Chamberlain family

Right Honourable Joseph Chamberlain, (1836-1914) statesman: Educated at University College School; member of screw-manufacturing firm in Birmingham, 1854-1874; interested in social reform; chairman of National Education League of Birmingham, 1870; mayor of Birmingham 1873-1875; became president of the Board of Trade and entered the second Gladstone cabinet, 1880; M.P. West Birmingham, 1885; president of Local Government Board in third Gladstone cabinet, February-March 1886, resigning on introduction of the home rule bill which he opposed; secretary of state for colonies in third Salisbury cabinet, 1895-1903; chancellor of the University of Birmingham, 1901; retired from public life in 1906.

Mary Chamberlain: (1864-1957); ne Endicott; then Chamberlain. Nationality: American. 3rd wife of Right Honourable Joseph Chamberlain, m. 1888; 2nd wife of Rev. William Hartley Carnegie, m. 1916; step-mother of the Right Honourable Sir Austen Chamberlain and Right Honourable Neville Chamberlain, biography: Diana Whitehall Laing, Mistress of Herself, Barre Publishers, Massachusetts, 1965.

Right Honourable Sir Joseph Austen Chamberlain, 1863-1937 statesman: Son of Joseph Chamberlain and half-brother of Neville; educated at Rugby and Trinity College Cambridge; liberal unionist MP, East Worcestershire, 1892-1914; West Birmingham, 1914-1937; civil lord of Admiralty; 1895-1900; financial secretary to Treasury, 1900-1902; postmaster general, 1902-1903; chancellor of the Exchequer, 1903-1905; secretary of state for India, 1915-1917; member of war cabinet, April 1918; chancellor of the Exchequer, 1919-1921; conservative leader, 1921; dissatisfaction with his support of Lloyd George culminated in Carlton Club meeting (19 October 1922) which brought coalition and his leadership to an end; foreign secretary, 1924-1929; Knight of the Garter and Nobel Peace Prize, 1925. Publications: Notes on the Families of Chamberlain and Harben, 1915; Down the Years, 1935; Politics from the Inside, 1936

Right Honourable Arthur Neville Chamberlain, 1869-1940: Son of the Right Honourable Joseph and Florence [nee Kenrick] Chamberlain, married Anne Vere Cole in 1911; half brother of the Right Honourable Sir Austen Chamberlain; educated at Rugby and Mason College, Birmingham; unsuccessfully attempted to grow sisal on his father's estate in the Bahamas, 1890-1897. In 1911 he was elected to Birmingham City Council and became Lord Mayor of Birmingham in 1915; established the only municipal savings bank, 1916; was appointed director-general of National Service by Lloyd George in 1916 and resigned, 1917. From 1918-1940 he was Conservative MP for a Birmingham division; while in opposition (1920-1931) reorganised Conservative Central Office; became postmaster general, 1922; Chancellor of the Exchequer, 1931-1937 and was Prime Minister, 1937-1940.

Reference: The Concise Dictionary of National Biography, 1901-1950 (Oxford, 1967).

From the guide to the The Chamberlain Family Collection, 1880-1950, (University of Birmingham Information Services, Special Collections Department)