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BANNERMAN, Sir Henry Campbell- (1836–1908), prime minister, was born at Kelvinside, Glasgow, on 7 September 1836, the second son and the youngest of the six children of Sir James Campbell (1790–1876) and his wife, Janet, née Bannerman (d. 1873). His extra surname was acquired as a condition of inheriting his maternal uncle's estate in 1871.
Bannerman, or ‘CB’ as he was affectionately known, went first to Glasgow University (1851–3), then to Trinity College, Cambridge (1854–8), where he read mathematics and classics. He neither impressed nor was impressed by Cambridge and his examination results were disappointingly modest.
After university CB straightaway joined the family firm, a flourishing warehouse and drapery business. He showed aptitude but was not particularly enthusiastic, and he acquired a reputation for indolence. He was made a partner in 1860. In the same year he met (Sarah) Charlotte (d. 1906), the rather plain, stout daughter of the late Major-General Sir Charles Bruce, and they married in September
In London, the Bannermans lived in a series of large, well-appointed houses at convenient, fashionable addresses. The weekends they spent at Hunton Court, the country property CB had inherited at Hunton near Maidstone. In 1884 he bought Belmont Castle, at Meigle, Perthshire, which after restoration and extension became their much loved Scottish home.
CB entered parliament in 1868 as an earnest, impatient radical. He defined Liberalism, simply and pragmatically, as ‘the politics of common sense’. Campbell represented the constituency of Stirling Burghs without interruption from that date for the rest of his parliamentary career. He was appointed Britain's first radical prime minister after a landslide victory in December 1905, succeeding the Tory, Arthur James Balfour.
Campbell’s achievements included a very successful period as Irish Chief secretary in favour of Home Rule, the promotion of peace in South Africa after the Boer War, supporting women’s suffrage and sponsoring the introduction of the Old Age Pension. He was in addition a popular man and at his death deeply regretted by many.
After a series of increasingly severe heart attacks, he died on the morning of 22 April 1908 while still in residence at 10 Downing Street. He was buried next to Charlotte in Meigle churchyard.
Thomas, (Philip) Edward (1878–1917), poet and writer, was born on 3 March 1878 in Lambeth, London, the eldest of the six sons of Philip Henry Thomas (1854–1920), on the staff at the Board of Trade, and Mary Elizabeth Townsend (b. 1855) of Newport, Monmouthshire.
Encouraged by the critic James Ashcroft Noble, he began to publish essays based on his long country walks and assemble his first book, The Woodland Life (1896). He had also begun a relationship with Noble's second daughter, Helen Berenice Noble (1877–1967). They married in 1899. In March 1898 Thomas, having matriculated at Oxford as a non-collegiate student (1897), had won a scholarship to Lincoln College. He graduated with a second-class degree in history (1900)
In 1901 Thomas and his family moved to Rose Acre (Roseacre) Cottage at Bearsted, near Maidstone, where they lived for three years and some of his nature poetry drew its inspiration from the Kent countryside. He worked as a regular reviewer for the Daily Chronicle, but despite this was earning less than £2 a week. He mainly reviewed contemporary poetry, reprints, criticism, and country books. In the ten years from 1903 to 1913 the Thomases moved house five times.
It was chiefly the country books which carried Thomas's hopes. They mix observation, information, stories, portraits, self-portraits, literary criticism, and reflection. The war also concentrated Thomas's mind because it focused his vision of England and led him to write ‘war poetry’ before he actually reached the trenches. In July 1915 he joined the Artists' Rifles where he was commissioned second lieutenant in November 1916, volunteered for service overseas in December and embarked in January 1917. On 9 April that year he was killed by a shell blast during the first hour of the battle of Arras and the following day was buried in Agny military cemetery on the outskirts of Arras.
At the end of the twentieth century Edward Thomas's reputation as a poet stood higher than it had ever done before. His significance as a poetry critic has also been underestimated.
Northcote, Sir Amyas Stafford (1864-1923) was the 7th son of Henry Stafford Northcote, 1st Earl of Iddesleigh, and Cecilia Frances Farrer. His father was Chancellor of the Exchequer from 1874-1880, and had a long political career. Amyas married Helen May Dudley in 1890 and the couple had two children, Cecilia Helen and Dudley Stafford Northcote.
Amyas Northcote was an author who wrote a book of ghost stories and articles for popular magazines. He was a Justice of the Peace in Buckinghamshire for several years, and a contemporary of M R James at Eton. He was buried at Boxley church in 1923.