Sidney Herbert, 1st Baron Herbert of Lea

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Sidney Herbert , painting by Francis Grant , 1847, National Portrait Gallery, London

Sidney Herbert PC (born September 16, 1810 in Richmond, Surrey , † August 2, 1861 at Wilton House , Wilton near Salisbury , Wiltshire ), younger son of the 11th Earl of Pembroke from the Herbert family , was a 19th-century British politician. Century, who sat for almost three decades as a member of the House of Commons and held various State Secretary and Ministerial posts . He belonged to the Conservative Party , but was mainly involved in liberal governments. Herbert became known during the Crimean War as a supporter of the Florence Nightingale , with whose support he later reformed the medical services and nursing in the British Army. Shortly before his death he was appointed Baron Herbert of Lea and thus a peer .

Career

Sidney Herbert attended the Harrow School and studied at Oriel College of the University of Oxford 1828-1831 classical archeology . He was a member of the Oxford Union Debating Club .

After completing his studies, a lightning career began in politics: in 1832, at the age of only 22 , he was elected to the Tory Party as one of two members of the South Wiltshire constituency of the House of Commons , where he remained until 1861, i.e. for 29 years should. Shortly after moving into the House of Commons, he joined the newly formed Conservative Party , of which he belonged to the liberal wing. He was sponsored by Robert Peel .

During the brief first term as Prime Minister Robert Peel Sidney Herbert 1834/35 one of the two was Lord Ellenborough assumed Secretaries of the Board of Control and the supervisory authority of the East India Company . After the collapse of this government, the Whig politician Lord Melbourne became the new Prime Minister and Herbert was a member of the opposition until 1841.

During Peel's second term in office, Herbert was State Secretary to the Admiralty from 1841 to 1845 . In February 1845 he was then appointed Secretary of State ( Secretary at War ) and received as such a seat in the cabinet . The Secretary at War was subordinate to the Colonial and War Secretary - at that time Gladstone - and dealt as head of the War Office with the administration and organization of the army .

Like Prime Minister Peel and almost every other member of the government, Sidney Herbert turned from protectionism - up until then one of the central tenets of the Conservatives - and turned to free trade . The ensuing dispute over the abolition of the Corn Laws then led to the collapse of the Peel government in the summer of that year and the split in the Conservative Party. Sidney Herbert became a leading member of the economically liberal Peelite faction, which split off from the protectionist party majority.

During the Whig government under Lord Russell that followed, as well as under the short-lived protectionist-conservative government under Lord Derby , Herbert was in the opposition and played no major political role. It was not until 1852 that he was a member of the Whig Peelite coalition government under Prime Minister Lord Aberdeen again as Secretary at War of the cabinet and was subordinate to the Minister of War Lord Newcastle .

Nightingale-run Scutari Military Hospital (lithograph by Day & Son, April 1856)

In October 1853 the Crimean War broke out. Sidney Herbert now had to organize the troops in the war and was faced with the greatest task of his career. He tried to make up for the decade-long neglect of the army in a short time, but this was only inadequate. In February 1855, the entire government finally failed due to military mismanagement and a lack of war success, for which Herbert, however, was not really responsible.

His greatest merit during this period was the promotion and reform of the medical system and nursing in the British Army: Sidney Herbert and his wife were privately close friends with Florence Nightingale ; Herbert became their most important advocate in politics. When reports of the catastrophic care of the wounded in the Crimea arrived, Herbert managed to get Nightingale in Scutari on the Bosporus to run a military hospital in the Selimiye barracks on behalf of the government . In the period that followed, the two worked closely together, though not always without conflict.

The exertions and strains of the war phase meant that Herbert's health deteriorated significantly. But he refused to reduce his workload. He became colonial minister in the Whig government under Lord Palmerston in 1855 , but gave up the office after only two weeks because of the Crimean Committee of Inquiry and stayed away from politics.

When Palmerston became Prime Minister for the second time in 1859, Herbert eventually became Minister of War of the Liberal government, succeeding Jonathan Peel in his office . In a short period of time he carried out extensive reform programs with great effort and with fluctuating success rates. Again together with Florence Nightingale he drove the improvement of the military medical system and the care of the wounded. In India he was responsible for the formation of the Indian Army . In Great Britain he led the formation of the Volunteer Force , a citizen's militia- like volunteer force to protect the motherland - there was fear of war with France after the Orsini affair - and became the first president of the National Volunteer Association .

