British history
The British Isles have witnessed intermittent periods of competition and cooperation between the people that occupy the various parts of Great Britain, the Isle of Man, Ireland, the Bailiwick of Guernsey, the Bailiwick of Jersey and ...
spanned the reign of
King Edward VII
Edward VII (Albert Edward; 9 November 1841 – 6 May 1910) was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and Emperor of India, from 22 January 1901 until his death in 1910.
The second child and eldest son of Queen Victoria a ...
, 1901 to 1910 and is sometimes extended to the start of the
First World War
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
. The death of
Queen Victoria
Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until Death and state funeral of Queen Victoria, her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 21 ...
in January 1901 marked the end of the
Victorian era
In the history of the United Kingdom and the British Empire, the Victorian era was the period of Queen Victoria's reign, from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. The era followed the Georgian period and preceded the Edwardia ...
. Her son and successor, Edward VII, was already the leader of a fashionable elite that set a style influenced by the art and fashions of
continental Europe
Continental Europe or mainland Europe is the contiguous continent of Europe, excluding its surrounding islands. It can also be referred to ambiguously as the European continent, – which can conversely mean the whole of Europe – and, by ...
.
Samuel Hynes
Samuel Lynn Hynes (August 29, 1924 – October 9, 2019) was an American author. He won a Robert F. Kennedy Book Award for ''The Soldiers' Tale'' in 1998.
Biography
Samuel Hynes was born in Chicago, Illinois. He attended the University of Minnesot ...
described the Edwardian era as a "leisurely time when women wore
picture hat
A picture hat or Gainsborough hat is an elaborate woman's hat with a wide brim. It has been suggested that the name may be derived from the way the broad brim frames the face to create a "picture".
This is a very broad category of hat; some vers ...
s and did not vote, when the rich were not ashamed to live conspicuously, and the sun really never set on the British flag."
The Liberals returned to power in 1906 and made significant reforms. Below the upper class, the era was marked by significant shifts in politics among sections of society that had largely been excluded from power, such as
labourers
A laborer (or labourer) is a person who works in manual labor types in the construction industry workforce. Laborers are in a working class of wage-earners in which their only possession of significant material value is their labor. Industries e ...
industrial working class
Industrial may refer to:
Industry
* Industrial archaeology, the study of the history of the industry
* Industrial engineering, engineering dealing with the optimization of complex industrial processes or systems
* Industrial city, a city dominate ...
. Women started to play more of a role in politics.
Roy Hattersley
Roy Sydney George Hattersley, Baron Hattersley, (born 28 December 1932) is a British Labour Party politician, author and journalist from Sheffield. He was MP for Birmingham Sparkbrook for over 32 years from 1964 to 1997, and served as Depu ...
, ''The Edwardians'' (2004).
The Edwardian era was the last period of British history to be named after the reigning monarch. The subsequent reigns of
George V
George V (George Frederick Ernest Albert; 3 June 1865 – 20 January 1936) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 until Death and state funeral of George V, his death in 1936.
Born duri ...
and
George VI
George VI (Albert Frederick Arthur George; 14 December 1895 – 6 February 1952) was King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Commonwealth from 11 December 1936 until Death and state funeral of George VI, his death in 1952. ...
are not commonly termed '' Georgian era'', this name being reserved for the time of the 18th-century kings of that name. Similarly, ''
Elizabethan era
The Elizabethan era is the epoch in the Tudor period of the history of England during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I (1558–1603). Historians often depict it as the golden age in English history. The symbol of Britannia (a female personifi ...
'' refers solely to the 16th-century queen
Elizabeth I
Elizabeth I (7 September 153324 March 1603) was Queen of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death in 1603. Elizabeth was the last of the five House of Tudor monarchs and is sometimes referred to as the "Virgin Queen".
El ...
and was not extended to the reign of
Elizabeth II
Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; 21 April 1926 – 8 September 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until her death in 2022. She was queen regnant of 32 sovereign states during ...
.
Perceptions
The Edwardian period is sometimes portrayed as a romantic golden age of long summer afternoons and garden parties, basking in a sun that never set on the
British Empire
The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the overseas possessions and trading posts esta ...
. This perception was created in the 1920s and later by those who remembered the Edwardian age with nostalgia, looking back to their childhoods across the abyss of the
Great War
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
. The Edwardian age was also seen as a mediocre period of pleasure between the great achievements of the preceding Victorian age and the catastrophe of the following war.
Recent assessments emphasise the great differences between the wealthy and the poor during this period and describe the age as heralding great changes in political and social life. Historian
Lawrence James
Edwin James Lawrence (born 26 May 1943, Bath, England), most commonly known as Lawrence James, is an English historian and writer.
Biography
James graduated with a BA in English & History from the University of York in 1966, and subsequently u ...
has argued that the leaders felt increasingly threatened by rival powers such as Germany, Russia, and the United States. Nevertheless, the sudden arrival of World War I in the summer of 1914 was largely unexpected, except by the Royal Navy, because it had been prepared and ready for war.
Politics
There was a growing political awareness among the
working class
The working class (or labouring class) comprises those engaged in manual-labour occupations or industrial work, who are remunerated via waged or salaried contracts. Working-class occupations (see also " Designation of workers by collar colou ...
, leading to a rise in
trade unions
A trade union (labor union in American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers intent on "maintaining or improving the conditions of their employment", ch. I such as attaining better wages and Employee ben ...
, the
Labour movement
The labour movement or labor movement consists of two main wings: the trade union movement (British English) or labor union movement (American English) on the one hand, and the political labour movement on the other.
* The trade union movement ...
and demands for better working conditions. The aristocracy remained in control of top government offices.
Conservative Party
The
Conservatives
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...
– at the time called "Unionists" – were the dominant political party from the 1890s until 1906. The party had many strengths, appealing to voters supportive of
imperialism
Imperialism is the state policy, practice, or advocacy of extending power and dominion, especially by direct territorial acquisition or by gaining political and economic control of other areas, often through employing hard power (economic and ...
, tariffs, the
Church of England
The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britain ...
, a powerful
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against F ...
, and traditional hierarchical society. There was a powerful leadership base in the landed aristocracy and landed gentry in rural England, plus strong support from the Church of England and military interests. Historians have used election returns to demonstrate that Conservatives did surprisingly well in working-class districts. They had an appeal as well to the better-off element of traditional working-class Britons in the larger cities.
In rural areas, the national headquarters made highly effective use of paid travelling lecturers, with pamphlets, posters, and especially lantern slides, who were able to communicate effectively with rural voters – particularly the newly enfranchised agricultural workers. In the first years of the twentieth century, the Conservative government, with
Arthur Balfour
Arthur James Balfour, 1st Earl of Balfour, (, ; 25 July 184819 March 1930), also known as Lord Balfour, was a British Conservative Party (UK), Conservative statesman who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1902 to 1905. As F ...
as
Prime Minister
A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister is not ...
, had numerous successes in foreign policy, defence, and education, as well as solutions for the issues of alcohol licensing and land ownership for the tenant farmers of Ireland.
Nevertheless, the weaknesses were accumulating, and proved so overwhelming in 1906 that the party did not return to complete power until
1922
Events
January
* January 7 – Dáil Éireann (Irish Republic), Dáil Éireann, the parliament of the Irish Republic, ratifies the Anglo-Irish Treaty by 64–57 votes.
* January 10 – Arthur Griffith is elected President of Dáil Éirean ...
. The Conservative Party was losing its drive and enthusiasm, especially after the retirement of the charismatic
Joseph Chamberlain
Joseph Chamberlain (8 July 1836 – 2 July 1914) was a British statesman who was first a radical Liberal, then a Liberal Unionist after opposing home rule for Ireland, and eventually served as a leading imperialist in coalition with the C ...
. There was a bitter split on "tariff reform" (that is, imposing tariffs or taxes on all imports), that drove many of the free traders over to the
Liberal
Liberal or liberalism may refer to:
Politics
* a supporter of liberalism
** Liberalism by country
* an adherent of a Liberal Party
* Liberalism (international relations)
* Sexually liberal feminism
* Social liberalism
Arts, entertainment and m ...
camp. Tariff reform was a losing issue that the Conservative leadership inexplicably clung to.
