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The Rt Hon. W.H. Smith

A Long Distance Swim
W.H. Smith: "Hooray - another stroke or two and we've done it."
Cartoon satirising Smith as rowing and Lord Salisbury, Prime Minister, swimming towards the end of the Parliamentary year to escape the twin waves of Free Education and Land Purchase, contentious issues of the time. Smith died three months after publication of the cartoon.
From Punch, 1891

William Henry Smith (24 June 1825 – 6 October 1891) was an English bookseller and newsagent of the family firm W H Smith, who expanded the firm and introduced the practice of selling books and newspapers at railway stations.

He was elected a Member of Parliament in 1868 and rose to the position of First Lord of the Admiralty less than ten years thereafter. Because of his lack of military experience, he was perceived as a model for the character Sir Joseph Porter in H.M.S. Pinafore. In the mid-1880s, he was twice Secretary of State for War, and later First Lord of the Treasury and Leader of the House of Commons, among other posts.

Biography

Smith was born in London, the son of William Henry Smith (1792-1865). He was educated at Tavistock Grammar School before joining the business with his father in 1846. As a result of his involvement, the business became a household name (W H Smith), and the practice of selling books and newspapers at railway stations began.

In 1868, Smith was elected Member of Parliament for Westminster as a Conservative after an initial attempt to get into parliament as 'Liberal Conservative' in 1865 as a supporter of Palmerston . In 1874 Smith was appointed Financial Secretary to the Treasury six years later when Disraeli returned as Prime Minister. In 1877 he became First Lord of the Admiralty. The appointment of a man with no naval or military experience to govern the Royal Navy was satirised by Gilbert and Sullivan in the character of Sir Joseph Porter, KCB, in their 1878 comic opera, H.M.S. Pinafore). W. S. Gilbert's Pinafore lyrics are scathing:

I grew so rich that I was sent

By a pocket borough into Parliament.

I always voted at my party's call,

And I never thought of thinking for myself at all.

I thought so little, they rewarded me

By making me the Ruler of the Queen's Navee!

Smith would be known by the derisive nickname "Pinafore Smith" during his three years in the post of First Lord. Smith held this office for three years until the Liberals returned to power.

In 1885 a redistribution of seats led to Smith now standing for the Strand division in Westminster, and served as Chief Secretary for Ireland for a short period in the following year. He was twice Secretary of State for War, the first time during Lord Salisbury's brief ministry between 1885 and 1886, and the second when the Conservatives won the 1886 General Election. He succeeded this appointment in 1887 as First Lord of the Treasury and Leader of the House of Commons, and became Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports in 1891, dying shortly afterwards at Walmer Castle. His widow was created Viscountess Hambleden, taking the title from the village close to the Smiths' country house of Greenlands, near Henley-on-Thames. One of the few ministers personally close to Lord Salisbury (apart from the latter's nephew Arthur Balfour), Smith was dubbed "Old Morality" due to his austere manner and conduct.

He was described by Henry Stratford Caldecott in an 1895 Johannesburg lecture as "[t]he doyen... of living English critics" in the dilation of the Baconian theory. It was Smith's famous letter to Lord Ellesmere in 1857 which, after its subsequent publication as a small volume entitled Bacon and Shakespere [sic]: An Inquiry Touching Players, Play-Houses, and Play-writers in the Days of Elizabeth, that gave the field its impetus.¹

Pinafore did not begin the mockery of Smith: This Punch cartoon is from 13 October 1877, months before the premiere of Pinafore.

References

• Caldecott, Harry Stratford: Our English Homer; or, the Bacon-Shakespeare Controversy (Johannesburg Times P. & P. Works, 1895).

Notes

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• This page was last modified on 4 November 2008, at 19:24.

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