John Russel

Background

John Russell was born in London, England, on the 18th of August 1792; the third son of the 6th duke of Bedford, by Georgiana Elizabeth Byng, second daughter of the 4th Viscount Torrington.

Education

After travelling in Scotland and in Spain, he studied from the autumn of 1809 to 1812 at the university of Edinburgh, then the academic centre of Liberalism, and dwelt in the house of Professor John Playfair.

Career

On leaving the university of Edinburgh, he travelled in Portugal and Spain, but on the 4th of May 1813 he was returned for the ducal borough of Tavistock and thereupon came back to England.

In foreign politics Lord John Russell's oratorical talents were especially shown in his struggles to prevent the union of Norway and Sweden.

When failure attended all his efforts he resigned his seat for Tavistock in March 1817, and meditated permanent withdrawal from public life, but was dissuaded from this step by the argupients of his friends, and especially by a poetic appeal from his friend Tom Moore.

In domestic questions he cast in his lot with those who opposed the repressive measures of 1817, and protested that the causes of the discontent at home should be removed by remedial legislation.

During the first parliament (1820 - 26) of George IV he sat for the county of Huntingdon, and secured in 1821 the disfranchisement of Grampound, but the seats were not transferred to the constituency which he desired.

Lord John Russell paid the penalty for his advocacy of Catholic emancipation with the loss in 1826 of his seat for Huntingdon county, but he found a shelter in the Irish borough of Bandon Bridge.

This exclusion was the more remarkable in that he was chosen (1st of March 1831) to explain the provisions of the Reform Bill, to which the cabinet had given its formal sanction.

The Whig ministry was soon defeated, but an appeal to the country increased the number of their adherents, and Lord John Russell was returned by the freeholders of Devon.

After the passing of the Reform Bill he sat for the S. division of Devon, and continued to retain the place of paymaster-general in the ministries of Lord Grey and Lord Melbourne.

The former of these cabinets was broken up by the withdrawal of Mr Stanley, afterwards Lord Derby.

Lord John Russell had visited Ireland in the autumn of 1833 and had come back with a keen conviction of the necessity for readjusting the revenues of the Irish church.

To these views he gave expression in a debate on the Irish Tithe Bill (May 1834), whereupon Stanley, with the remark that "Johnny has upset the coach, " resigned his place.

The Whig ministry succeeded in passing a Municipal Reform Bill (7th of September 1835), and a settlement of the tithe question in England and Ireland (1836).

In May 1839, on an adverse motion concerning the administration of Jamaica, the ministry was left with a majority of five only, and promptly resigned.

Their prospects brightened when Sir John Yarde Buller's motion of "no confidence" at the opening of the Session of 1840 was defeated by twenty-one, but a similar vote was some months later carried by a majority of one, whereupon the Whig leader announced a dissolution of parliament (June 1841).

On Sir Robert Peel's resignation (1846) the task of forming an administration was entrusted to Lord John Russell, and he remained at the head of affairs from Tuly 1846 to Feb. 1852, but his tenure of office was not marked by any great legislative enactments.

His celebrated Durham letter (4th of Nov. 1850) on the threatened assumption of ecclesiastical titles by the Roman Catholic bishops weakened the attachment of the "Peelites" and alienated his Irish supporters.

The impotence of their opponents, rather than the strength of their friends, kept the Whig ministry in power, and, although beaten by a majority of nearly two to one on Mr Locke King's County Franchise Bill in February 1851, it could not divest itself of office.

In 1854 he brought in a Reform Bill, but in consequence of the war with Russia the bill was allowed to drop.

His popularity was diminished by this failure, and although he resigned in January 1855, on Mr Roebuck's motion for an inquiry into the conduct of the war in the Crimea, he did not regain his old position in the country.

He was the chief instrument in defeating Lord Palmerston in 1857.

He led the attack on the Tory Reform Bill of 1859.

A reconciliation was then effected between the rival Whig leaders, and Lord John Russell consented to become foreign secretary in Lord Palmerston's ministry (1860) and to accept an earldom (July 1861).

During the American War Earl Russell's sympathies with the North restrained his country from taking sides in the contest, and he warmly sympathized with the efforts for the unification of Italy, but he was not equally successful in preventing the spoliation of Denmark.

Works

More photos

• book

  • The Nun Of Arrouca by J. Russell.....

    (This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)

  • National Education. Speech Delivered In The House Of Commons, Apr. 4, 1853

    (This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)

  • A Letter To ... Lord Holland, On Foreign Politics

    ( This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923....)

  • Letter To The Electors Of Stroud, On The Principles Of The Reform Act...

    (This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)

  • Speech ... In The House Of Commons, On December 14th, 1819, On Moving Resolutions Relative To Corrupt Boroughs. With Extracts From The Evidence On The Grampound Bribery Indictments

    (This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)

Connections

Earl Russell was twice married-first in 1835, to Adelaide, daughter of Mr Thomas Lister, and widow of Thomas, second Lord Ribblesdale, and secondly, in 1841, to Lady Frances Ann Maria, daughter of Gilbert, second earl of Minto.

By the former he had two daughters, by the latter three sons and one daughter.

His eldest son, Lord Amberley, who married a daughter of the second Baron Stanley of Alderley, predeceased him on the 9th of January 1876, and their eldest son (b. 1865) succeeded as second Earl Russell.

Mother:

Georgiana Elizabeth Byng

1st wife:

Adelaide Lister

2nd wife:

Frances Ann Maria

Son:

Lord Amberley

References

• John Russell, First Earl of Bedford (Royal Historical Society Studies in History)