Conservative support weakened among the top tier of the working-class and lower middle-class, and there was dissatisfaction among intellectuals. The 1906 general election was a landslide victory for the Liberal Party, which saw its total vote share increase by 25%, while the Conservative total vote held steady.
Labour Party
The Labour Party was emerging from the rapidly growing trade union movement after 1890. In 1903 it entered the Gladstone–MacDonald pact with the Liberals, allowing for cross-party support in elections, and the emergence of a small Labour contingent in Parliament. It was a temporary arrangement until the 1920s, when the Labour Party was strong enough to act on its own, and the Liberals were in an irreversible decline. Subtle social changes in the working-class were producing a younger generation that wanted to act independently.Michael Childs, "Labour Grows Up: The Electoral System, Political Generations, and British Politics 1890–1929." ''Twentieth Century British History'' 6#2 (1995): 123–144.
Michael Childs argues that the younger generation had reason to prefer Labour over Liberal political styles. Social factors included secularised elementary education (with a disappearing role for Dissenting schools that inculcated Liberal viewpoints); the "New Unionism" after 1890 brought unskilled workers into a movement previously dominated by the skilled workers; and new leisure activities, especially the
music hall
Music hall is a type of British theatrical entertainment that was popular from the early Victorian era, beginning around 1850. It faded away after 1918 as the halls rebranded their entertainment as variety. Perceptions of a distinction in Bri ...
and sports, involved youth while repelling the older generation of Liberal voters.
Liberal Party
The
Liberal Party
The Liberal Party is any of many political parties around the world. The meaning of ''liberal'' varies around the world, ranging from liberal conservatism on the right to social liberalism on the left.
__TOC__ Active liberal parties
This is a li ...
lacked a unified ideological base in 1906. It contained numerous contradictory and hostile factions, such as imperialists and supporters of the Boers; near-socialists and laissez-faire classical liberals; suffragettes and opponents of women's suffrage; antiwar elements and supporters of the military alliance with France. Nonconformist Dissenters – Protestants outside the Anglican fold – were a powerful element, dedicated to opposing the established church in the fields of education and taxation. However, the Dissenters were losing support and played a lesser and lesser role in party affairs after 1900.
The party also included Roman Catholics, including the notable Catholic intellectual
Hilaire Belloc
Joseph Hilaire Pierre René Belloc (, ; 27 July 187016 July 1953) was a Franco-English writer and historian of the early twentieth century. Belloc was also an orator, poet, sailor, satirist, writer of letters, soldier, and political activist. H ...
, who sat as a Liberal MP between 1906 and 1910. They included secularists from the labour movement. The middle-class business, professional and intellectual communities were generally strongholds, although some old aristocratic families played important roles as well. The working-class element was moving rapidly toward the newly emerging Labour Party. One unifying element was widespread agreement on the use of politics and Parliament as a means to upgrade and improve society and to reform politics. In the House of Lords, the Liberals lost most of their members, who in the 1890s "became Conservative in all but name." The government could force the unwilling king to create new Liberal peers, and that threat did prove decisive in the battle for dominance of Commons over Lords in 1911.
Boer War
The government entered the
Second Boer War
The Second Boer War ( af, Tweede Vryheidsoorlog, , 11 October 189931 May 1902), also known as the Boer War, the Anglo–Boer War, or the South African War, was a conflict fought between the British Empire and the two Boer Republics (the Sout ...
with great confidence, little expecting that the two small rural Boer republics in southern Africa with a combined White population smaller than that of London would hold off the concentrated power of the
British Empire
The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the overseas possessions and trading posts esta ...
for two and half years, and take 400,000 Imperial troops to secure victory. The war split the Liberal Party into anti- and pro-war factions. Great orators, such as Liberal
David Lloyd George
David Lloyd George, 1st Earl Lloyd-George of Dwyfor, (17 January 1863 – 26 March 1945) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1916 to 1922. He was a Liberal Party politician from Wales, known for leading the United Kingdom during t ...
, who spoke against the war, became increasingly influential. Nevertheless, Liberal Unionist
Joseph Chamberlain
Joseph Chamberlain (8 July 1836 – 2 July 1914) was a British statesman who was first a radical Liberal, then a Liberal Unionist after opposing home rule for Ireland, and eventually served as a leading imperialist in coalition with the C ...
, who was largely in charge of the war, maintained his hold on power.
When General Kitchener took command in 1900, he initiated a scorched earth policy in order to foil Boer guerrilla tactics. Captured Boer combatants were transported overseas to other British possessions as prisoners of war. However he relocated non-combatant Boers—mostly women and children—into heavily guarded internment camps. The internment camps were overcrowded with bad sanitation and meagre food rations. Contagious diseases such as measles, typhoid and dysentery were endemic.
Many of the internees died.
Emily Hobhouse
Emily Hobhouse (9 April 1860 – 8 June 1926) was a British welfare campaigner, anti-war activist, and pacifist. She is primarily remembered for bringing to the attention of the British public, and working to change, the deprived conditions in ...
visited the camps and brought the conditions to the attention of the British public. Public outcry resulted in the Fawcett Commission which corroborated Hobhouse's report and eventually led to improved conditions. The Boers surrendered and the Boer Republics were annexed by the British Empire.
Jan Smuts
Field Marshal Jan Christian Smuts, (24 May 1870 11 September 1950) was a South African statesman, military leader and philosopher. In addition to holding various military and cabinet posts, he served as prime minister of the Union of South Af ...
—a leading Boer general—became a senior official of the new government and even became a top British official in the World War.
In 1901, the six British self-governing colonies of Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia, and Western Australia united to form the Commonwealth of Australia, with almost complete control of its internal affairs, but with foreign policy and defence handled by London.
Edmund Barton
Sir Edmund "Toby" Barton, (18 January 18497 January 1920) was an Australian politician and judge who served as the first prime minister of Australia from 1901 to 1903, holding office as the leader of the Protectionist Party. He resigned to ...
was the first prime minister.
The Liberal reforms
The
Liberal Party
The Liberal Party is any of many political parties around the world. The meaning of ''liberal'' varies around the world, ranging from liberal conservatism on the right to social liberalism on the left.
__TOC__ Active liberal parties
This is a li ...
under
Henry Campbell-Bannerman
Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman (né Campbell; 7 September 183622 April 1908) was a British statesman and Liberal politician. He served as the prime minister of the United Kingdom from 1905 to 1908 and leader of the Liberal Party from 1899 to 1 ...
rallied Liberals around the traditional platform of free trade and land reform and led them to the greatest electoral victory in Liberal Party history. The
Prime Minister
A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister is not ...
was overshadowed by his frontbench, most notably H. H. Asquith at the Exchequer, Edward Grey at the Foreign Office,
Richard Burdon Haldane
Richard Burdon Haldane, 1st Viscount Haldane, (; 30 July 1856 – 19 August 1928) was a British lawyer and philosopher and an influential Liberal and later Labour politician. He was Secretary of State for War between 1905 and 1912 during ...
at the War Office and
David Lloyd George
David Lloyd George, 1st Earl Lloyd-George of Dwyfor, (17 January 1863 – 26 March 1945) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1916 to 1922. He was a Liberal Party politician from Wales, known for leading the United Kingdom during t ...
at the Board of Trade. Campbell-Bannerman retired in 1908 and was succeeded by Asquith. He stepped up the government's radicalism, especially in the "
People's Budget
The 1909/1910 People's Budget was a proposal of the Liberal government that introduced unprecedented taxes on the lands and incomes of Britain's wealthy to fund new social welfare programmes. It passed the House of Commons in 1909 but was blo ...
" of 1909 that proposed to fund expanded social welfare programmes with new taxes on land and high incomes. It was blocked by the Conservative-dominated
House of Lords
The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the Bicameralism, upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is by Life peer, appointment, Hereditary peer, heredity or Lords Spiritual, official function. Like the ...
, but eventually became law in April 1910.
Almost half of the Liberal MPs elected in 1906 were supportive of the " new liberalism", which advocated government action to improve people's lives.
