Introduction: The Foreign Office and British Diplomacy in the Twentieth Century

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Notes

 1. H. Nicolson, Diplomacy (London: Oxford University Press, 1963), pp.3–4.

 2. Notable exceptions include: Z.S. Steiner, The Foreign Office and Foreign Policy, 1898–1914 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969); R.A. Jones, The British Diplomatic Service, 1815–1914 (Gerrards Cross: Smythe, 1983); A. Bosco and C. Navari (eds.), Chatham House and British Foreign Policy 1919–1945: The Royal Institute of International Affairs in the Inter-War Period (London: Lothian Foundation Press, 1994); R. Bullen (ed.), The Foreign Office, 1782–1982 (Frederick, MD: University Publications of America, 1984); R. Warman, ‘The Erosion of Foreign Office Influence in the Making of Foreign Policy, 1916–1918’, The Historical Journal, 15/1 (1972), pp.133–59; E. Maisel, The Foreign Office and Foreign Policy, 1919–1926 (Brighton: Sussex University Press, 1994); E. Goldstein, Winning the Peace: British Diplomatic Strategy, Peace Planning, and the Paris Peace Conference, 1916–1920 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1991); C. Larner, ‘The Amalgamation of the Diplomatic Service with the Foreign Office’, Journal of Contemporary History, 7/1–2 (1972), pp.107–26; A. Sharp, ‘The Foreign Office in Eclipse, 1919–1922’, History, 61/2 (1976), pp.198–218.

 3. One of the most influential being P. Kennedy, The Realities Behind Diplomacy: Background Influences on British External Policy 1865–1980 (London: Fontana, 1981); P. Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers: Economic Change and Military Conflict from 1500–2000 (New York: Random House, 1987).

 4. A partial exception is J. Connell, The ‘Office’: A Study of British Foreign Policy and its Makers, 1919–1951 (London: Allan Wingate, 1958). However, important work on Colonial and Foreign Office policy towards the Empire and the Commonwealth has been done by Lorna Lloyd. See L. Lloyd, ‘“What's in a Name?” The Curious Tale of the Office of High Commissioner’, Diplomacy and Statecraft, 11/1 (2000), pp.47–78; L. Lloyd, ‘“Us and Them”: The Changing Nature of Commonwealth Diplomacy, 1880–1973’, Commonwealth and Comparative Politics, 39/3 (2001), pp.9–30. Also J. Zametica (ed.), British Officials and British Foreign Policy 1945–1950 (Leicester: Leicester University Press, 1990); N. Henderson, The Private Office Revisited: A Personal Account of Life in the Private Office of Five Secretaries of State for Foreign Affairs, and an Inside View of that Office and of Subsequent Ministers seen in Recent Times (London: Profile, 2001); R. Dudley Edwards, True Brits: Inside the Foreign Office (London: BBC books, 1994).

 5. R. Mayne, In Victory, Magnanimity, In Peace, Goodwill: A History of Wilton Park (London: Whitehall History Publishing in association with Frank Cass, 2003).

 6. Z.S. Steiner, The Foreign Office; V. Cromwell and Z.S. Steiner, ‘The Foreign Office before 1914: A Study in Resistance’, in G. Sutherland (ed.), Studies in the Growth of Nineteenth-Century Government (London: Routledge, 1972); Z.S. Steiner and M.L. Dockrill, ‘The Foreign Office and the Paris Peace Conference of 1919’, International History Review, 2/2 (1980), pp.55–86; Z. S. Steiner, ‘Elitism and Foreign Policy: The Foreign Office before the Great War’, in B.J.C. McKercher and D.J. Moss (eds.), Shadow and Substance in British Foreign Policy, 1895–1939: Memorial Essays Honouring C.J. Lowe (Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, 1984). Other important studies include E. Goldstein, Winning the Peace.

 7. P. Hennessy, Whitehall (London: Secker and Warburg, 1989).

 8. I. Colvin, Vansittart in Office (London: Gollancz, 1965); N. Rose, Vansittart: Portrait of a Diplomat (London: Heinemann, 1977); M. Roi, Alternative to Appeasement: Sir Robert Vansittart and Alliance Diplomacy, 1934–1937 (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1997); A.L. Goldman, ‘Sir Robert Vansittart's Search for Italian Cooperation against Hitler, 1933–1936’, Journal of Contemporary History, 9/2 (1974), pp.93–130; B.J.C. McKercher, ‘The Last Old Diplomat: Sir Robert Vansittart and the Verities of British Foreign Policy, 1903–1930’, Diplomacy and Statecraft, 6/1 (1995), pp.1–38; C. Morrisey and M.A. Ramsay, ‘“Giving a Lead in the Right Direction”: Sir Robert Vansittart and the Defence Requirements Sub-Committee’, Diplomacy and Statecraft, 6/3 (1995), pp.39–60; S. Bourette-Knowles, ‘The Global Micawber: Sir Robert Vansittart, the Treasury and the Global Balance of Power 1933–1935’, Diplomacy and Statecraft, 6/1 (1995), pp.91–121; M. Roi, ‘From the Stresa Front to the Triple Entente: Sir Robert Vansittart, the Abyssinian Crisis, and the Containment of Germany’, Diplomacy and Statecraft, 6/3 (1995), pp.61–90.