In bad health, Herbert was eventually to move as a peer to the less strenuous House of Lords , for which he was appointed Baron Herbert of Lea, of Lea in the County of Wiltshire in January 1861 for his services . It was too late, however. Herbert gave up his ministerial post in July. He then died shortly thereafter, early the following month, at the age of only 50 of Bright's disease (nephritis) .

family

Sidney Herbert was the son of George Herbert, 11th Earl of Pembroke (1759-1827), and his second wife Ekaterina Voronzowa (Catherine Vorontsova) (1783-1856). His father, a general in the British Army and Governor of Guernsey , had already held a seat in the House of Commons from 1780 to 1784 and supported the Whigs at the time . His mother was the daughter of the Russian ambassador Semyon Vorontsov and sister of Mikhail Vorontsov .

As the younger son of an earl, he was born with the courtesy title The Honorable Sidney Herbert. With the attainment of the baron shortly before his death he was then dubbed The Right Honorable The Lord Herbert of Lea .

Sidney Herbert was the second surviving son and the eldest from a second marriage. He had five sisters and one half-sister. His older half-brother was Robert Herbert (1791-1862), after his father's death in 1827, the 12th Earl of Pembroke . After a failed, chaotic marriage with an Italian noblewoman, the older brother led an unsteady life abroad, which is why Sidney Herbert took over the family seat of Wilton House in Wilton (Wiltshire) and lived there. The Irish estate of Mount Merrion was also administered by him.

Church of St. Mary and St. Nicholas in Wilton

In contrast to his brother, he was considered a prime example of a British gentleman and led a socially respected life. He used his fortune for philanthropic purposes. Together with his mother, he financed the construction of the splendidly furnished church of St. Mary and St. Nicholas in his home town of Wilton from 1841 to 1844 in the neo-Romanesque - Lombard style. In this church there is also a grave figure of Herbert.

In 1846 he married Elizabeth (1822-1911), the daughter of General Charles Ashe à Court . Elizabeth Herbert, like her husband, became known as a philanthropist, moved in the best circles of high Victorian society and represented her husband's political views there. Together with Lord Ashley , the two created the Female Emigration Fund in 1849 to support poor women emigrating to the colonies.

The couple had seven children:

1. George Robert Charles (1850–1895), after the death of his father the 2nd Baron Herbert of Lea and after the death of his uncle the 13th Earl of Pembroke
2. Sidney (1853–1913), Member of Parliament; after the death of brother 14th Earl of Pembroke
3. William Reginald (1854–1870), died in the sinking of the HMS Captain
4. Michael Henry (1857–1904), diplomat, ambassador to the United States
5. Mary Catherine (1849–1935), ⚭ Friedrich von Hügel
6. Elizabeth Maud (1851–1933), ⚭ Hubert Parry
7. Constance Gwladys (1859-1917), ⚭ 1.) St George Lowther, 4th Earl of Lonsdale , ⚭ 2.) Frederick Robinson, the Earl de Gray

With Sidney Herbert's death, his eldest son George inherited the barony and with it the seat in the House of Lords. Since his uncle, the 12th Earl, followed his younger brother to the grave six months later without legitimate children, George also inherited his earliest dignity and Baron Herbert of Lea became a subordinate title of the Earls of Pembroke.

The second son, Sidney Herbert Jr., followed his father's career and sat for many years in the House of Commons, but lost his home constituency in 1885. After the early death of his brother, he became the 14th Earl of Pembroke.

Herbert's widow Elizabeth converted after the death of her husband and became a fanatical Catholic. Their change of faith caused a scandal among the Anglican relatives and tore the family apart.

Honors

Sidney Herbert's statue in front of the Crimean War Memorial in London

In February 1845 Sidney Herbert in the Privy Council of Her Majesty ( Privy Council ) appointed.

In 1843 named an expedition under James Clark Ross in the Antarctic to Herbert Sound after the former Admiralty Secretary.

Herbert was a member and promoter of the New Zealand Colonization Society Canterbury Association . In his honor, the highest point (920 meters) on the Banks Peninsula Mount Herbert was named in 1849 .

The small town of Pembroke in Ontario is also named in his honor and bears the name of his father's title.