Liberals in 1906–1911 passed major legislation designed to reform politics and society, such as the regulation of working hours,
National Insurance
National Insurance (NI) is a fundamental component of the welfare state in the United Kingdom. It acts as a form of social security, since payment of NI contributions establishes entitlement to certain state benefits for workers and their famil ...
and the beginnings of the welfare state, as well as curtailing the power of the House of Lords. Women's suffrage was not on the Liberal agenda. There were numerous major reforms helping labour, typified by the
Trade Boards Act 1909
The Trade Boards Act 1909 was a piece of social legislation passed in the United Kingdom in 1909. It provided for the creation of boards which could set minimum wage criteria that were legally enforceable. It was expanded and updated in the Trade ...
that set minimum wages in certain trades with the history of "sweated" or "sweatshop" rates of especially low wages, because of surplus of available workers, the presence of women workers, or the lack of skills.Sheila Blackburn, "Ideology and social policy: the origins of the Trade Boards Act." ''The Historical Journal'' 34#1 (1991): 43–64.
At first it applied to four industries: chain-making, ready-made tailoring, paper-box making, and the machine-made lace and finishing trade. It was later expanded to coal mining and then to other industries with preponderance of unskilled manual labour by the Trade Boards Act 1918. Under the leadership of
David Lloyd George
David Lloyd George, 1st Earl Lloyd-George of Dwyfor, (17 January 1863 – 26 March 1945) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1916 to 1922. He was a Liberal Party politician from Wales, known for leading the United Kingdom during t ...
Liberals extended minimum wages to farm workers.
Conservative peers in the House of Lords tried to stop the
People's Budget
The 1909/1910 People's Budget was a proposal of the Liberal government that introduced unprecedented taxes on the lands and incomes of Britain's wealthy to fund new social welfare programmes. It passed the House of Commons in 1909 but was blo ...
. The Liberals passed the
Parliament Act 1911
The Parliament Act 1911 (1 & 2 Geo. 5 c. 13) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It is constitutionally important and partly governs the relationship between the House of Commons and the House of Lords, the two Houses of Parlia ...
to sharply reduce the power of the
House of Lords
The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the Bicameralism, upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is by Life peer, appointment, Hereditary peer, heredity or Lords Spiritual, official function. Like the ...
to block legislation. The cost was high, however, as the government was required by the king to call two general elections in 1910 to validate its position and ended up frittering away most of its large majority, with the balance of power held by
Labour
Labour or labor may refer to:
* Childbirth, the delivery of a baby
* Labour (human activity), or work
** Manual labour, physical work
** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer
** Organized labour and the labour ...
and
Irish Parliamentary Party
The Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP; commonly called the Irish Party or the Home Rule Party) was formed in 1874 by Isaac Butt, the leader of the Nationalist Party, replacing the Home Rule League, as official parliamentary party for Irish national ...
members.
Foreign relations
Ties with France and Russia against Germany
Germany's Chancellor
Otto von Bismarck
Otto, Prince of Bismarck, Count of Bismarck-Schönhausen, Duke of Lauenburg (, ; 1 April 1815 – 30 July 1898), born Otto Eduard Leopold von Bismarck, was a conservative German statesman and diplomat. From his origins in the upper class of J ...
dominated European diplomacy from 1872 to 1890, with a policy of using the
European balance of power
The European balance of power is the tenet in international relations that no single power should be allowed to achieve hegemony over a substantial part of Europe. During much of the Modern Age, the balance was achieved by having a small number of ...
to keep the peace. There were no wars. Bismarck was removed by an aggressive young Kaiser Wilhelm in 1890, effectively decentralizing the Bismarckian Order that had been shrewdly managed, and empowering French efforts to isolate Germany. With the formation of the
Triple Entente
The Triple Entente (from French '' entente'' meaning "friendship, understanding, agreement") describes the informal understanding between the Russian Empire, the French Third Republic, and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland as well a ...
, Germany began to feel encircled: to the West lay France, with whom rivalry was awakening after a generation of dormancy following the Franco-Prussian War, to the East sat Russia, whose rapid industrialization worried Berlin and Vienna.
Joseph Chamberlain
Joseph Chamberlain (8 July 1836 – 2 July 1914) was a British statesman who was first a radical Liberal, then a Liberal Unionist after opposing home rule for Ireland, and eventually served as a leading imperialist in coalition with the C ...
, who played a major role in foreign policy in the late 1890s under the Salisbury government, repeatedly tried to open talks with Germany about some sort of alliance. Berlin was not interested. Meanwhile, Paris went to great pains to woo Russia and Great Britain. Key markers were the
Franco-Russian Alliance
The Franco-Russian Alliance (french: Alliance Franco-Russe, russian: Франко-Русский Альянс, translit=Franko-Russkiy Al'yans), or Russo-French Rapprochement (''Rapprochement Russo-Français'', Русско-Французско ...
of 1894, the 1904
Entente Cordiale
The Entente Cordiale (; ) comprised a series of agreements signed on 8 April 1904 between the United Kingdom and the French Republic which saw a significant improvement in Anglo-French relations. Beyond the immediate concerns of colonial de ...
linking France and Great Britain, and finally the Anglo-Russian Entente in 1907 which became the
Triple Entente
The Triple Entente (from French '' entente'' meaning "friendship, understanding, agreement") describes the informal understanding between the Russian Empire, the French Third Republic, and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland as well a ...
. France thus had a formal alliance with Russia, and an informal alignment with Britain, against Germany and Austria. By 1903 good relations had been established with the United States and Japan.
Britain abandoned the policy of holding aloof from the continental powers, so called "
Splendid Isolation
''Splendid isolation'' is a term used to describe the 19th-century British diplomatic practice of avoiding permanent alliances, particularly under the governments of Lord Salisbury between 1885 and 1902. The concept developed as early as 1822, ...
", in the 1900s after being isolated during the
Boer War
The Second Boer War ( af, Tweede Vryheidsoorlog, , 11 October 189931 May 1902), also known as the Boer War, the Anglo–Boer War, or the South African War, was a conflict fought between the British Empire and the two Boer Republics (the Sou ...
. Britain concluded agreements, limited to colonial affairs, with her two major colonial rivals: the
Entente Cordiale
The Entente Cordiale (; ) comprised a series of agreements signed on 8 April 1904 between the United Kingdom and the French Republic which saw a significant improvement in Anglo-French relations. Beyond the immediate concerns of colonial de ...
with France in 1904 and the Anglo-Russian Entente of 1907. Britain's alignment was a reaction to an assertive German foreign policy and the build-up of its navy from 1898 which led to the
Anglo-German naval arms race
The arms race between Great Britain and Germany that occurred from the last decade of the nineteenth century until the advent of World War I in 1914 was one of the intertwined causes of that conflict. While based in a bilateral relationship tha ...
. British diplomat Arthur Nicolson argued it was "far more disadvantageous to us to have an unfriendly France and Russia than an unfriendly Germany".
The impact of the Triple Entente was to improve British relations with France and its ally Russia and to demote the importance to Britain of good relations with Germany. After 1905, foreign policy was tightly controlled by the Liberal Foreign Secretary Edward Grey (1862-1933), who seldom consulted with his party leadership. Grey shared the strong Liberal policy against all wars and against military alliances that would force Britain to take a side in war. However, in the case of the Boer War, Grey held that the Boers had committed an aggression that it was necessary to repulse. The Liberal party split on the issue, with a large faction strongly opposed to the war in Africa
The Triple Entente between Britain, France and Russia is often compared to the Triple Alliance between Germany, Austria–Hungary and Italy, but historians caution against the comparison. The Entente, in contrast to the Triple Alliance or the
Franco-Russian Alliance
The Franco-Russian Alliance (french: Alliance Franco-Russe, russian: Франко-Русский Альянс, translit=Franko-Russkiy Al'yans), or Russo-French Rapprochement (''Rapprochement Russo-Français'', Русско-Французско ...
, was not an alliance of mutual defence and Britain therefore felt free to make her own foreign policy decisions in 1914. The Liberals were highly moralistic, and by 1914 they have been increasingly convinced that German aggression violated international norms, and specifically that its invasion of neutral Belgium was completely unacceptable in terms of morality, Britain and Germany's obligations under the Treaty of London, and in terms of British policy against any one power controlling the continent of Europe.
Until the last few weeks before it started in August 1914, almost no one saw a world war coming. The expectation among the generals was that because of industrial advances any future war would produce a quick victory for the side that was better-prepared, better armed, and faster to move. No one saw that the innovations of recent decades—high explosives, long-range artillery and machine guns—were defensive weapons that practically guaranteed defeat of massed infantry attacks with very high casualties.
