The Bonham-Carter family and the Liberal Party
Created | Updated Oct 4, 2004
From the Russells to the Lloyd Georges, the history of the liberal movement in Britain has had extraordinary families running through it and threads of kinship connect many of the most significant figures in liberal history. In the twentieth century few families have been more notable than the Bonham-Carters, whose scions remain in the public eye today.
During the reforming liberal heyday of the 1908 administration, Maurice Bonham-Carter was the Private Secretary to Prime Minister Asquith. He was an arch Asquithian supporting the talented government which laid the foundations of the welfare state, with the Old Age Pensions and National Insurance Acts. He was a close personal friend of the Asquith family. This closeness is best evidenced by the fact that he married Asquith’s daughter Violet in 1915.
A remarkable and much written about individual, Violet Bonham-Carter (later Lady Bonham-Cater and eventually as Baroness Asquith of Yarnbury) may well be the most influential member of the Liberal Party never to have been an MP. Her involvement with liberal politics spanned some fifty years, in which time she was twice President of the Women’s Liberal Federation (established in response to the success of the Tory ‘Primrose League’), and was eventually President of the Liberal Party. Throughout the dark years of liberalism, when the party was stuck in the shadows, she stood out as a beacon of hope and continuity, while remaining a very modern and progressive figure. Aside from politics she was a celebrated patron of the arts (and especially the theatre) and was a Governor of the BBC. It’s easy to imagine her offering a vociferous defence of the corporation, were she still with us in these post-Hutton Report days. Although she made two attempts to enter Parliament as an MP, it was as a life peer that she finally took up her place at Westminster. There she spent the final five years of life, in regular attendance and often speaking passionately on the issues which, by then, she was incredibly knowledgeable. Her papers and diaries make fascinating reading, widely recommended are ‘Lantern Slides’, selected diaries and letters from 1904-1914 which are edited jointly by Mark Pottle and her son, the late Mark Bonham-Carter. In 1998 they were adapted and dramatised for BBC Radio, starring her granddaughter Helena.
Violet and Maurice had four children, two boys and two girls. Their daughter Laura was a loyal Liberal, and like her mother contested a parliamentary seat, in this case West Aberdeenshire. Like her mother she failed to win it, but remained highly active in campaigning on an eclectic variety of issues. She was the wife and aide of Jo Grimond, Liberal Party leader from 1956-1967, and the great moderniser of the party which was seen as increasingly out of touch. As Jo gave the party a sense of common direction once again, it was Laura who undoubtedly helped form his agenda, especially their shared international interests and early belief in nuclear disarmament.
Among Laura’s siblings was Mark Bonham-Carter (like his mother, later created a life peer) who was briefly Member of Parliament for Torrington, having won the seat in a 1958 by-election. As with his mother, his impact on liberal politics cannot be judged by his time spent in Parliament. He led the then controversial Race Relations Board (and its successors) from its inception, for over a decade through the late 1960s and 70s, and played an important role in the transition of the SDP-Liberal Alliance to united party in the 1980s. Ultimately he was rewarded by his elevation to the House of Lords and the role of party Foreign Affairs Spokesman, a position he was evidently more than qualified to fill. True to his Bonham-Carter heritage, the arts were equally prominent in his life. Following in Violet’s footsteps he served the BBC (as Vice-Chairman) as well as being heavily involved in the opera and ballet, and his untimely death in 1994 was as much a loss to the cultural life of Britain as to liberal politics. Its hard to think of a politician today who has played so many roles outside of mainstream political life, and who has managed to remain such a profoundly rounded individual despite public office.
Among the Bonham-Carter generation of today there are a number of influential individuals. These days the family name is most well known through Helena, the granddaughter of Violet who portrayed her in ‘Lantern Slides’. One of Britain’s foremost actresses, she is the star of films as diverse as the appropriately Edwardian ‘Room with a View’ and the brilliantly post-modern ‘Fight Club’.
Eliza Bonham-Carter is a significant figure on the English art scene, as both Head of the Fine Art Department at Reading University and a talented artist in her own right. Crispin Bonham-Carter is the familiar figure on our television screens who featured as Mr.Bingley in the BBC’s massively successful ‘Pride and Prejudice’ in 1995. The family connection with the liberalism remains strong too though. Mark Bonham-Carter’s daughter Jane was heavily responsible for Charles Kennedy’s well orchestrated campaign for leadership of the Liberal Democrats in 1999. Having previously worked for Paddy Ashdown she now produces for the BBC (another institution clearly important to the family) and sits on the board of liberal think-tank, The Centre for Reform.
