1929-1956
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Keeper of the Liberal flame
The life of Ivor Davies (1915-1986), who would have been the Liberal candidate at the Oxford by-election in 1938.
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Battle of ideas or absence of leadership?
Analysis of the ideological struggle in the Liberal Party in the 1940s and 1950s.
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Sir Donald Maclean, 1864-1932
Sir Donald Maclean had greatness thrust upon him. Until 1918, everything in his career suggested that he was living a useful public life which would one day merit an obituary notice in The Times, but would hardly bring him into the first rank of politics – yet he was to play a critical and unexpected…
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Isaac Foot, 1880-1960
Isaac Foot was born in Plymouth, Devon on 23 February 1880, the fifth child of Isaac and Eliza, nee Ryder. His father was a carpenter and undertaker, who, as a young man, had migrated from Horrabridge, Devon, the family home for at least three centuries, to Plymouth, building his own home at 20, Notte Street.…
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Sir Archibald Sinclair (Viscount Thurso), 1890-1970
Archibald Sinclair was the Liberal leader from 1935 to 1945. He was a leading figure in British politics in that period, first as an outspoken critic of appeasement, and then as a minister during the war. For Liberals, his importance lay in his belief in the possibility of a Liberal revival, which was crucial in…
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Herbert Samuel (Viscount Samuel), 1870-1963
Herbert Samuel was a leading figure in the Liberal Party for over fifty years, from its zenith before the First World War to the nadir of its fortunes in the mid-1950s. With Sinclair, he was the last independent Liberal to serve in the Cabinet. A respected statesman, formidable mediator and administrator, and notable political thinker,…
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The slow death of Liberal Wales 1906 – 1979
The story of Liberalism in Wales 1906 – 1979.
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David and Frances: Marriage
An examination of the build-up to the marriage of David Lloyd George and Frances Stevenson in 1943.
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Survival and revival
Review of Mark Egan, Coming into Focus: The Transformation of the Liberal Party 1945-1964 (VDM Verlag Dr Muller, 2009).