Naval race with Germany
After 1805 the dominance of Britain's Royal Navy was unchallenged; in the 1890s Germany decided to match it. Grand Admiral
Alfred von Tirpitz
Alfred Peter Friedrich von Tirpitz (19 March 1849 – 6 March 1930) was a German grand admiral, Secretary of State of the German Imperial Naval Office, the powerful administrative branch of the German Imperial Navy from 1897 until 1916. Prussi ...
(1849 – 1930) dominated German naval policy from 1897 until 1916. Before the German Empire formed in 1871, Prussia never had a real navy, nor did the other German states. Tirpitz turned the modest little fleet into a world-class force that could threaten the British Royal Navy. The British responded with new technology typified by the Dreadnought revolution. It made every battleship obsolete and, supplemented by the global network of coaling stations and telegraph cables, enabled Britain to stay well in the lead in naval affairs.
Apart from a determination to retain a strong naval advantage, the British lacked a military strategy or plans for a major war.
Economy
The Edwardian era stands out as a time of peace and prosperity. There were no severe depressions, and prosperity was widespread. Britain's growth rate, manufacturing output and
GDP
Gross domestic product (GDP) is a monetary measure of the market value of all the final goods and services produced and sold (not resold) in a specific time period by countries. Due to its complex and subjective nature this measure is ofte ...
(but not GDP per capita) fell behind its rivals, the United States and Germany, but the nation still led the world in trade, finance and shipping, and had strong bases in manufacturing and mining. The industrial sector was slow to adjust to global changes, and there was a striking preference for leisure over entrepreneurship among the elite.Arthur J Taylor, "The Economy", in Simon Nowell-Smith, ed., ''Edwardian England: 1901–1914'' (1964) pp. 105–138
However, major achievements should be underlined.
London
London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...
was the financial centre of the world—far more efficient and wide-ranging than New York, Paris or Berlin. Britain had built up a vast reserve of overseas credits in its formal Empire, as well as in its informal empire in Latin America and other nations. It had huge financial holdings in the United States, especially in railways. These assets proved vital in paying for supplies in the first years of the World War. The amenities, especially in urban life, were accumulating—prosperity was highly visible. The working classes were beginning to protest politically for a greater voice in government, but the level of industrial unrest on economic issues was not high until about 1908.
Social change and improved health
By the late-1880s, the
Industrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...
had created new technologies that changed the way people lived. The growth of industry shifts in manufacturing factories, special-purpose machinery and technological innovations, which led to increased productivity.
Gender roles
A gender role, also known as a sex role, is a social role encompassing a range of behaviors and attitudes that are generally considered acceptable, appropriate, or desirable for a person based on that person's sex. Gender roles are usually cent ...
shifted as women made use of the new technology to upgrade their lifestyle and their career opportunities.
Mortality declined steadily in urban England and Wales 1870–1917. Robert Millward and Frances N. Bell looked statistically at those factors in the physical environment (especially population density and overcrowding) that raised death rates directly, as well as indirect factors such as price and income movements that affected expenditures on sewers, water supplies, food, and medical staff. The statistical data show that increases in the incomes of households and increases in town tax revenues helped cause the decline of mortality.
The new money permitted higher spending on food, and also on a wide range of health-enhancing goods and services such as medical care. The major improvement in the physical environment was the quality of the housing stock, which rose faster than the population; its quality was increasingly regulated by central and local government.
Infant mortality
Infant mortality is the death of young children under the age of 1. This death toll is measured by the infant mortality rate (IMR), which is the probability of deaths of children under one year of age per 1000 live births. The under-five morta ...
fell faster in England and Wales than in Scotland. Clive Lee argues that one factor was the continued overcrowding in Scotland's housing. During the First World War, infant mortality fell sharply across the country. J. M. Winter attributes this to the full employment and higher wages paid to war workers.
Rising status of women
For housewives, sewing machines enabled the production of ready-made clothing and made it easier for women to sew their own clothes; more generally, argues Barbara Burman, "home dressmaking was sustained as an important aid for women negotiating wider social shifts and tensions in their lives." Increased literacy in the
middle class
The middle class refers to a class of people in the middle of a social hierarchy, often defined by occupation, income, education, or social status. The term has historically been associated with modernity, capitalism and political debate. Com ...
gave women wider access to information and ideas. Numerous new magazines appealed to her tastes and helped define femininity.
The inventions of the typewriter, telephone, and new filing systems offered middle-class women increased employment opportunities. So too did the rapid expansion of the school system, and the emergence of the new profession of nursing. Education and status led to demands for female roles in the rapidly expanding world of sports.
Women were very active in church affairs, including attendance at services, Sunday school teaching, fund raising, pastoral care, social work and support for international missionary activities. They were almost completely excluded from practically all leadership roles.
Women's suffrage
As middle-class women rose in status, they increasingly supported demands for a political voice. There was significant support for woman suffrage in all the parties, but the Liberal Party was in control after 1906 and a handful of its leaders, especially
H. H. Asquith
Herbert Henry Asquith, 1st Earl of Oxford and Asquith, (12 September 1852 – 15 February 1928), generally known as H. H. Asquith, was a British statesman and Liberal Party politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom f ...
, blocked it.
There were numerous organisations which did their work quietly. After 1897, they were increasingly linked together by the
National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies
The National Union of Women Suffrage Societies (NUWSS), also known as the ''suffragists'' (not to be confused with the suffragettes) was an organisation founded in 1897 of women's suffrage societies around the United Kingdom. In 1919 it was ren ...
(NUWSS) led by
Millicent Fawcett
Dame Millicent Garrett Fawcett (née Garrett; 11 June 1847 – 5 August 1929) was an English politician, writer and feminist. She campaigned for Women's suffrage in the United Kingdom, women's suffrage by Law reform, legal change and in 1897– ...
. However, front page publicity was seized by the
Women's Social and Political Union
The Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) was a women-only political movement and leading militant organisation campaigning for women's suffrage in the United Kingdom from 1903 to 1918. Known from 1906 as the suffragettes, its membership an ...
(WSPU). Founded in 1903, it was tightly controlled by the three Pankhursts,
Emmeline Pankhurst
Emmeline Pankhurst ('' née'' Goulden; 15 July 1858 – 14 June 1928) was an English political activist who organised the UK suffragette movement and helped women win the right to vote. In 1999, ''Time'' named her as one of the 100 Most Impo ...
(1858–1928), and her daughters
Christabel Pankhurst
Dame Christabel Harriette Pankhurst, (; 22 September 1880 – 13 February 1958) was a British suffragette born in Manchester
Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bord ...
(1880–1958) and
Sylvia Pankhurst
Estelle Sylvia Pankhurst (5 May 1882 – 27 September 1960) was a campaigning English feminist and socialist. Committed to organising working-class women in London's East End, and unwilling in 1914 to enter into a wartime political truce with t ...
(1882–1960).
It specialised in highly visible publicity campaigns such as large parades. This had the effect of energising all dimensions of the suffrage movement. While there was a majority of support for suffrage in Parliament, the ruling Liberal Party refused to allow a vote on the issue; the result of which was an escalation in the suffragette campaign. The WSPU, in dramatic contrast to its allies, embarked on a campaign of violence to publicise the issue, even to the detriment of its own aims.
Birth control
Although abortion was illegal, it was nevertheless the most widespread form of birth control in use. Used predominantly by
working-class
The working class (or labouring class) comprises those engaged in manual-labour occupations or industrial work, who are remunerated via waged or salaried contracts. Working-class occupations (see also " Designation of workers by collar colou ...
women, the procedure was used not only as a means of terminating pregnancy, but also to prevent poverty and unemployment. Those who transported contraceptives could be legally punished. Contraceptives became more expensive over time and had a high failure rate. Unlike contraceptives, abortion did not need any prior planning and was less expensive. Newspaper advertisements were used to promote and sell
abortifacient
An abortifacient ("that which will cause a miscarriage" from Latin: ''abortus'' "miscarriage" and '' faciens'' "making") is a substance that induces abortion. This is a nonspecific term which may refer to any number of substances or medications, ...
s indirectly.
Not all of society was accepting of contraceptives or abortion, and the opposition viewed both as part of one and the same sin. Abortion was much more common among the middle-classes than among those living in rural areas, where the procedure was not readily available. Women were often tricked into purchasing ineffective pills. In addition to fearing legal reprimands, many physicians did not condone abortion because they viewed it as an immoral procedure potentially endangering a woman's life. Because abortion was illegal and physicians refused to perform the procedure, local women provided abortions, often using crochet hooks or similar instruments.
