H.H. Asquith: Letters to Venetia Stanley

by Herbert Henry Asquith, Michael Brock (editor), Eleanor Brock (editor)

Here are the letters of a Prime Minister in his sixties to the young woman he adored.H. H. Asquith fell in love with Venetia Stanley one Sunday morning in the spring of 1912. The letters he wrote to her are unique because of their scope and their abundance — he never used the telephone in his private life. Whenever Asquith could not see Venetia he wrote to her, lovingly, informatively, entertainingly, sometimes three times a day, sometimes during a debate in the House of Commons, on occasion even in a Cabinet meeting.

Early in 1914 he started to write about politics. There was plenty to tell, and the letters will lead historians to make some reassessments. Few other British premiers have wielded such power or made decisions of such moment,. His letters reveal a statesman who faced political ruin in an Irish civil war and who escaped through the war crisis of July 1914 (he did not foresee that his country would become involved in the fighting). When the war came he shared many secrets with Venetia, discussing military plans with her before they were known to the Cabinet or to the naval and military commanders concerned. He wrote freely of his colleagues, who included Lloyd George, Churchill, and Kitchener.

The personal story is equally arresting. When Venetia began to find the role of Prime Minister's friend oppressive, the suitor she had once rejected tried again. He was Edwin Montagu, a junior Cabinet Minister in his thirties. Some of the letters which passed between him and Venetia are included alongside Asquith's. To both Edwin and Asquith, Venetia was a 'life-giver': during one wartime Cabinet meeting both men were writing to her. Asquith feared that he was losing Venetia but did not suspect that she and Edwin were planning marriage. The letter in which Venetia at last told the Premier of her engagement grieved him acutely. It reached him at a crisis in his and his country's wartime fortunes. She could hardly have dealt him a crueler blow.

676 pages, Hardcover

First published November 8, 1982

About the author

Father of Herbert Asquith

British politician Herbert Henry Asquith, first earl of Oxford and Asquith, from 1908 as Liberal prime minister to 1916 introduced unemployment insurance and old-age pensions, and supported the Parliament act, which of 1911 established salaries for elected members and restricted the power of veto in the House of Lords.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._H._A...

Reviews

[Louis Phillips]

The reason I am interested in the book is my very deep feeling of resonance with Venetia Stanley. I won't go into why that is, it's probably a reason for a book about women. That said the insight into Asquith is invaluable. He was a member of that triumvirate of iconoclasts Asquith Churchill and Lloyd George that changed the world mostly for the better when they were involved in the government of Britain.

[Jean · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is all the letters by the PM H H Asquith sent to a much younger Venetia Stanley declaring his love and telling her all the secrets the PM got regarding the war sometimes only five people in the country knew about. He sent letters three times a day.
To me he was a very weak pathetic man obsessed with a younger woman often writing while in parliament even cancelled his appointment with the king so he could have half an hour with her and when she was nursing soldiers he complained using derogatory terms on the men fighting for his country!
The book was well put together with comments from the author.

[Adi · Rating 2 out of 5]

Apart from the very dodgy relationship of a much older married man to a young woman, I'm finding Asquith's letters rather irritating. The most interesting bits are the intermittent summaries by the editor of the events Asquith writes about being put into a political and historical context. Interesting insights into both the causes of the 20th century Irish problem and the origins of WW1.

[Nick Pengelley · Rating 4 out of 5]

These letters between PM Asquith and a young woman are endless fascinating - and a wonderful source of material for a novelist!