Agent of Peace (19 page)

Nearly all the people Emily met and mentioned in the Diary, were Members of Parliament or prominent in other fields. Many were members of the Union of Democratic Control (UDC), formed at the beginning of the war by a group of Liberal MPs and others who believed that secret diplomacy had led to the outbreak of war. Among these, in particular, were E.D. Morel, who was said to have great organising abilities and had previously sought to limit the powers of King Leopold II of Belgium over the Belgian Congo; Arthur Ponsonby, a son of Sir Henry Ponsonby Queen Victoria’s Private Secretary, a former diplomat who had considerable inside knowledge; Charles Trevelyan, who had held parliamentary office; and Charles Buxton. Other members were R.W. Outhwaite and Arnold Rowntree. J. Ramsay MacDonald, the future Prime Minister, and Norman Angel were among the founders. These people were all proponents of a negotiated peace. Lord Courtney was a sympathiser. Emily’s brother, Leonard Hobhouse, who had been such a support to her in the Anglo-Boer War, was not a member of the group.

The first two pages of the Diary are missing. Perhaps Emily tore them out herself as she waited in the Westminster Palace Hotel for an answer to her wire to Sir Edward Grey. She said she felt very shaken by her visit to New Scotland Yard. One can imagine that her heart was playing her up:

Saturday, July 1
st
I was strangely relieved after my examination at New Scotland [Yard] was over, and the terrible palpitations of my heart subsided. Mr Ponsonby was unfortunately out of town. Still I could not shake off the impression of Martial Law and the idea of being watched. I called on the Devonports
*
but found they had just left for the weekend. Called also on Lord Courtney and had a fairly satisfactory talk with him, urging secrecy for the present. He looked very thin and ill, and seemed too weak for me to tell him all I wished.

In the evening I walked across to Mrs J.R. Green
**
and told her the position. As regards Ruhleben Camp she suggested I should lunch with her next day to meet Mrs Pope Hennessy who is on a Government Commission connected with the Red Cross for the care of our prisoners in Germany. Accepted gratefully. I urged Secrecy – she replied she was ‘loaded up with Secrets’ and promised. [So the weekend was not yet over and Emily was already pursuing her second objective – to obtain the release of civilian prisoners of war.]

Sunday, July 2nd
Part of Abbey Service – tiring to my back. To lunch with Mrs Green. Found on arrival Mrs Pope Hennessey and her husband the Major – both already in full possession of my Secret. (Oh Mrs Green!) Found her very bitter and antagonistic. He very nice – Just off for Mesopotamia. She suggested I should go and visit their office in 18 Carlton House Gardens and we fixed Wednesday morning. I found her very difficult to talk to, but we agreed that the trouble in the Civilian Camp was mental primarily, and from her I first learned what I suspected, that a similar state of things obtained among the German prisoners in our Civilian Camps of Knockaloe, Alexandra Palace, etc. We agreed that the only sensible policy was the complete break up of the Camps – she of course imagined that only Germany was to blame for hindering this. I, on the other hand could assure her that in the Foreign Office at Berlin it was asserted that our government put difficulties in the way.

Coming home looked at my little old house in Cowley Street – empty again. A fatality rests on that house.

Monday, July 3rd
Mr Ponsonby called early. His visit was a great relief to me. I told him much but not the crème de la crème – upon which, however, he advised me how to act in regard to the Foreign Office. He was sympathetic and encouraging and asked to be allowed to tell the UDC Executive and arrange for me to meet them for a talk. In the evening Mr Outhwaite came and we had a good long chat.

Tuesday, July 4th
Phoebe left. Her departure a true relief. She left everything in very bad condition. At 2 p.m. came Mr Charles Trevelyan, who had meantime, however, heard my news from Arthur Ponsonby. Still, we had a nice talk.