Feminists of the era focused on educating and finding jobs for women, leaving aside the controversial issues of contraceptives and abortion, which in popular opinion were often related to promiscuity and prostitution. The Church condemned abortion as immoral and a form of rebellion against the child-bearing role women were expected to assume. Many considered abortion to be a selfish act that allowed a woman to avoid personal responsibility, contributing to a decline in moral values. Abortion was often a solution for women who already had children and did not want more. Consequently, the size of families decreased drastically.
Poverty among working-class women
The 1834 Poor Law defined who could receive monetary relief. The act reflected and perpetuated prevailing gender conditions. In Edwardian society, men were the source of wealth. The law restricted relief for unemployed, able-bodied male workers, due to the prevailing view that they would find work in the absence of financial assistance. However, women were treated differently. After the Poor Law was passed, women and children received most of the aid.
The law did not recognise single independent women, and put women and children into the same category. If a man was physically disabled, his wife was also treated as disabled under the
coverture
Coverture (sometimes spelled couverture) was a legal doctrine in the English common law in which a married woman's legal existence was considered to be merged with that of her husband, so that she had no independent legal existence of her own. U ...
laws, even though coverture was fast becoming outmoded in the Edwardian era. Unmarried mothers were sent to the workhouse, receiving unfair social treatment such as being restricted from attending church on Sundays.
During marriage disputes, women often lost the rights to their children, even if their husbands were abusive. However, women were increasingly granted custody of their children under seven years of age; this tendency was colloquially known as the "tender years doctrine," where it was believed that a child was best left under maternal care until the age of seven.
At the time, single mothers were the poorest sector in society, disadvantaged for at least four reasons. First, women lived longer, often leaving them widowed with children. Second, women had fewer opportunities to work, and when they did find it, their wages were lower than male workers' wages. Thirdly, women were often less likely to marry or remarry after being widowed, leaving them as the main providers for the remaining family members. Finally, poor women had deficient diets, because their husbands and children received disproportionately large shares of food. Many women were malnourished and had limited access to health care.
Female servants
Edwardian Britain had large numbers of male and female
domestic servant
A domestic worker or domestic servant is a person who works within the scope of a residence. The term "domestic service" applies to the equivalent occupational category. In traditional English contexts, such a person was said to be "in service ...
s, in both urban and rural areas. Middle- and upper-class women relied on servants to run their homes smoothly. Servants were provided with food, clothing, housing, and a small wage, and lived in a self-enclosed social system within their employer's house. However, the number of domestic servants fell in the Edwardian era due to fewer young people willing to be employed in this capacity.
Fashion
The upper classes embraced leisure sports, which resulted in rapid developments in fashion, as more mobile and flexible clothing styles were needed. During the Edwardian era, women wore a very tight corset, or
bodice
A bodice () is an article of clothing traditionally for women and girls, covering the torso from the neck to the waist. The term typically refers to a specific type of upper garment common in Europe during the 16th to the 18th century, or to the ...
, and dressed in long skirts. The Edwardian era was the last time women wore corsets in everyday life. According to
Arthur Marwick
Arthur John Brereton Marwick (29 February 1936 – 27 September 2006) was a British social historian, who served for many years as Professor of History at the Open University. His research interests lay primarily in the history of Britain in the ...
, the most striking change of all the developments that occurred during the Great War was the modification in women's dress, "for, however far politicians were to put the clocks back in other steeples in the years after the war, no one ever put the lost inches back on the hems of women's skirts".
Fabrics were usually sweet pea shades in chiffon, mousse line de sore, tulle with feather boas and
lace
Lace is a delicate fabric made of yarn or thread in an open weblike pattern, made by machine or by hand. Generally, lace is divided into two main categories, needlelace and bobbin lace, although there are other types of lace, such as knitted o ...
. 'High and boned collars for the day; plunging off shoulder décolleté for the evening'. The Tea Gown's cut was relatively loose compared to the evening gown, and was worn without a corset. The silhouette was flowing, and was usually decorated with lace or with the cheaper Irish crochet.
Long kid gloves, trimmed hats, and parasols were often used as accessories.
Parasol
An umbrella or parasol is a folding canopy (building), canopy supported by wooden or metal ribs that is usually mounted on a wooden, metal, or plastic pole. It is designed to protect a person against rain or sunburn, sunlight. The term ''umbr ...
s are different than umbrellas; they are used for protection from the sun, rather from the rain, though they were often used as ornamentation rather than for function. By the end of the Edwardian era, the hat grew bigger in size, a trend that would continue in the 1910s.
The Edwardians developed new styles in clothing design. The Edwardian Era saw a decrease in the trend for voluminous, heavy skirts.
* The two-piece dress came into vogue. At the start of the decade, skirts were trumpet-shaped.
* Skirts in 1901 often had decorated hems with ruffles of fabric and lace.
* Some dresses and skirts featured trains.
* Tailored jackets, first introduced in 1880, increased in popularity and by 1900, tailored suits known as tailormades became popular.
* In 1905, skirts fell in soft folds that curved in, then flared out near the hemlines.
* From 1905 – 1907, waistlines rose.
* In 1911, the
hobble skirt
A hobble skirt was a skirt with a narrow enough hem to significantly impede the wearer's stride. It was called a "hobble skirt" because it seemed to hobble any woman as she walked. Hobble skirts were a short-lived fashion trend that peaked betw ...
was introduced; a tight fitting skirt that restricted a woman's stride.
* Lingerie dresses, or tea gowns made of soft fabrics, festooned with ruffles and lace were worn indoors.
* Around 1913 women's dresses acquired a lower and sometimes V-shaped neckline in contrast to the high collars a generation before. This was considered scandalous by some, and caused outrage among clergy throughout Europe.
Newspapers
The turn of the century saw the rise of popular journalism aimed at the lower middle class and tending to deemphasise highly detailed political and international news, which remain the focus of a handful of low-circulation prestige newspapers. These were family-owned and operated, and were primarily interested not in profits but in influence on the nation's elite by their control of the news and editorials on serious topics.R.C.K. Ensor, England, 1870-1914 (1936) pp 309-16.
The new press, on the other hand, reached vastly larger audiences by emphasis on sports, crime, sensationalism, and gossip about famous personalities. Detailed accounts of major speeches and complex international events were not printed.
Alfred Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Northcliffe
Alfred Charles William Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Northcliffe (15 July 1865 – 14 August 1922), was a British newspaper and publishing magnate. As owner of the ''Daily Mail'' and the ''Daily Mirror'', he was an early developer of popular journal ...
was the chief innovator. He used his ''
Daily Mail
The ''Daily Mail'' is a British daily middle-market tabloid newspaper and news websitePeter Wilb"Paul Dacre of the Daily Mail: The man who hates liberal Britain", ''New Statesman'', 19 December 2013 (online version: 2 January 2014) publish ...
'' and ''
Daily Mirror
The ''Daily Mirror'' is a British national daily tabloid. Founded in 1903, it is owned by parent company Reach plc. From 1985 to 1987, and from 1997 to 2002, the title on its masthead was simply ''The Mirror''. It had an average daily print ...
'' to transform the media along the American model of "
Yellow Journalism
Yellow journalism and yellow press are American terms for journalism and associated newspapers that present little or no legitimate, well-researched news while instead using eye-catching headlines for increased sales. Techniques may include e ...
". Lord Beaverbrook said he was "the greatest figure who ever strode down Fleet Street". Harmsworth made a great deal of money, but during the
First World War
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
he also wanted political power. For that he purchased the highest prestige newspaper, ''
The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...
''.
P. P. Catterall
Pippa Poppy Catterall (born Peter Paul Catterall in 1961) is a British academic historian who, since 2016, has been Professor of History and Policy at the University of Westminster. Her research has focused on twentieth-century history and politi ...
Belle Époque
The Belle Époque or La Belle Époque (; French for "Beautiful Epoch") is a period of French and European history, usually considered to begin around 1871–1880 and to end with the outbreak of World War I in 1914. Occurring during the era ...
''. Despite its brief pre-eminence, the period is characterised by its own unique architectural style, fashion, and lifestyle.
