THE famous circle of enthusiasts, reformers, brilliant eccentrics-Sha\y the Webbs, Wells-whose ideas and unconventional attitudes fashioned our modern world by Norman C&Jeanne MacKenzie AUTHORS OF H.G. Wells: A Biography PRAISE FOR Not quite a political party, not quite a pressure group, not quite a debating society, the Fabians could only have happened in Britain....In a thoroughly admirable study the MacKenzies have captured the vitality of the early years. Since much of this is anecdotal, it is immensely fun to read. Most im¬ portant, they have pinpointed (with¬ out belaboring) all the internal para¬ doxes of F abianism. —The Kirkus Reviews H. G. Wells, George Bernard Shaw, Sidney and Beatrice Webb, Bertrand Russell, part of the outstandingly talented and paradoxical group that led the way to socialist Britain, are brought into brilliant human focus in this marvelously detailed and anecdote-filled por¬ trait of the original members of the Fabian Society—with a fresh assessment of their contributions to social thought. “The first Fabians,” said Shaw, were “missionaries among the savages,” who laid the ground¬ work for the Labour Party, and whose mis¬ sionary zeal and passionate enthusiasms carried them from obscurity to fame. This voluble and volatile band of middle-class in¬ tellectuals grew up in a period of liberating ideas and changing morals, influenced by (continued on back flap) c A / c~ 335*1 MacKenzie* Norman Ian* Ml99f The Fabians / Norman and Jeanne MacKenzie* - New York : Simon and Schuster, cl977* — 446 p** [8] leaves of plates : ill* - ; 24 cm* Includes bibliographical references and index* ISBN 0—671—22347—X : $11.95 1* Fabian Society, London* I* Title. POCK CARD 770620 OSf 1201167 j 76-41350 — SF 335/*14 By the same authors H. G. WELLS The authors wish to thank the following sources for permission to re¬ produce the photographs that appear between pages 224-225: R. Walston Chubb, photograph 2; Pease family papers, photographs 4, 5; Olivier family papers, photograph 7; Radio Times Hulton Picture Library, photographs 10, n, 12, 16, 19, 21, 25; The Mansell Collection, photographs 17, 18, 22, 24; Lon¬ don School of Economics, photographs 26, 27-A, 27-B, 29; Longmans Pub¬ lishers, photograph 13. SAN FRANCISCO PUBLIC LIBRARY COPYRIGHT © 1977 BY NORMAN AND JEANNE MACKENZIE ALL RIGHTS RESERVED INCLUDING THE RIGHT OF REPRODUCTION IN WHOLE OR IN PART IN ANY FORM PUBLISHED BY SIMON AND SCHUSTER A GULF+WESTERN COMPANY ROCKEFELLER CENTER, 630 FIFTH AVENUE NEW YORK, NEW YORK 10020 DESIGNED BY ELIZABETH WOLL MANUFACTURED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 123456789 10 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING IN PUBLICATION DATA MACKENZIE, NORMAN IAN. THE FABIANS. INCLUDES BIBLIOGRAPHICAL REFERENCES AND INDEX I. FABIAN SOCIETY, LONDON. I. MACKENZIE, JEANNE DAISY, 1922- JOINT AUTHOR. II. TITLE. HX11.F5M33 335'.14 7<5~4i35° ISBN O-67I-22347-X ACKNO WLEDGMENT Anyone who writes on the early Fabians owes a great debt to Dame Margaret Cole, who has not only played a significant part in the Society throughout her long life but has also contributed much in her writings to knowledge of the Fabians and of Sidney and Beatrice Webb in particular. We were greatly helped by surviving members of the families of the first Fabians. Mr. and Mrs. Nicholas Pease, Lady Flelen Pease and Dr. Sebastian Pease all provided ma¬ terials and personal memories of Edward Pease and his contemporaries, es¬ pecially the Fabian coterie settled around Limpsfield. Mrs. Paul Bland helped with information about Hubert Bland and Edith Nesbit. Mr. R. Walston Chubb did much to increase our knowledge of his father, Percival Chubb, and his associates in founding the Society. Mrs. Olivier Bell, Sir John and Lady Nicholson, Dr. Angela Harris and Dr. Benedict Richards made Olivier family papers available to us. The late Miss May Wallas agreed that we might see and quote from her father’s papers. We appreciate the help given to our enquiries about the involvement of early Fabians in the Society for Psychical Research by Mr. Mostyn Gilbert and Mr. J. Fraser Nicol. Dr. Peter Weiler and Professor Willard Wolfe were kind enough to let us see forthcoming publications in manuscript, Professor Stanley Pierson made most useful suggestions about the location of docu¬ ments, and Professor Royden Harrison drew our attention to other sources. Miss Doris Ker gave us valuable leads on the early life of Hubert Bland. Mr. T. A. Critchley and Mr. C. H. Rolph directed us to Home Office records on the unemployed disturbances of the Eighties. We particularly thank Mr. George Spater and Professor George Feaver, who read early drafts of this book and made many helpful comments. We are grateful to the library staff at the University of Sussex, who helped in many ways, and to the other libraries which answered enquiries, 6 