697 Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice

Constituency : Calne  1868-85,  Cricklade  1898-1906

Edmond  took  over  at  Calne  from  Robert  Lowe  who  moved  over  to  the  London  Universities  seat. He  was  unopposed.

Edmond  was  the  brother  of  the  Marquess  of  Lansdowne  who  owned  the  seat.  He  was  educated  at  Eton  and  Cambridge  where  he  was  President  of  the  Union  in  1866. He  was  trained  as  a  barrister  but  never  practised.

Edmond's  maiden  speech  was  against  the  university  tests.   He  was  one  of  Henry  Fawcett's  acolytes. In  1872  he  became  Lowe's  parliamentary  private  secretary  and  held  the  position  until  1874. In  1880  Gladstone made  him  a  Commissioner  at  Constantinople  to  help  reorganise  the  European  provinces  of  the  Ottoman  Empire  according  to  the  principles  of  the  Treaty  of  Berlin  but  his  plans  never  really  came  to  fruition. He  was  then  Under-Secretary  of  State  for  Foreign  Affairs  from  1883  to  1885.

When  Calne  was  abolished  in  1885  Edmond  was  adopted  for  a  Glasgow  constituency  but  illness  forced  his  withdrawal.  When  he  recovered  he  found  it  difficult  to  return  to  Parliament, losing  at  Deptford  in  1892  and  Cricklade  in  1895. He  got  back  in  for  the  latter  constituency  at  a  by-election  in  1898. He  was  chairman  of  Wiltshire  County  Council  from  1896  to  1906.

In  1905  Edmond  resumed  his  old  position  at  the  Foreign  Office  under  Sir  Edward  Grey  and  had  actually  been   Campbell-Bannerman's  second  choice  for  the  top  job  if  Grey  were  to  refuse  it.

Edmond  declined  to  stand  in  1906  and  was  elevated  to  the  Lords  as  Baron  Fitzmaurice. He  retained  his  post  and  was  soon  elevated  to  the  Cabinet  as  Asquith's  Chancellor  of  the  Duchy  of  Lancaster. However  he  soon  fell  ill  again  and  he  had  to  resign  in  1909.

Edmond  was  also  a  biographer  with  published  works  on  his  ancestor  Lord  Shelburne  , the  economist  Sir  William  Petty  and  Lord  Granville.

Despite  his  background  Edmond  was  favourable  to  agricultural  trade  unionism  and  chaired  a  meeting  of  the  West  of  England  Labourers  Association  in  the  1870s.  He  supported  allotments.  He  was  a  local  benefactor  to  Bradford-on-Avon.

Despite  his  health  problems  Edmond   lived  to  89 , dying  in  1935.