Art Nouveau
Art Nouveau (; ) is an international style of art, architecture, and applied art, especially the decorative arts. The style is known by different names in different languages: in German, in Italian, in Catalan, and also known as the Modern ...
had a particularly strong influence. Artists were influenced by the development of the automobile and electricity, and a greater awareness of human rights.
In November 1910,
Roger Fry
Roger Eliot Fry (14 December 1866 – 9 September 1934) was an English painter and critic, and a member of the Bloomsbury Group. Establishing his reputation as a scholar of the Old Masters, he became an advocate of more recent developme ...
organised the exhibition ''Manet and the Post-Impressionists'' at the
Grafton Galleries
The Grafton Galleries, often referred to as the Grafton Gallery, was an art gallery in Mayfair, London. The French art dealer Paul Durand-Ruel showed the first major exhibition in Britain of Impressionist paintings there in 1905. Roger Fry' ...
, London. This exhibition was the first to prominently feature
Gauguin
Eugène Henri Paul Gauguin (, ; ; 7 June 1848 – 8 May 1903) was a French Post-Impressionist artist. Unappreciated until after his death, Gauguin is now recognized for his experimental use of colour and Synthetist style that were distinct fr ...
,
Manet
A wireless ad hoc network (WANET) or mobile ad hoc network (MANET) is a decentralized type of wireless network. The network is ad hoc because it does not rely on a pre-existing infrastructure, such as routers in wired networks or access points ...
,
Matisse
Henri Émile Benoît Matisse (; 31 December 1869 – 3 November 1954) was a French visual artist, known for both his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known prima ...
, and
Van Gogh
Vincent Willem van Gogh (; 30 March 185329 July 1890) was a Dutch Post-Impressionist painter who posthumously became one of the most famous and influential figures in Western art history. In a decade, he created about 2,100 artworks, inc ...
in England and brought their art to the public. He followed it up with the ''Second Post-Impressionist Exhibition'' in 1912.
George Frampton
Sir George James Frampton, (18 June 1860 – 21 May 1928) was a British sculptor. He was a leading member of the New Sculpture movement in his early career when he created sculptures with elements of Art Nouveau and Symbolism, often combinin ...
's statue of Peter Pan, "erected in Hyde Park in 1912 ... immediately became a source of contention, sparking debate about the role of public statuary and its role in spaces of recreation."
Literature
In fiction, some of the best-known names are
J. M. Barrie
Sir James Matthew Barrie, 1st Baronet, (; 9 May 1860 19 June 1937) was a Scottish novelist and playwright, best remembered as the creator of Peter Pan. He was born and educated in Scotland and then moved to London, where he wrote several succ ...
,
Arnold Bennett
Enoch Arnold Bennett (27 May 1867 – 27 March 1931) was an English author, best known as a novelist. He wrote prolifically: between the 1890s and the 1930s he completed 34 novels, seven volumes of short stories, 13 plays (some in collaboratio ...
Arthur Conan Doyle
Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle (22 May 1859 – 7 July 1930) was a British writer and physician. He created the character Sherlock Holmes in 1887 for ''A Study in Scarlet'', the first of four novels and fifty-six short stories about Ho ...
,
Joseph Conrad
Joseph Conrad (born Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski, ; 3 December 1857 – 3 August 1924) was a Poles in the United Kingdom#19th century, Polish-British novelist and short story writer. He is regarded as one of the greatest writers in t ...
,
E. M. Forster
Edward Morgan Forster (1 January 1879 – 7 June 1970) was an English author, best known for his novels, particularly ''A Room with a View'' (1908), ''Howards End'' (1910), and ''A Passage to India'' (1924). He also wrote numerous short stori ...
,
John Galsworthy
John Galsworthy (; 14 August 1867 – 31 January 1933) was an English novelist and playwright. Notable works include ''The Forsyte Saga'' (1906–1921) and its sequels, ''A Modern Comedy'' and ''End of the Chapter''. He won the Nobel Prize i ...
,
Kenneth Grahame
Kenneth Grahame ( ; 8 March 1859 – 6 July 1932) was a British writer born in Edinburgh, Scotland. He is most famous for ''The Wind in the Willows'' (1908), a classic of children's literature, as well as ''The Reluctant Dragon (short story), T ...
,
M. R. James
Montague Rhodes James (1 August 1862 – 12 June 1936) was an English author, medievalist scholar and provost of King's College, Cambridge (1905–1918), and of Eton College (1918–1936). He was Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambrid ...
,
Rudyard Kipling
Joseph Rudyard Kipling ( ; 30 December 1865 – 18 January 1936)''The Times'', (London) 18 January 1936, p. 12. was an English novelist, short-story writer, poet, and journalist. He was born in British India, which inspired much of his work.
...
,
A. A. Milne
Alan Alexander Milne (; 18 January 1882 – 31 January 1956) was an English writer best known for his books about the teddy bear Winnie-the-Pooh, as well as for children's poetry. Milne was primarily a playwright before the huge success of Winni ...
,
E. Nesbit
Edith Nesbit (married name Edith Bland; 15 August 1858 – 4 May 1924) was an English writer and poet, who published her books for children as E. Nesbit. She wrote or collaborated on more than 60 such books. She was also a political activist a ...
,
Beatrix Potter
Helen Beatrix Potter (, 28 July 186622 December 1943) was an English writer, illustrator, natural scientist, and conservationist. She is best known for her children's books featuring animals, such as ''The Tale of Peter Rabbit'', which was he ...
,
Saki
Hector Hugh Munro (18 December 1870 – 14 November 1916), better known by the pen name Saki and also frequently as H. H. Munro, was a British writer whose witty, mischievous and sometimes macabre stories satirize Edwardian society and cultu ...
,
George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950), known at his insistence simply as Bernard Shaw, was an Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist. His influence on Western theatre, culture and politics extended from ...
P. G. Wodehouse
Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, ( ; 15 October 188114 February 1975) was an English author and one of the most widely read humorists of the 20th century. His creations include the feather-brained Bertie Wooster and his sagacious valet, Jeeve ...
. Apart from these famous writers, this was a period when a great number of novels and short stories were being published, and a significant distinction between "
highbrow
Used colloquially as a noun or adjective, "highbrow" is synonymous with intellectual; as an adjective, it also means elite, and generally carries a connotation of high culture. The term, first recorded in 1875, draws its metonymy from the pseudo ...
" literature and
popular fiction
Genre fiction, also known as popular fiction, is a term used in the book-trade for fictional works written with the intent of fitting into a specific literary genre, in order to appeal to readers and fans already familiar with that genre.
A num ...
emerged. Among the most famous works of literary criticism was
A. C. Bradley
Andrew Cecil Bradley, (26 March 1851 – 2 September 1935) was an English literary scholar, best remembered for his work on Shakespeare.
Life
Bradley was born at Park Hill, Clapham, Surrey. His father was the preacher Charles Bradley (178 ...
's ''Shakespearean Tragedy'' (1904).
Music
Live performances, both amateur and professional, were popular.
Henry Wood
Sir Henry Joseph Wood (3 March 186919 August 1944) was an English conductor best known for his association with London's annual series of promenade concerts, known as the The Proms, Proms. He conducted them for nearly half a century, introd ...
Gustav Holst
Gustav Theodore Holst (born Gustavus Theodore von Holst; 21 September 1874 – 25 May 1934) was an English composer, arranger and teacher. Best known for his orchestral suite ''The Planets'', he composed many other works across a range ...
,
Arnold Bax
Sir Arnold Edward Trevor Bax, (8 November 1883 – 3 October 1953) was an English composer, poet, and author. His prolific output includes songs, choral music, chamber pieces, and solo piano works, but he is best known for his orchestral musi ...
,
George Butterworth
George Sainton Kaye Butterworth, MC (12 July 18855 August 1916) was an English composer who was best known for the orchestral idyll '' The Banks of Green Willow'' and his song settings of A. E. Housman's poems from ''A Shropshire Lad''.
Early ...
Thomas Beecham
Sir Thomas Beecham, 2nd Baronet, Order of the Companions of Honour, CH (29 April 18798 March 1961) was an English conductor and impresario best known for his association with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, London Philharmonic and the Roya ...
were all active. Military and brass bands often played outside in parks during the summer. The new technology of
wax cylinders
Phonograph cylinders are the earliest commercial medium for Sound recording and reproduction, recording and reproducing sound. Commonly known simply as "records" in their era of greatest popularity (c. 1896–1916), these hollow cylinder, cylind ...
and gramophone records played on
phonograph
A phonograph, in its later forms also called a gramophone (as a trademark since 1887, as a generic name in the UK since 1910) or since the 1940s called a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogu ...
s and talking machines, made live performances permanently available for repetition at any time.
