The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Churchill’s theatre meeting made headlines across UK
Today’s main image is a piece of political memorabilia that takes us back to a key historical event in Dundee in the early years of the last century.
Referring to the vintage document, which was signed off by election agent PF Husband and printed by the city’s James P Mathew and Co, Dundee University archivist Kenneth Baxter explains: “It is a reporter’s pass that was issued to The City Echo for an election meeting held by Winston Churchill at the King’s Theatre in the Cowgate on December 1 1910.
“The City Echo was one of the periodicals produced by the Dundee poet, artist and journalist Joseph Lee; this meeting was held as the start of Churchill’s campaign to be re-elected as one of Dundee’s MPs at the December 1910 general election.
“This was the second general election held in that year and marked the third time Churchill had contested Dundee, having been first returned for the city in the May 1908 by-election.
“Churchill was by this time home secretary in the Liberal government and was one of the best known political figures in the country. With Dundee still considered a safe seat, it was not expected that his campaign would face much difficulty.
“Indeed he went on to top the poll and be re-elected along with Labour’s Alex Wilkie, although both saw a slight decline in their vote shares compared with the result of the previous contest in January.”
Dr Baxter adds: “The meeting at the King’s Theatre attracted attention not just because it marked the launch of Churchill’s campaign in Dundee. One of the main reasons the election had been called was to give the Liberal government a mandate to introduce legislation to limit the ability of the House of Lords to block policies agreed by the House of Commons.
“The previous afternoon, the former Liberal prime minister the Earl of Rosebery had made a controversial, and highly publicised, speech in Manchester challenging the government on this issue.
“Now out of sympathy with the party he had once led, Rosebery had bitterly attacked the government’s calling of an election to curb the power of the Lords and attributed its actions to ‘Irish dictation’ and ‘foreign gold’.
“These allegations stemmed from the fact that as no party had a majority in the House of Commons the Liberals were generally reliant on the support of the Irish Parliamentary Party’s MPs to ensure legislation was passed; the Irish leader John Redmond had received funds for his party’s election costs from Irish communities in America, Canada and Australia.
“Churchill denounced Rosebery’s attack as vulgar slander and argued that the Irish Parliamentary Party was open in how it had raised money to cover election costs, but that the Conservative leader of the opposition, Arthur Balfour, was benefiting from funds raised by the Tariff Reform League, the origin of which was ‘veiled in impenetrable obscurity’.
“He went on to dismiss Rosebery as ‘a bitter and excited partisan’ and said that even if there had been no Irish MPs in the Commons the government would have still sought to limit the Lords’ power over the elected chamber.
“Given Churchill’s stature at the time it is not surprising that and his remarks at this meeting attracted significant press coverage across the UK the following day.”
The historian adds a piece of Courier Country background concerning the venue that played host to the national rumpus, stating: “The King’s Theatre had opened in March 1909 and was capable of accommodating 2,000 people.
“It was designed by Frank Thomson, the son of the well-known Dundee architect James Thomson. It would later be converted into a cinema.”