William Peel, 1st Earl Peel

William Robert Wellesley Peel, 1st Earl Peel, GCSI, GBE, TD, PC, DL (7 January 1867 – 28 September 1937), 2nd Viscount Peel from 1912 to 1929, was a British politician who was a local councillor, a Member of Parliament and a member of the House of Lords. After an early career as a barrister and a journalist, he entered first local and then national politics. He rose to hold a number of ministerial positions but is probably best remembered for chairing the Peel Commission in 1936–1937, which recommended for the first time the partition of the British Mandate of Palestine into separate Jewish and Arab states.

The Right Honourable The Earl Peel GCSI GBE TD PC DL
Peel in 1910
Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal
In office 3 September 1931 – 5 November 1931
Monarch	George V
Prime Minister	Ramsay MacDonald
Preceded by	Tom Johnston
Succeeded by	The Viscount Snowden
Secretary of State for India
In office 18 October 1928 – 4 June 1929
Monarch	George V
Prime Minister	Stanley Baldwin
Preceded by	The Earl of Birkenhead
Succeeded by	William Wedgwood Benn
In office 19 March 1922 – 22 January 1924
Monarch	George V
Prime Minister	David Lloyd George Bonar Law Stanley Baldwin
Preceded by	Edwin Montagu
Succeeded by	The Lord Olivier
First Commissioner of Works
In office 10 November 1924 – 18 October 1928
Monarch	George V
Prime Minister	Stanley Baldwin
Preceded by	Fred Jowett
Succeeded by	The Marquess of Londonderry
Minister of Transport
In office 7 November 1921 – 12 April 1922
Monarch	George V
Prime Minister	David Lloyd George
Preceded by	Eric Geddes
Succeeded by	The Earl of Crawford
Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
In office 1 April 1921 – 19 March 1922
Monarch	George V
Prime Minister	David Lloyd George
Preceded by	The Earl of Crawford
Succeeded by	William Sutherland
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for War
In office 10 January 1919 – 1 April 1921
Monarch	George V
Prime Minister	David Lloyd George
Preceded by	Ian Macpherson
Succeeded by	Robert Sanders
Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of National Service
In office 15 April 1918 – 10 January 1919
Monarch	George V
Prime Minister	David Lloyd George
Preceded by	Cecil Beck
Succeeded by	Position abolished
Member of the House of Lords Lord Temporal
In office 24 October 1912 – 28 September 1937 as a hereditary peer
Preceded by	The 1st Viscount Peel
Succeeded by	The 2nd Earl Peel
Member of Parliament for Taunton
In office 23 February 1909 – 24 October 1912
Preceded by	Sir Edward Boyle
Succeeded by	Gilbert Wills
Member of Parliament for Manchester South
In office 29 May 1900 – 8 February 1906
Preceded by	John Campbell
Succeeded by	Arthur Haworth
Personal details
Born	(1867-01-07)7 January 1867 London
Died	28 September 1937(1937-09-28) (aged 70) East Meon, near Petersfield, Hampshire
Nationality	British
Political party	Liberal Unionist Conservative
Spouse	Hon. Eleanor Williamson
Children	Doris Arthur
Parent	Arthur Peel, 1st Viscount Peel (father)
Alma mater	Balliol College, Oxford

The grandson of a Conservative prime minister, he was unusual even for his period in the number of political parties for which he was elected. He began as a member of the Moderate Party on the London County Council and later became the leader of the renamed Municipal Reform Party; he was then elected as an MP for the Liberal Unionists and then for the Conservative Party before he inherited his seat in the Lords in 1912. He also served as a minister in governments led by Liberal, Conservative and Labour prime ministers.

His ministerial career began as Under-Secretary of State for War in 1919, and he entered the cabinet in 1922 as Secretary of State for India and held a number of other ministerial positions.

Early life and career

The eldest son of Arthur Peel, 1st Viscount Peel, and Adelaide Dugdale, William Peel was born in London in 1867. His father was the fifth and youngest son of Prime Minister Sir Robert Peel.

Peel was educated at Harrow and Balliol College, Oxford, where he was secretary of the Oxford Union.

In 1893, he was called to the bar at the Inner Temple and practised as a barrister before taking the position of special correspondent for the Daily Telegraph during the Greco-Turkish War of 1897.

Political career

In 1900, Peel was appointed a member of the Royal Commission that was formed to inquire into the operation of the Port of London. In February the same year, he began his political career when he was elected in a by-election to fill a vacant seat for Woolwich in the London County Council to which he was re-elected in the ordinary election the following year. He was a member of the Moderate pro-Conservative grouping on the council that became the Municipal Reform Party. He was leader of the party from 1908 to 1910 and chairman of the county council from 1914 to 1916.

Lord Peel at the entrance of the King David Hotel, 1936.

He began his parliamentary career when he was elected as Liberal Unionist MP for Manchester South at the 1900 Manchester South by-election. At the next general election in 1906, he stood unsuccessfully at Harrow. He returned to the Commons in 1909, when he was elected as Conservative MP for Taunton at a by-election. He inherited his father's viscountcy in 1912 and so moved to the House of Lords.

Peel was appointed a deputy lieutenant of Bedfordshire and lieutenant-colonel of the Bedfordshire Yeomanry in 1912 and, at the outbreak of the First World War moved to France with his regiment, but ill health made him return to Britain in 1915. In 1918, he received his first government post as Joint Parliamentary Secretary at the Department of National Service in the coalition government of David Lloyd George. In 1919, Peel became Under-Secretary of State for War and a member of the Privy Council. Two years later, he became Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for Transport.

He entered the cabinet in 1922 as Secretary of State for India, and, after the downfall of Lloyd George's coalition, continued to hold the post during the premierships of Andrew Bonar Law and Stanley Baldwin. The latter's government fell in January 1924, but after a brief spell in opposition, it was returned to power at the 1924 general election. Peel was appointed First Commissioner of Works in the Conservative administration formed by Baldwin. In 1928, Peel briefly returned to the India Office, but the Conservatives lost power by the 1929 general election.

In 1929, Peel was created Viscount Clanfield, of Clanfield in the County of Southampton, and Earl Peel in that year's Dissolution Honours. When a Conservative-dominated National Government was formed after the 1931 election, he became Lord Privy Seal but held that office for only two months and left government in November.

In 1932, he was appointed chairman of the Wheat Commission, and in 1934, he chaired the Royal Commission on the Common Law. In 1936–1937, he chaired the Peel Commission, which recommended for the first time the partition of the British Mandate of Palestine into separate Jewish and Arab states.

Family

Peel married in 1899 the Honourable Eleanor Williamson (1871–1949), daughter of James Williamson, 1st Baron Ashton. They had two children:

• Lady Doris Peel (1900–1983), who married in 1927 Colonel Stewart Blacker (1887–1964), and had four children. She was a Justice of the Peace for the County of London in 1939, and for Sussex in 1948.
• Arthur Peel, 2nd Earl Peel (1901–1969)

In 1929, Ashton died, and Peel succeeded him as chairman of James Williamson and Company. He was a director of Barclays Bank and of the Great Northern Railway.

Death

Lord Peel died at 70 in his home in East Meon, near Petersfield, Hampshire, in 1937 after a long illness. He was succeeded in his titles by his son, Arthur.

References

Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs

External links

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by the Earl Peel