Performing arts
Cinema was primitive and audiences preferred live performances to picture shows.
Music hall
Music hall is a type of British theatrical entertainment that was popular from the early Victorian era, beginning around 1850. It faded away after 1918 as the halls rebranded their entertainment as variety. Perceptions of a distinction in Bri ...
was very popular and widespread; influential performers included male impersonator
Vesta Tilley
Matilda Alice Powles, Lady de Frece (13May 186416September 1952) was an English music hall performer. She adopted the stage name Vesta Tilley and became one of the best-known male impersonators of her era. Her career lasted from 1869 until 19 ...
and comic
Little Tich
Harry Relph (21 July 186710 February 1928),Russell, Dav"Relph, Harry (1867–1928)" ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, 2004, online edition, January 2011. Retrieved 1 August 2013 professionally known as Littl ...
.
The most successful playwright of the era was
W. Somerset Maugham
William Somerset Maugham ( ; 25 January 1874 – 16 December 1965) was an English writer, known for his plays, novels and short stories. Born in Paris, where he spent his first ten years, Maugham was schooled in England and went to a German un ...
. In 1908, he had four plays running simultaneously in London, and ''
Punch
Punch commonly refers to:
* Punch (combat), a strike made using the hand closed into a fist
* Punch (drink), a wide assortment of drinks, non-alcoholic or alcoholic, generally containing fruit or fruit juice
Punch may also refer to:
Places
* Pun ...
'' published a cartoon of Shakespeare biting his fingernails nervously as he looked at the billboards. Maugham's plays, like his novels, usually had a conventional plot structure, but the decade also saw the rise of the so-called New Drama, represented in plays by
George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950), known at his insistence simply as Bernard Shaw, was an Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist. His influence on Western theatre, culture and politics extended from ...
,
Harley Granville Barker
Harley Granville-Barker (25 November 1877 – 31 August 1946) was an English actor, director, playwright, manager, critic, and theorist. After early success as an actor in the plays of George Bernard Shaw, he increasingly turned to directi ...
, and Continental imports by
Henrik Ibsen
Henrik Johan Ibsen (; ; 20 March 1828 – 23 May 1906) was a Norwegian playwright and theatre director. As one of the founders of modernism in theatre, Ibsen is often referred to as "the father of realism" and one of the most influential playw ...
Sir Henry Irving
Sir Henry Irving (6 February 1838 – 13 October 1905), christened John Henry Brodribb, sometimes known as J. H. Irving, was an English stage actor in the Victorian era, known as an actor-manager because he took complete responsibility ( ...
Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree
Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree (17 December 1852 – 2 July 1917) was an English actor and theatre manager.
Tree began performing in the 1870s. By 1887, he was managing the Haymarket Theatre in the West End, winning praise for adventurous progr ...
, was in decline.
Architecture
Notable architects included
Edwin Lutyens
Sir Edwin Landseer Lutyens ( ; 29 March 1869 – 1 January 1944) was an English architect known for imaginatively adapting traditional architectural styles to the requirements of his era. He designed many English country houses, war memori ...
,
Charles Rennie Mackintosh
Charles Rennie Mackintosh (7 June 1868 – 10 December 1928) was a Scottish architect, designer, water colourist and artist. His artistic approach had much in common with European Symbolism. His work, alongside that of his wife Margaret Macdo ...
, and
Giles Gilbert Scott
Sir Giles Gilbert Scott (9 November 1880 – 8 February 1960) was a British architect known for his work on the New Bodleian Library, Cambridge University Library, Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, Battersea Power Station, Liverpool Cathedral, and ...
. In spite of the popularity of
Art Nouveau
Art Nouveau (; ) is an international style of art, architecture, and applied art, especially the decorative arts. The style is known by different names in different languages: in German, in Italian, in Catalan, and also known as the Modern ...
in Europe, the
Edwardian Baroque
Edwardian architecture is a Neo-Baroque architectural style that was popular in the British Empire during the Edwardian era (1901–1910). Architecture up to the year 1914 may also be included in this style.
Description
Edwardian architecture is ...
style of architecture was widely favoured for public structures and was a revival of
Christopher Wren
Sir Christopher Wren PRS FRS (; – ) was one of the most highly acclaimed English architects in history, as well as an anatomist, astronomer, geometer, and mathematician-physicist. He was accorded responsibility for rebuilding 52 churches ...
–inspired designs of the late 17th and early 18th centuries. The change or reversal in taste from the Victorian eclectic styles corresponded with the historical revivals of the period, most prominently earlier
Georgian
Georgian may refer to:
Common meanings
* Anything related to, or originating from Georgia (country)
** Georgians, an indigenous Caucasian ethnic group
** Georgian language, a Kartvelian language spoken by Georgians
**Georgian scripts, three scrip ...
and Neoclassical styles of the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
White City Stadium
White City Stadium was a stadium located in White City, London, England. Built for the 1908 Summer Olympics, it hosted the finish of the first modern marathon and other sports like swimming, speedway, boxing, show jumping, athletics, stock ...
, used for the
1908 Summer Olympics
The 1908 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the IV Olympiad and also known as London 1908) were an international multi-sport event held in London, England, United Kingdom, from 27 April to 31 October 1908. The 1908 Games were ori ...
, was the first Olympic Stadium in the UK. Built on the site of the
Franco-British Exhibition
The Franco-British Exhibition was a large public fair held in London between 14 May and 31 October 1908. The exhibition attracted 8 million visitors and celebrated the Entente Cordiale signed in 1904 by the United Kingdom and France. The chief ar ...
, it had a seating capacity of 68,000 and was opened by King Edward VII on 27 April 1908. It was the largest structure of its type in the world at the time, and was designed to be awe-inspiring and thereby enhance the love of large-scale spectacle that characterised Edwardian London.
Film
Filmmakers
Mitchell and Kenyon
The Mitchell & Kenyon film company was a pioneer of early commercial motion pictures based in Blackburn in Lancashire, England, at the start of the 20th century. They were originally best known for minor contributions to early fictional narrative ...
documented many scenes from Britain and Ireland from 1900 to 1907, sports, parades, factory exits, parks, city streets, boating and the like. Their films have survived in very good quality restored from the original negatives.
Science and technology
The period featured many innovations.
Ernest Rutherford
Ernest Rutherford, 1st Baron Rutherford of Nelson, (30 August 1871 – 19 October 1937) was a New Zealand physicist who came to be known as the father of nuclear physics.
''Encyclopædia Britannica'' considers him to be the greatest ...
published his studies on radioactivity. The first transatlantic wireless signals were sent by
Guglielmo Marconi
Guglielmo Giovanni Maria Marconi, 1st Marquis of Marconi (; 25 April 187420 July 1937) was an Italians, Italian inventor and electrical engineering, electrical engineer, known for his creation of a practical radio wave-based Wireless telegrap ...
English Channel
The English Channel, "The Sleeve"; nrf, la Maunche, "The Sleeve" (Cotentinais) or ( Jèrriais), (Guernésiais), "The Channel"; br, Mor Breizh, "Sea of Brittany"; cy, Môr Udd, "Lord's Sea"; kw, Mor Bretannek, "British Sea"; nl, Het Kana ...
by air; the largest ship in the world, RMS ''Olympic'', had sailed on its maiden voyage and her larger sister RMS ''Titanic'' was under construction; automobiles were common; and the
South Pole
The South Pole, also known as the Geographic South Pole, Terrestrial South Pole or 90th Parallel South, is one of the two points where Earth's axis of rotation intersects its surface. It is the southernmost point on Earth and lies antipod ...
was reached for the first time by
Roald Amundsen
Roald Engelbregt Gravning Amundsen (, ; ; 16 July 1872 – ) was a Norwegian explorer of polar regions. He was a key figure of the period known as the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration.
Born in Borge, Østfold, Norway, Amundsen bega ...
