.[16]
Violet travelled to theSudan, where her brother Arthur was in the civil service.[4] On her return to the United Kingdom, she found that her good friendOlive MacLeod, sister ofFlora MacLeod, had lost her fiancéBoyd Alexander, killed in Africa. Under Violet's influence, Olive played the part of a widow. She then travelled to visit Alexander's grave.[17]
In May 1912 Violet accompanied her father and step-mother on a Mediterranean cruise, aboardHMS Enchantress, with a party comprising mainly Churchill, members of his family, and his political entourage includingEdward Marsh, but alsoLouis of Battenberg.[18] That year she acquired a long-term correspondent,Matthew Nathan.[19] In March 1913 she metRupert Brooke, at a dinner given by Marsh to celebrate Brooke's Fellowship atKing's College, Cambridge, withW. B. Yeats,Clementine Churchill and Cynthia Asquith.[20] She was the chosen confidante of Marsh after Brooke's death in 1915.[21]
Violet made an effort to befriendOttoline Morrell, in 1913. Her house inBedford Square offered conversation withHenry James,Wyndham Lewis andDesmond MacCarthy. Morrell found her conversation dazzling rather than profound.[22]
On 16 January 1915, the ageing Henry James visited the Asquiths atWalmer Castle in Kent. Violet Asquith and her half-sisterElizabeth saw James's lapidary but orotund and halting conversation being treated without respect by Winston Churchill, who had not read his books. James referred, on leaving, to the "very encouraging experience to meet that young man".[23] In February she saw off Rupert Brooke, who had become a friend and correspondent, sailing with his division bound for theGallipoli campaign and death.[24][25] Violet wrote in 1915 toAubrey Herbert that Brooke's death was one of the greatest sorrows of her life;[26] and according toVirginia Woolf, in 1916 she said that she had loved Brooke "as she had never loved any man".[27] On 30 November 1915 Violet marriedMaurice Bonham-Carter, her father's principal private secretary.[28]
Jackie Fisher theFirst Sea Lord, at odds with Churchill, theFirst Lord of the Admiralty, over the Gallipoli campaign, resigned on 15 May 1915. It set off a train of political events that led to the end of the Liberal Cabinet in favour of a coalition, the removal of Churchill, and then in 1916 Asquith's replacement as prime minister byLloyd George. Bonham Carter influenced the later historiography of these events, clashing in particular withRobert Blake who adhered more toLord Beaverbrook's account. Through her, Asquith's biographerRoy Jenkins was given access to family papers.[29][30]
The Liberal Party split between followers of Asquith and of Lloyd George. As it fell on hard times in the 1920s, Bonham Carter campaigned for her father at the1920 Paisley by-election. That election was won, and she was asked to become a Liberal candidate herself.Lord Kilbracken was in favour, but she decided to give her children priority. She was active as President of theWomen's Liberal Federation (1923–25, 1939–45) and was the first woman to serve asPresident of the Liberal Party (1945–47).[4] She campaigned withEleanor Rathbone forfamily allowances.[31]
Bonham Carter spoke on many platforms in the 1920s and 1930s, and along with Winston Churchill (and others), she early saw the dangers of Europeanfascism. She joined and animated a number of anti-fascist groups (such asThe Focus Group), often in concert with Churchill, and spoke at their gatherings. In a 1938 speech she mockedNeville Chamberlain's dealings withNazi Germany as the policy of "peace at any price that others can be forced to pay".[4] After theProtectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was created from Czechoslovakia on 15 March 1939, she supported Czechoslovak refugees and those persecuted by the Nazis.[32][33]
In the1945 general election Bonham Carter stood forWells, coming third, while in1951 she stood for the winnable seat ofColne Valley.[34] As an old friend, Churchill arranged for the Conservatives to refrain from nominating a candidate for the constituency, giving her a clear run againstLabour. She was nonetheless narrowly defeated. In the1953 Coronation Honours she was appointed aDame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE).[35] She continued to be a popular and charismatic speaker for Liberal candidates, including her son-in-lawJo Grimond, her son Mark, andJeremy Thorpe, and she was a frequent broadcaster on current affairs programmes on radio and television.
In the postwar years, Bonham Carter was an active supporter of theUnited Nations and the cause of European unity, advocating for Britain's entry into theCommon Market.[4] In the non-political sphere, she was also active in the arts, including serving as a governor of theBBC from 1941 to 1946, and a governor of theOld Vic (1945–69).[4]
On 21 December 1964, Violet Bonham Carter was created alife peer asBaroness Asquith of Yarnbury, of Yarnbury in theCounty of Wilts,[36] one of the first new Liberal peers in several decades. She became active in theHouse of Lords.
Lady Violet Bonham Carter died in 1969 of aheart attack, aged 81, and was interred atSt Andrew's Church, Mells, Somerset, near the home of her late brother, Raymond.[37]
Violet Bonham Carter was a diarist and biographer. Her works include:
Winston Churchill As I Knew Him (1965) recounted how during the course of conversation at the dinner party at which they first met, Churchill concluded a thought with words to the effect that "Of course, we are all worms, but I do believe that I am a glow worm".[39]
Violet Asquith married her father'sPrincipal Private Secretary,Maurice Bonham Carter, in 1915. They had four children together:
Their long-term London address was 21Hyde Park Square.[34]
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| Party political offices | ||
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| Preceded by | President of the Liberal Party 1945–1947 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | President of the Women's Liberal Federation 1923–1925 | Succeeded by |
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