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS provided materials and gave us facilities for research. At the British Library of Political and Economic Science Mr. Geoffrey Allen, Mr. David Bovey and Miss Angela Raspin were unfailingly helpful. We also thank the staff of the British Museum, the Bodleian, the National Library of Scotland, Sheffield University Library, Sheffield Reference Library, the Yale University Library, the Library of Newnham College, Cambridge, the Library of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, the Woolwich Public Library, the Society for Psychical Research and the Fabian Society. We have a special debt to Nuffield College, Oxford, whose library contains the Fabian Papers, and to the University of Illinois, which permitted us to use the Wells Archive there. We thank all those copyright holders who granted permission to quote published and unpublished material. The British Library of Political and Eco¬ nomic Science gave permission to quote from the Passfield Papers; the So¬ ciety of Authors acted on behalf of the estate of George Bernard Shaw; and the trustees of the will of Mrs. Bernard Shaw allowed us to quote from her letters. Mr. Nicholas Pease and Mr. R. Walston Chubb released letters writ¬ ten by their respective fathers. Professor G. P. Wells, on behalf of the estate of H. G. Wells, permitted the use of copyright material from the Wells Archive. There are some individuals to whom we are much indebted. Mr. Ronald Blythe generously shared with us his own research on the early Fabians, and Mr. Tony Godwin encouraged us to undertake the writing of this book. Finally, we thank Mrs. Margaret Ralph, Mrs. Audrey Hunt and Mrs. Netta Burns, who shared the task of typing the manuscript. In affectionate memory of TONY GODWIN CONTENTS PART ONE ARDENT DISCIPLES 1. The Nicest Set of People 15 2. The Downstart 30 3. Bohemians 45 4. Acquaintances in Trouble 56 5. England, Arise! 73 6. Stump and Inkpot 90 7. Angels on Our Side 104 PART TWO PRIDE AND POLITICS 8. Little Busy Bee 119 9. A Year of Love 135 10. Exit Beatrice Potter 148 11. The Quintessence of Shaw 166 PART THREE PROPHETS AND PERMEATORS 12. Enthusiasts 09 13. Postulate, Permeate, Perorate 191 10 CONTENTS 14. Professionals 207 15. New Alliances 225 16. The Irish Lady 237 PART FOUR THE CIVILIZING MISSION 17. Fresh Starts 255 18. Joe’s War 267 19. Men and Supermen 279 20. Wirepullers 296 PART FIVE JUDGMENT DAYS 21. Modern Utopians 317 22. New Worlds for Old 328 23. Luxurious Perversity 353 24. Heartbreak House 375 Epilogue 396 References 413 Index 429 They saw “no divine part of Christianity,” but divinified humanity, or humanised religion, and taught that man was perfectible, but childhood —Lord Acton: Letter to Richard Simpson, December 8, 1861 <•<? PART ONE ARDENT DISCIPLES 1 Si! THE NICEST SET OF PEOPLE On the evening of 24 October 1883 Edward Pease invited fifteen people to his comfortable lodgings at 17 Osnaburgh Street, London, close by Regent’s Park, to discuss the formation of a new society. Most of the group were, like Pease, young provincials adrift in the capital. He him¬ self was twenty-six and had been working for three years in a stock¬ broker’s office. His guests included a couple of junior clerks in the civil service, a medical student, an architect, some aspiring journalists and half a dozen ladies of advanced opinions. Some of them he knew already, acquaintances picked up in London’s bohemia; the rest had been sug¬ gested by friends as possible sympathizers. None of them had any clear idea about the purpose of the new society, but there was vague agree¬ ment that their lives were unsatisfying and that they needed some com¬ mon moral purpose. Pease came to London at a time when the stable Victorian order was breaking up. Britain’s long industrial supremacy was over and the coun¬ try was beset by economic troubles.1 Competition from Germany and the United States was provoking uncertainty and discontent; the trade slump which started in 1879 made the problem of “unemployment” so acute in the big cities that the word came into general use for the first time. In the countryside, where a run of wet summers and imports of 16 ARDENT DISCIPLES cheap grain from the American prairies had thrown agriculture into a deep depression, things were even worse. Gladstone’s Liberal govern¬ ment, swept into office in 1880 on a radical tide, had failed to introduce any significant reforms. Elected as a party of peace, it had become em¬ broiled in military adventures in Afghanistan, Egypt and South Africa. And Ireland was in an uproar under a police terror to keep the nationalist movement under control. These social stresses were accompanied by severe psychological strains. The new sciences, especially Darwin’s evolutionary doctrine, had undermined the Evangelical faith which energized the Victorian middle classes.