Superficially, the Bonham-Carters simply represent 'Hampstead intellectualism', liberal thinking aloof from the restraints of class-based politics which so dominated the twentieth century. As a family they clearly contributed so much more than this though, to the arts as well as to liberalism, and they continue to play a role in this radical tradition.
Paul Evans
During the reforming liberal heyday of the 1908 administration, Maurice Bonham-Carter was the Private Secretary to Prime Minister Asquith. He was an arch Asquithian supporting the talented government which laid the foundations of the welfare state, with the Old Age Pensions and National Insurance Acts. He was a close personal friend of the Asquith family. This closeness is best evidenced by the fact that he married Asquith’s daughter Violet in 1915.
A remarkable and much written about individual, Violet Bonham-Carter (later Lady Bonham-Cater and eventually as Baroness Asquith of Yarnbury) may well be the most influential member of the Liberal Party never to have been an MP. Her involvement with liberal politics spanned some fifty years, in which time she was twice President of the Women’s Liberal Federation (established in response to the success of the Tory ‘Primrose League’), and was eventually President of the Liberal Party. Throughout the dark years of liberalism, when the party was stuck in the shadows, she stood out as a beacon of hope and continuity, while remaining a very modern and progressive figure. Aside from politics she was a celebrated patron of the arts (and especially the theatre) and was a Governor of the BBC. It’s easy to imagine her offering a vociferous defence of the corporation, were she still with us in these post-Hutton Report days. Although she made two attempts to enter Parliament as an MP, it was as a life peer that she finally took up her place at Westminster. There she spent the final five years of life, in regular attendance and often speaking passionately on the issues which, by then, she was incredibly knowledgeable. Her papers and diaries make fascinating reading, widely recommended are ‘Lantern Slides’, selected diaries and letters from 1904-1914 which are edited jointly by Mark Pottle and her son, the late Mark Bonham-Carter. In 1998 they were adapted and dramatised for BBC Radio, starring her granddaughter Helena.
Violet and Maurice had four children, two boys and two girls. Their daughter Laura was a loyal Liberal, and like her mother contested a parliamentary seat, in this case West Aberdeenshire. Like her mother she failed to win it, but remained highly active in campaigning on an eclectic variety of issues. She was the wife and aide of Jo Grimond, Liberal Party leader from 1956-1967, and the great moderniser of the party which was seen as increasingly out of touch. As Jo gave the party a sense of common direction once again, it was Laura who undoubtedly helped form his agenda, especially their shared international interests and early belief in nuclear disarmament.
Among Laura’s siblings was Mark Bonham-Carter (like his mother, later created a life peer) who was briefly Member of Parliament for Torrington, having won the seat in a 1958 by-election. As with his mother, his impact on liberal politics cannot be judged by his time spent in Parliament. He led the then controversial Race Relations Board (and its successors) from its inception, for over a decade through the late 1960s and 70s, and played an important role in the transition of the SDP-Liberal Alliance to united party in the 1980s. Ultimately he was rewarded by his elevation to the House of Lords and the role of party Foreign Affairs Spokesman, a position he was evidently more than qualified to fill. True to his Bonham-Carter heritage, the arts were equally prominent in his life. Following in Violet’s footsteps he served the BBC (as Vice-Chairman) as well as being heavily involved in the opera and ballet, and his untimely death in 1994 was as much a loss to the cultural life of Britain as to liberal politics. Its hard to think of a politician today who has played so many roles outside of mainstream political life, and who has managed to remain such a profoundly rounded individual despite public office.
Among the Bonham-Carter generation of today there are a number of influential individuals. These days the family name is most well known through Helena, the granddaughter of Violet who portrayed her in ‘Lantern Slides’. One of Britain’s foremost actresses, she is the star of films as diverse as the appropriately Edwardian ‘Room with a View’ and the brilliantly post-modern ‘Fight Club’.
Eliza Bonham-Carter is a significant figure on the English art scene, as both Head of the Fine Art Department at Reading University and a talented artist in her own right. Crispin Bonham-Carter is the familiar figure on our television screens who featured as Mr.Bingley in the BBC’s massively successful ‘Pride and Prejudice’ in 1995. The family connection with the liberalism remains strong too though. Mark Bonham-Carter’s daughter Jane was heavily responsible for Charles Kennedy’s well orchestrated campaign for leadership of the Liberal Democrats in 1999. Having previously worked for Paddy Ashdown she now produces for the BBC (another institution clearly important to the family) and sits on the board of liberal think-tank, The Centre for Reform.
Superficially, the Bonham-Carters simply represent 'Hampstead intellectualism', liberal thinking aloof from the restraints of class-based politics which so dominated the twentieth century. As a family they clearly contributed so much more than this though, to the arts as well as to liberalism, and they continue to play a role in this radical tradition.
Paul Evans