Wednesday, July 5th
The Abbey – then to 18 Carlton House Gardens to Mrs Pope Hennessy. Saw also Mrs Livingstone and Sir Lewis Mallet. Found Mrs Hennessy as before, very brusque and ‘difficile’. Mrs Livingstone more sympathetic and urged I should go with her on a tour to see the English Camps, Knockaloe and Alexandra Palace. Mrs H proposed arranging for me to see Lord Newton at once and telephoned there and then. The answer came he could see me at once, therefore I broke away, took a taxi and drove to the Foreign Office. Lord Newton was very nice, unofficial in mind and manner – open – agreed with me about the Camps – acknowledged same state of affairs here in England – desired complete exchange – was aware Germany had proposed this a year ago – said Kitchener had stood in the way.
*
‘These naval and military fellows,’ he said, ‘always make difficulties; they are narrow and one-ideaed and know nothing’. He thought (as I suggested) that the matter could be arranged easily enough by unofficial hands, and proposed that I should myself write to von Jagow and get the thing done. He said he could get it sent via USA Embassy, but it would have to be submitted to the Cabinet. I said I was quite agreeable to that. He said this must be kept quite private. I went home and wrote the letter and sent to him for this purpose.

At 3.30 that afternoon Mr Buxton came to see me – a very charming personality. He was busy about a Memorial for Negotiations, and I signed his paper. He arranged for his wife to come and see me later.

At 6.30 p.m. came Captain Bennett who was delightful and told me he had just completed translation of the German White Book on Belgium Atrocities. Asked me to lunch to meet his wife – counselled speaking to Lord Northcliffe who he said was pessimistic about the war.

At the Red Cross Headquarters Sir Lewis Mallet ran off a letter (5 July) to Sir Horace Rumbold
**
at the Foreign Office. It started with a flourish: ‘Miss Hobhouse, pro-Boer and pro-German, called upon me this morning to my horror.’
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(It is interesting that even though fourteen years had lapsed since the end of the Anglo-Boer War the term ‘pro-Boer’ was still used against Emily in a derogatory sense, regardless of what she had done to help the people, and that responsible diplomats should feel free to use name-calling in this way. As Emily had explained much earlier, being pro-Boer – having sympathy for them – certainly did not mean that one was anti-British. The same could be said of ‘pro-German’. )

Guy Locock an assistant undersecretary at the Foreign Office, was intrigued by it and wrote to Sir Lewis Mallet: ‘What else did the mischievous Miss Hobhouse say?’
2
In reply Mallet told Rumbold on 10 July that Miss Hobhouse was careful to speak favourably of the material conditions at Ruhleben and stressed that, though Germans had intended no mistreatment, the captivity was having a depressing, even maddening, effect on many men.

At that time Emily had apparently produced her plan for the exchange of all British and German civilians over military age who wished to go and for sending the remainder to a neutral country where normal life could be resumed. (This would have been the plan agreed with Stumm in the German Foreign Office.)

Lord Newton noted in his diary:

Miss E. Hobhouse, who has been lately at Ruhleben and gives very bad account. Wants to write to Jagow and propose exchange: told her to w[rite] and send letter for me to see, and that I would ask if it might go. Afterwards sent it to me; showed it to R. Cecil and Drummond, who thought it would not do …

Afternoon, debate on Ruhleben. Just before making statement heard that reply had just arrived and that it was not categorical refusal … Am being denounced in Harmsworth press as being too pro(?) Germany. Germans in note say they want whole of 26,000 here for our 4,000! According to Miss H. condition of Ruhleben people horrible …
3

The difference in numbers was because there were, according to the 1911 census, over 50,000 Germans living in Britain. Some had been there for generations. Not all were interned.
4

It was on another matter that Lord Newton sent Emily a formal and private note the next day. Emily had asked him about her third objective – better food for Belgium:

Foreign Office

Private

July 6 1916

Dear Miss Hobhouse,
5

I have nothing personally to do with Belgium, and perhaps you had better write to Lord Robert yourself. I will tell him, when I next see him, that you wish to speak to him.

You will probably have noticed that, since I saw you, the Germans have sent a reply about the exchange of civilians, which gives ground for hope of an eventual agreement.

In view of this, I feel sure that the authorities here will not be in favour of private communication on the subject, on the ground of causing further complications.

In that event, shall I send the letters back to you or shall I destroy them?

Yrs very truly

Newton

At the same time Emily had written another letter to Sir Edward Grey:
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5th July 1916

Dear Sir Edward Grey,

Since writing to you last Saturday I bought a copy of Hansard to read up debates – and in especial your speech of May 24th.

With profound feeling I read these words of yours:–

‘The fact is the Allies are not beaten, and are not going to be. The first step towards peace will be when the German Government recognize that fact.’ p. 2204

Now quite by chance I happen to know that the Hansard verbatim report of that debate was in the Foreign Office of Berlin; I myself however had not read it owing to the vicissitudes of travel.

