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On the first day of January 1921 few people stopped to think on the amazing and unprecedented position of Lloyd George. Certainly his own colleagues, Bonar Law, Chamberlain, Birkenhead, even Churchill, showed no sign of consciousness of the extraordinary political situation.

Lloyd George was a Prime Minister without a Party.

Of his own group of followers, made up mostly of Office-holders, many were ashamed of their association with the Tories, and longing to return to their old tried and trusted leader, H. H. Asquith, who was still in the running for Downing Street.

The back-bench Members of the Coalition Liberal Party were “uncertain, coy and hard to please”. They could not be counted. They would not stand up. It is right to say that some waited eagerly and impatiently for honours and places from Lloyd George’s bountiful hand. They were loyal. The rest, almost without exception, hoped for reunion with Asquith.^[1]

But the weakness of Lloyd George’s following was counterbalanced in the minds of men by the Prime Minister himself. His name made up the balance of his strength.

Then again many Tory Members had been persuaded to believe that their own seats depended upon the Liberal votes in their constituencies which had been delivered to them at the last election by the almighty hand of the Prime Minister.

He was in the eyes of men supreme and indispensable.

Then 1921 ushered in two cruel years which were to rip away all the gold brocade and the tinsel too. The illusions were being shattered and a great tragedy was being enacted for all to see.

The Greeks told us of a man in high position, self-confident, so successful as to be overpowering to all others. Then his virtues turned to failings. He committed the crime of arrogance. His structure of self-confidence and success came tumbling down. He struggled against fate, but he was doomed. So it was with Lloyd George in the year 1921 and into 1922. Then all was over. His plans good and bad came to nothing. He fell and never rose again.

“The soothing voice”

Miss Stevenson—she married Lloyd George in 1943

The brilliant schemes and stratagems which he resorted to in war, outwitting Generals and Politicians, Peers, Prelates and the King, and all to save Britain, he now applied with daring and skill to save himself from defeat by the Members of the House of Commons. He was confident that what he had done once, he could do again. To keep the seat of power, the place of patronage, he was prepared to stand out as the leader of Empire-minded men—or appear as the Liberal Apostle of Free Trade: as the Man of Peace in Europe—or the Man of War against Turkey and France: as the hammer of the Russian Bolsheviks—or their noble conciliator: as the Tribune of the British working classes—or the Champion of the Tory Landlords against Labour: stern enemy of the Irish—or their tender friend spreading his covering wings about another Celtic race ground under the heel of the oppressor. He took up each position in turn during those tragic years of 1921 and 1922.

Sometimes and simultaneously he took up contradictory standings. His daring was wonderful to look upon. But to those who never forgot his greatness in his great days, the spectacle wore thin and ere long became pathetic. “... God hath made man upright; but they have sought out many inventions.”

What a world of power and dignity and authority he might have lived in had he taken a different turn. Spurning all paths of pleasantness, he might have walked out into the desert of Opposition. There he could have reunited his disparate Liberals, attracting to himself the youth of Britain. His return to power would have been a certainty.

Yet he could not. The driver’s seat was as he believed his rightful place. He clung to the wheel guiding the vehicle of state until he was rudely flung forth—the fate of every politician who stays too long.

Here I endeavour to record the reasons for the fall of David Lloyd George, war leader, whose friends had believed he might be Prime Minister for life if he wished. It is not a history of the period 1921-22. Many incidents and events of immense importance have been passed over in brief mention. It is, however, an attempt to tell of the shifting of political power as I saw and heard it at the time.

Many conversations, records of meetings and accounts of personal conflicts are told at length, while the Imperial Conference and the Washington Naval Agreement are relegated to the task of the historian. My efforts to gather and preserve vast collections of papers and correspondence may be of more use to that same historian than all of my writings.

It is my intention to publish two more volumes; first the “Age of Baldwin”, then “Churchill’s Victory”. I have gathered the necessary material.

For Lloyd George’s triumphs in war, see Appendix 63.

[1]

It was in 1920 that Lloyd George, supported by Churchill and Charles McCurdy, put forward to his colleagues serving in the Government a scheme for merging the Coalition Liberal and Conservative Parties. He was at that time at the height of his popularity and power. He informed his colleagues that he would be the leader of the combined Party. Bonar Law and Sir George Younger had agreed to the plan, Bonar Law having taken this decision after consulting many of his colleagues. Younger made the condition that Lloyd George’s Fund, amounting to several million pounds, should be handed over to the joint Party chest. “Gate money” he called it.In late June Lloyd George met his colleagues and put the plan before them for the second and last time. Ministers, Under-Ministers and colleagues, under the leadership of T. J. Macnamara, Ian Macpherson and Alfred Mond, were in opposition to the plan. They would not sacrifice their Liberal affiliations. The plan was defeated.From the meeting Lloyd George came to Cherkley, my Surrey home. He regretted the decision. Dame Margaret Lloyd George, who came with him, rejoiced. She never liked the Tories and never failed to say just so.