Summary – A prominent Liberal politician, Montagu was only the third Jewish MP to enter the Cabinet, serving as Secretary of State for India at the height of the First World War. This article from the British Newspaper Archive from the Cambridge Independent Press of 26 Jan 1906 was published shortly after his election.
Mr E.S. MONTAGU
“Mr Edwin Samuel Montagu has been before the electors of West Cambs. as the Liberal candidate for nearly three years. He was adopted at a meeting in Cambridge as long ago as March 1903, and since then he has given ample proof that he had no intention, as he promised the members who gave him unanimous support at that meeting, of becoming “a sleeping or sleepy candidate”.
“Within a week of his adoption he had addressed five meetings of the constituency, and since then he has lived in Cambridge and he has been in and out of the villages so frequently, keeping himself in touch with the electors and the particular interests of the constituency, that no one in the constituency can say that he and his views are not well known.
“Mr Montagu is the second son of Sir Samuel Montagu, the well-known banker, who was the Member for the Whitechapel Division of Tower Hamlets from 1885-1900. He was born in 1879 and was educated at Clifton College, University College, London, and Trinity College, Cambridge, graduating in 1902. He early showed an aptitude for politics and in his College days, distinguished himself in the discussions of the miniature University Parliament known as the Union Society, of which he was President during the Michaelmas Term of 1903. He is also a past president of the Cambridge University Liberal Club, and a member of the Eighty Club Committee.
“About a year ago, Mr Montagu went out to Canada with Lord Lucas, who, as Mr Bron Herbert, was then Liberal Candidate for South Hunts. They made a tour of the country, their main object to investigate Canadian opinion upon Mr [Joseph] Chamberlain’s fiscal policy, and when they came home they published they obtained in a book, to which Lord Rosebury [soon to become Foreign Secretary] wrote a preface.”
And thus the article ends.
Outside of Cambridgeshire
His WikiP page is here, and it’s striking that he died aged only 45. Serving in a number of junior ministerial posts before becoming Secretary of State for India – one of the most important posts in the Cabinet in those days – shows that he clearly could have remained one of the most prominent politicians in British politics had he lived for longer. It’s interesting to think given his religious background what impact he could have had on international politics – especially in the 1930s.
Lost Cambridge 