 9. R. Vansittart, Mist Procession (London: Hutchinson, 1958).

10. S. Crowe and E.T. Corp, Our Ablest Public Servant: Sir Eyre Crowe, GCB, GCMG, KCB, KCMG, 1864–1925 (Braunton: Merlin, 1993), although S.E. Crowe, ‘Sir Eyre Crowe and the Locarno Pact’, The English Historical Review, 87/1 (1972), pp.49–72, is more balanced; B.C. Busch, Hardinge of Penshurst: A Study in the Old Diplomacy (Hamden, CT: Archon, 1980).

11. An important exception being E.T. Corp, ‘Sir William Tyrrell: The Eminence Grise of the British Foreign Office’, The Historical Journal, 25/4 (1982), pp.697–708.

12. P.M.H. Bell, France and Britain 1900–1940: Entente and Estrangement (London: Longman, 1996); P.M.H. Bell, France and Britain 1940–1990: The Long Separation (London: Longman, 1997).

13. See M. Gilbert, Sir Horace Rumbold: Portrait of A Diplomat (London: Heinemann), 1973; P. Neville, Appeasing Hitler. The Diplomacy of Sir Nevile Henderson 1937–9 (Basingstoke; Palgrave Macmillan, 2000); G. Johnson, The Berlin Embassy of Lord D'Abernon, 1920–1926 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002); G. Protheroe, ‘Sir George Clerk and the Struggle for British Influence in Central Europe, 1919–26’, Diplomacy and Statecraft, 12/2 (2001), pp.39–64, and his forthcoming biography of Clerk, to be published by Taylor & Francis Diplomats Series, 2004; K. Urbach, Bismarck's Favourite Englishman: Lord Odo Russell's Mission to Berlin (London: IB Tauris, 1999); K. Hamilton, Bertie of Thame: Edwardian Ambassador (Woodbridge: Royal Historical Society, 1990); D. Gillies, Radical Diplomat: The Life of Archibald Clark Kerr, Lord Inverchapel, 1882–1951 (London: IB Tauris, 1999); B. J.C. McKercher, Esme Howard: A Diplomatic Biography (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989).

14. Cf. B. Willson, Friendly Relations: a Narrative of Britain's Ministers and Ambassadors to America, 1791–1930 (London: Dickson and Thompson, 1934); F.L. Ford, ‘Three Observers in Berlin: Rumbold, Dodd and François-Poncet’, C.E. Schorske, ‘Two German Ambassadors: Dirksen and Schulenburg’, F. Gilbert, ‘Two British Ambassadors: Perth and Henderson’, and W.W. Kaufmann, ‘Two American Ambassadors: Bullitt and Kennedy’, all in G.A. Craig and F. Gilbert (eds.), The Diplomats, 1919–1939 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1953); W.-A. van't Padje, ‘At the Heart of the Growing Anglo-Imperialist Rivalry: Two British Ambassadors in Berlin, 1884–1908’, unpublished D.Phil thesis, Oxford University, 2001.

15. The already large body of diplomatic memoirs from this period include D. Scott, Three Years as British Ambassador in South Africa (Braamfontein: South African Institute of International Affairs, 1980); H. Brind, Lying Abroad: Diplomatic Memoirs (London: Radcliffe, 1999); H. Phillips, Envoy Extraordinary: A Most Unlikely Ambassador (London: Radcliffe, 1995); W. Hugh-Jones, Diplomacy to Politics: By Way of the Jungle (Spennymoor: Memoir Club, 2002); B. Burrows, Diplomat in a Changing World (Spennymoor: Memoir Club, 2001); R. Faber, A Chain of Cities: Diplomacy at the End of Empire (London: Radcliffe, 2000); J. Reeve, Cocktails, Crises and Cockroaches (London: Radcliffe, 1999); I. Lucas, A Road to Damascus: Mainly Diplomatic Memoirs from the Middle East (London: Radcliffe, 1997); D. Owen, Balkan Odyssey (London: Gollancz, 1995); S. Falle, My Lucky Life: In War, Revolution, Peace and Diplomacy (Lewes: Book Guild, 1996); C.H. Philips, Beyond the Ivory Tower: The Autobiography of Sir Cyril Philips (London: Radcliffe, 1995); P. Cradock, Experiences of China (London: John Murray, 1994); N. Elliott, Never Judge a Man by his Umbrella (Wilton: Russell, 1991); F. Roberts, Dealing with Dictators: The Destruction and Revival of Europe, 1930–1970 (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1991); C. Parrott, The Serpent and the Nightingale (London: Faber, 1977); W.G. Hayter, The Kremlin and the Embassy (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1966) and G. Rendel, The Sword and the Olive: Recollections of Diplomacy and the Foreign Service, 1913–1954 (London: John Murray, 1957).

16. For example, M. West, Catching the Bag: Who'd be a Woman Diplomat? (Edinburgh: Pentland Press, 2000).