Servants of Diplomacy: A Domestic History of the Victorian Foreign Office

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Servants of Diplomacy offers a bottom-up history of the 19th-century Foreign Office and in doing so, provides a ground-breaking study of modern British diplomacy. Whilst current literature focuses on the higher echelons of the Office, Keith Hamilton sheds a new light on the administrative and social history of Whitehall which have, until now, been largely ignored. Hamiltons examination of the roles and actions of the Foreign Offices domestic staff is exhaustive, with close attention paid to: the keepers of the office, keepers of the papers, the carriers of the papers and the efforts made to adapt to growing technological changes. Hamiltons exhaustive analysis also focuses on the reforms of 1905-06 and the Queens Messengers during wartime. Drawing extensively from Foreign Office and Treasury archives and private manuscript collections, this is essential reading for anyone with an interest of British diplomatic history.

Reviews

A charming tale of Victorian life, told from an unusual angle. While the leaders of the British empire met upstairs at the Foreign Office, below stairs were very different servants of the empire. Hamilton, with wit and an eye for telling detail, delicately dissects this hidden world. Wonderful history. * Erik Goldstein, Professor of International Relations & History, Boston University, USA. *
Writing crisply and with immense authority, Keith Hamilton reveals much that we did not know about downstairs at the Victorian Foreign Office and the extent of the aristocratic paternalism it enjoyed. It is an original, absorbing and, at times, entertaining book. * G. R. Berridge, Emeritus Professor of International Politics, University of Leicester, UK. *

Author Bio

Keith Hamilton was formerly an historian in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and has written extensively on British diplomacy.