After his death, a statue of him, made of bronze by Baron Marochetti , was inaugurated in Salisbury Market Square in 1863 . Since Herbert had distinguished himself as a great benefactor in his home region, thousands of spectators were present at the inauguration. The statue was moved to Victoria Park in 1953 due to lack of space .

Another statue of him, created by Foley , was erected in front of the War Office building in Pall Mall , London, in 1867 . When the structure was demolished a few decades later, the statue was moved in front of the Crimean War Memorial on Waterloo Place , where it still stands today next to Florence Nightingale's.

The Woolwich Military Hospital that he and Nightingale created was named Royal Herbert Hospital . There was also a Herbert Memorial Convalescent Hospital in Bournemouth .

literature

• Lloyd C. Sanders: Celebrities of the Century: Being A Dictionary of Men and Women of the Nineteenth Century , Vol. 1-2, Cassel, London 1887; Entry Herbert of Lea , p. 558 f. ( Digitized version )
• Cassell's Biographical Dictionary: Containing Original Memoirs of the most Eminent Men and Women of all Ages and Countries , Cassell, Petter & Galpin, London 1867-1869; Entry Herbert, The Right Hon. Sidney, Lord Herbert of Lea (available in WBIS Online )
• Charles Knight (Ed.): The English Cyclopaedia , Bradbury, Evans & Co., London; Volume 3 ( Biography ), 1856, entry Herbert, Right. Hon. Sidney , column 392 f. ( Digitized version ), as well as the appendix ( supplement ), 1872, entry Herbert of Lea; Right Hon. Sidney, Lord , column 667 f. ( Digitized version )
• John Francis Waller, PE Dove (Ed.): The Imperial Dictionary of Universal Biography: a Series of Original Memoirs of Distinguished Men, of all Ages and all Nations , Volume 2 ( Daa-Iwa ), Mackenzie, London 1857-1863; Entry Herbert, Sidney, Lord Herbert of Lea , p. 881 ( digitized version )
• Thomas Humphry Ward: Men of the Reign: a Biographical Dictionary of Eminent Persons of British and Colonial Birth who Have Died during the Reign of Queen Victoria , Routledge, London 1885; Entry Herbert, Lord of Lea, Right Hon. Sidney , p. 419 f. ( Digitized version )

Web links

• HCG Matthew: Herbert, Sidney, first Baron Herbert of Lea (1810–1861) in the online version of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
• The National Archives : PAPERS OF SIDNEY HERBERT, 1st BARON HERBERT OF LEA

Individual evidence

1. ^ HCG Matthew: Herbert, Sidney, first Baron Herbert of Lea (1810–1861) in the online version of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
2. ^ HCG Matthew: Herbert, Sidney, first Baron Herbert of Lea (1810–1861) in the online version of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography and Charles Knight: English Cyclopaedia , Volume 3 ( Biography ), 1856; Entry Herbert, Right. Hon. Sidney , column 392
3. ^ Sanders: Celebrities of the Century , entry Herbert of Lea , p. 558
4. ↑ London Gazette . No. 20439, HMSO, London, February 4, 1845, p. 315 ( PDF , accessed October 18, 2013, English).
5. ^ Herbert Sound in the US Geological Survey's Geographic Names Information System
6. ^ Johannes Carl Andersen: Place-names of Banks peninsula: a topographical history , Skinner, 1927, pp. 84/85
7. ^ Adrian Room: Dictionary of World Place Names Derived from British Names , Routledge, 1989, p. 135
8. ^ The Citizens' War Memorial, Market Place, Salisbury, History and Significance , July 2011, pp. 9ff
9. ↑ Victorianweb.org: Sidney Herbert Monument ( Memento of October 8, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
10. ^ Charles Knight: English Cyclopaedia , Supplement; Entry Herbert of Lea; Right Hon. Sidney, Lord , column 668

predecessor	Office	successor
New title created	Baron Herbert of Lea 1861	George Herbert
Thomas Fremantle	Secretary at War 1845-1846	Fox Maule-Ramsay
William Beresford	Secretary at War 1852-1854	Henry Pelham-Clinton
George Gray	Secretary of State for the Colonies 1855	John Russell
Jonathan Peel	Secretary of State for War 1859–1861	George Cornewall Lewis