's and then
Robert Falcon Scott
Captain Robert Falcon Scott, , (6 June 1868 – c. 29 March 1912) was a British Royal Navy officer and explorer who led two expeditions to the Antarctic regions: the ''Discovery'' expedition of 1901–1904 and the ill-fated ''Terra Nov ...
's teams.
Sport
The 1908 Summer Olympic Games were held in London. Popularity of sports tended to conform to class divisions, with tennis and yachting popular among the very wealthy and
football
Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...
favoured by the working class.
Football
Aston Villa
Aston Villa Football Club is a professional football club based in Aston, Birmingham, England. The club competes in the , the top tier of the English football league system. Founded in 1874, they have played at their home ground, Villa Park ...
maintained their position as the pre-eminent football team of the era, winning the
FA Cup
The Football Association Challenge Cup, more commonly known as the FA Cup, is an annual knockout football competition in men's domestic English football. First played during the 1871–72 season, it is the oldest national football competi ...
for the fourth time in 1904–05 and their sixth League title in 1909–10. The club colours of claret and sky blue were adopted by
Burnley
Burnley () is a town and the administrative centre of the wider Borough of Burnley in Lancashire, England, with a 2001 population of 73,021. It is north of Manchester and east of Preston, Lancashire, Preston, at the confluence of the River C ...
as a tribute to their success in 1910. Sunderland achieved their fourth league title in 1901–02. The era also saw
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a popul ...
(1900–01, 1905–06), Newcastle United (1904–05, 1906–07, 1908–09) and Manchester United (1907–08) winning their first league titles.Tony Mason, "'Our Stephen and our Harold': Edwardian footballers as local heroes." ''The International Journal of the History of Sport'' 13#1 (1996): 71–85.
See also
*
Belle Epoque
Belle may refer to:
* Belle (''Beauty and the Beast'')
* Belle (given name), a list of people and fictional characters
* Belle (surname), a list of people
Brands and enterprises
* Belle Air, a former airline with headquarters in Tirana, Albania ...
, a concurrent period of prosperity in
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
and mainland Europe
*
Historiography of the United Kingdom
The historiography of the United Kingdom includes the historical and archival research and writing on the history of the United Kingdom, Great Britain, England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales. For studies of the overseas empire see historiography ...
*
Progressive Era
The Progressive Era (late 1890s – late 1910s) was a period of widespread social activism and political reform across the United States focused on defeating corruption, monopoly, waste and inefficiency. The main themes ended during Am ...
, near concurrent period in the United States
References
Further reading
* Black, Mark. ''Edwardian Britain: A Very Brief History'' (2012 excerpt and text search * Bowman, Timothy, and Mark L. Connelly. ''The Edwardian Army: Recruiting, Training, and Deploying the British Army, 1902-1914'' (Oxford University Press, 2012).
* Brooks, David. ''The Age of Upheaval: Edwardian Politics, 1899-1914'' (1995 online * Dangerfield, George. ''
The Strange Death of Liberal England
''The Strange Death of Liberal England'' is a book written by George Dangerfield and published in 1935. Its thesis is that the Liberal Party in the United Kingdom ruined itself in dealing with the House of Lords, women's suffrage, the Irish quest ...
'' (1935 online free to borrow * Elton, G.R. ''Modern Historians on British History 1485–1945: A Critical Bibliography 1945–1969'' (1969), annotated guide to 1000 history books on every major topic, plus book reviews and major scholarly articles online * Ensor, R. C. K. ''England 1870–1914'' (1936), scholarly survey online * Etherington, Norman. ''Imperium of the soul: The political and aesthetic imagination of Edwardian imperialists'' (Manchester UP, 2017).
* Field, Clive D. "'The Faith Society'? Quantifying Religious Belonging in Edwardian Britain, 1901–1914." ''Journal of Religious History'' 37.1 (2013): 39–63.
*
* Halévy, Elie. ''History of the English People, 1905–1914'' (1934), 686pp.
* Hamlett, Jane. ''At Home in the Institution: Material Life in Asylums, Lodging Houses and Schools in Victorian and Edwardian England'' (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014)
* Hattersley, Roy. ''The Edwardians'' (2005) excerpt * Hawkins, Alun. "Edwardian Liberalism", ''History Workshop'' (1977) #4 pp. 143–61
* Hearnshaw, F. J. C., ed. ''Edwardian England AD 1901–1910'' (1933 online 294pp; 10 essays by scholars.
* Heffer, Simon. ''The Age of Decadence: Britain 1880 to 1914'' (2017), wide-ranging scholarly survey.
* Heller, Michael. ''London Clerical Workers, 1880–1914'' (Pickering & Chatto, 2011)
* Holland, Evangeline. ''Pocket Guide to Edwardian England'' (2013 excerpt and text search * Horrall, Andrew. ''Popular culture in London c. 1890–1918: The transformation of entertainment'' (Manchester UP, 2001).
* Hughes, Michael. "Archbishop Davidson, the 'Edwardian Crisis,' and the Defense of the National Church." ''Journal of Church and State'' 57#2 (2015): 217–242.
* Jenkins, Roy. ''Asquith: portrait of a man and an era'' (1964 online * Lambert, Andrew D., Robert J. Blyth, and Jan Rüger, eds. ''The Dreadnought and the Edwardian age'' (Ashgate, 2011) online review * Marriott, J.A.R. ''Modern England, 1885-1945'' (1948) pp 169–358 online political narrative.
* Meacham, Standish. ''A life apart: The English working class, 1890–1914'' (Harvard UP, 1977), scholarly social history online * Nowell-Smith, Simon, ed. ''Edwardian England, 1901–14'' (1964), 620pp; 15 wide-ranging essays by scholars.
* Ottewill, Roger Martin. "Faith and good works: congregationalism in Edwardian Hampshire 1901–1914" (PhD. Diss. University of Birmingham, 2015 online Bibliography pp 389–417.
* Prior, Christopher. ''Edwardian England and the Idea of Racial Decline: An Empire's Future'' (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013)
* Read, Donald. ''Edwardian England'' (1972) 288pp; survey by scholar online * Roberts, Clayton, and David F. Roberts. ''A History of England, Volume 2: 1688 to the present'' (2013) university textbook 1985 edition online * Russell, A. K. ''Liberal landslide : the general election of 1906'' (1973).
* Searle, G. R. ''A new England?: peace and war, 1886–1918'' (Oxford University Press, 2004), wide-ranging survey, 952 pp.
* Spender, J.A. ''Great Britain: empire and commonwealth, 1886-1935'' (1936) pp 159–401, Focus on UK politics
* Thackeray, David, "Rethinking the Edwardian Crisis of Conservatism", ''Historical Journal'' (2011) 54#1 pp. 191–21 in JSTOR * Thompson, Paul. ''The Edwardians: The Remaking of British Society'' (2nd ed. 1992)
* Trumble, Angus, and Andrea Wolk Rager, eds. ''Edwardian Opulence: British Art at the Dawn of the Twentieth Century'' (2012).
* Ubbelohde, A. R. "Edwardian Science and Technology: Their Interactions", ''British Journal for the History of Science'' (1963) 1#3 pp. 217–22 in JSTOR
Gender and family
* Aston, Jennifer, and Paolo Di Martino. "Risk, success, and failure: female entrepreneurship in late Victorian and Edwardian England." ''Economic History Review'' 70.3 (2017): 837–858 online *
* Delap, Lucy. "The Superwoman: Theories of Gender and Genius in Edwardian Britain", ''Historical Journal'' (2004) 47#1 pp. 101–12 in JSTOR * Dyhouse, Carol. ''Girls growing up in late Victorian and Edwardian England'' (Routledge, 2012).
* Liddington, Jill. ''Rebel Girls: How votes for women changed Edwardian lives'' (Hachette UK, 2015).
* Purvis, June. ''Gendering the Historiography of the Suffragette Movement in Edwardian Britain: some reflections'' (Routledge, 2016).
* Ross, Ellen. "'Fierce Questions and Taunts': Married Life in Working-Class London, 1870–1914." ''Feminist Studies'' 8.3 (1982): 575–602 in JSTOR * Sutherland, Gillian. "Self-education, class and gender in Edwardian Britain: women in lower middle class families." ''Oxford Review of Education'' 41#4 (2015): 518–533.
* Tracy, Michael. ''The World of the Edwardian Child: As Seen in Arthur Mee's Children's Encyclopaedia, 1908-1910'' (2008 online