George Wyndham

George Wyndham, PC (29 August 1863 – 8 June 1913) was a British Conservative politician, statesman, man of letters, and one of The Souls.

Background and education Wyndham was the elder son of the Honourable Percy Wyndham, third son of George Wyndham, 1st Baron Leconfield, and he was a direct descendant of Sir John Wyndham. He was the brother of Guy Wyndham and Mary Constance Wyndham. His mother was Madeleine Campbell, sixth daughter of Major-General Sir Guy Campbell, 1st Baronet, and Pamela, through whom he was the great-grandson of the Irish Republican leader Lord Edward FitzGerald, whom Wyndham greatly resembled physically. He was educated at Eton College and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst. He joined the Coldstream Guards in March 1883, serving through the Suakin Expedition of 1885.

Political career Wyndham started his political career in 1887, when he became private secretary to Arthur Balfour. In 1889, he was elected unopposed to the House of Commons as Member of Parliament (MP) for Dover, and held the seat until his death.

Wyndham launched an Imperialist magazine called The Outlook in February 1898. This may have been supported financially by Cecil Rhodes, with whom he had a close relationship. Joseph Conrad, who was a contributor, described the publication: There is a new weekly coming. Its name The Outlook; its price three pence sterling, its attitude – literary; its policy – Imperialism, tempered by expediency; its mission – to make money for a Jew; its editor Percy Hurd (never heard of him) ... and sworn a member of the Privy Council on 11 August 1902.

Wyndham furthered the 1902 Land Conference and also successfully saw the significant Land Purchase (Ireland) Act 1903 into law.

He was thought to be associated with the devolution scheme to deal with the Home Rule question, co-ordinated with the Irish Reform Association and conceived by his permanent under-secretary Sir Antony MacDonnell (afterwards Baron) with the approval of the Lord Lieutenant William Ward, 2nd Earl of Dudley. He was elected a Member of the Worshipful Company of Musicians in January 1903.

Wyndham was the leader of the "die-hard" opponents in the House of Commons of the Parliament Bill that became the Parliament Act 1911.

Family Wyndham married in 1887 Sibell Mary, Countess Grosvenor, daughter of Richard Lumley, 9th Earl of Scarbrough,

Works North's Plutarch (1894; editor) The Poems of Shakespeare (1898; editor) The Ballad of Mr. Rook (1901) Ronsard & La Pleiade, with Selections From Their Poetry and Some Translations in the Original Metres (1906) Sir Walter Scott (1908) The Springs of Romance in the Literature of Europe (1910; address, University of Edinburgh, October 1910) Essays in Romantic Literature (1919; edited by Charles Whibley)