But – reading it now – it seems to explain to me a certain insistence with which von Jagow repeated: ‘The English are not beaten. It is true we Germans have had great victories, but we have also had great defeats. The English may have had no great victories but on the other hand have sustained no great defeats. We know full well the English are not beaten.’

The words struck me at the time and stand out clear in my brain, though perhaps I did not at the moment grasp their full import, and certainly did not know what now seems plain that they were a kind of reply to those words of yours.

Do please if you can find time let me see you and tell you all that passed for it weighs upon my mind.

Emily’s requests went unheeded. In fact it had been decided at the Foreign Office that no one should see her.
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So all Emily’s reasonableness had come to nothing.

Lord Newton continued in his diary on 6 July: ‘Discussion about German note & Ruhleben. R Cecil wants to intern everyone in neutral country…. Heard from Miss Hobhouse. Seems all right.’

He wrote to her from the Foreign Office that same day:
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Dear Miss Hobhouse

I am much obliged for your note. I think that I can safely undertake to dispose of the letter, fire or no fire!

Yrs vy truly

Newton

Thursday, July 6th
Took my letter to the Foreign Office and walking back met Emeline Pethrick Lawrence. She asked me questions that shewed at once she knew of my visit to Germany and told me that Mrs Swanwick had told them at the Women’s International League. I felt cross and saw the difficulty of keeping a Secret. She invited me to drive with her and I accepted. At 4.30 p.m. went to call on Mr Morel at UDC [Union of Democratic Control] Office and arranged [to talk at] a meeting of Exve for Tuesday – then on to St Clements Inn making a detour to see the Margaret Macdonald Memorial in Lincoln’s Inn Fields. A pleasant tête-à-tête dinner with Emeline Lawrence (he away). She sympathetic and burning for information, little of which I could give her. Taxied back to the Hotel, she going to a meeting close by.

Friday, July 7th
Margaret Clark came early but I was horribly exhausted and not able to talk to her as I wished. Very hearty and longing to know everything. Then to lunch with Bennetts in Chester Terrace. Mrs B. perfectly charming but I told her nothing as a stranger was there. When I got home callers came and at 5.30 p.m. Sylvia Parkhurst who shared my eggs tea with me and then was put to rest on my bed while we talked. She went on to speak at a meeting and I had Ravelli [a young pianist friend from South Africa] to tell me all his doings.

Saturday, July 8th
No note or recollection of what happened that day. Correspondence. Dined at Bennetts and met Lady Barlow who was full of a scheme for taking her children to America.

Sunday, July 9th
Kate Courtney called. When gone, came Dr Markel with his car who took me to lunch with him as previously arranged. Found him and his wife in a charming house with many rooms given over to work for the prisoners and stores for them. Mrs Markel very sweet – semi-invalid. Talked long – so sympathetic – then he drove me to the Courtneys where, however did not effect much as people kept coming in – Drakes, Fisher, Williams, etc so I came away. Expected Nell [another South African friend] that evening but she did not arrive.

Monday, July 10th
Lady Barlow ’phoned that Mr John Barlow would call on me. Very glad to see him. We had a quiet Quaker talk. It was with real fervour he said: ‘I am very glad you went to Germany.’ I felt he understood the true inwardness of that act and I asked his advice about line of action which he promised to think over and tell me. Mr Ponsonby called also, I think, and many others but I cannot recollect all. F.W. Jowett
*
I think was one. He was curiously unlike what I expected and I had the same sense I always have with one-eyed people of not being able to fix on the right eye to talk into, being obsessed by the destroyed eye. I merely felt he was not greatly in sympathy with the Zimmerwald Socialists. Later Sir Wm Byles called and I took his advice about seeing Ministers. He looked very sad and aged and said he was going fast.

This afternoon too, Lord and Lady Devonport called. They came to hear about their boy Kearl[e]y whom I had seen in Ruhleben. They were simple folk and cried both of them. I liked her, though overdressed and magnificent diamonds. He, too was simple – a good worthy grocer – said he was going to make a speech in the House on the Camps and I begged him to deprecate Reprisals. This he promised to do. Asked me how to pronounce that word ‘proteins’. She stayed a good while and talked on in very simple homely fashion and I gave her all the details that I could.