James Headlam-Morley
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Sir James Wycliffe Headlam-Morley, CBE (24 December 1863 – 6 September 1929) was a British academic historian{{Cite web|date=2018-02-15|title=Historians and Policymaking: A New Chorus Singing an Old Ballad|url=https://warontherocks.com/2018/02/historians-policymaking-new-chorus-singing-old-ballad/|access-date=2021-06-11|website=War on the Rocks|language=en-US}} and classicist. He became a civil servant and government advisor on current foreign policy. He was known as James Wycliffe Headlam until 1918, when he changed his surname to Headlam-Morley by royal licence. He was knighted in 1929 for public service.
Family
He was the second son of Arthur William Headlam (1826–1908), vicar of Whorlton, County Durham,{{cite journal|doi=10.1080/09592299808406102 | volume=9 | title=James Headlam‐Morley: Creating international history | year=1998 | journal=Diplomacy & Statecraft | pages=266–283 | last1 = Sharp | first1 = Alan| issue=3 }} and was the younger brother of Arthur Cayley Headlam (1862–1947), Bishop of Gloucester.[http://www.rascal.ac.uk/collection/?ff=no&CollectionID=508&ff=no&results_per_page=10&browse_title=H Research and Special Collections Available Locally] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061013163724/http://www.rascal.ac.uk/collection/?ff=no&CollectionID=508&ff=no&results_per_page=10&browse_title=H |date=2006-10-13 }} at rascal.ac.uk
In 1893, he married Elisabeth Charlotta Henrietta Ernestina Sonntag (1866–1950), a German musician and composer who was also known as Else Headlam-Morley.[http://www.londonmet.ac.uk/genesis/search/$-search-results.cfm?CCODE=572 Profile], londonmet.ac.uk. Accessed 19 January 2023. The historian Agnes Headlam-Morley (1902–1986) was their daughter.
Education and career
He was educated at Eton, King's College, Cambridge, and in Germany where he studied with Treitschke and Hans Delbrück.
From 1894–1900 he was Professor of Greek and Ancient History at Queen's College, London.{{cite journal|doi=10.1080/09592299808406102 | volume=9 | title=James Headlam‐Morley: Creating international history | journal=Diplomacy & Statecraft | pages=266–283 | year=1998 | last1 = Sharp | first1 = Alan| issue=3 }}
An influential figure, he worked on propaganda in World War I. At the end of the war, he was appointed as a Foreign Office specialist on the British Empire Delegation to the Paris Peace Conference.{{Cite web |title=Historical Documents - Office of the Historian |url=https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1919Parisv03/d1 |access-date=2025-03-16 |website=history.state.gov}} He was involved in the drafting of the Versailles Treaty, especially regarding Danzig.D.B. Kaufman, "'A House of Cards Which Would Not Stand': James Headlam-Morley, the Role of Experts, and the Danzig Question at the Paris Peace Conference." Diplomacy & Statecraft 30.2 (2019): 228-252. He effectively sponsored Arnold J. Toynbee for appointment in 1924 to Chatham House. He also gathered materials on the diplomatic history of the origins of the war as an official production of the British government and contributed to it though the main editor was Harold Temperley. The historian Anna Cienciala attributes to Headlam and Sidney Edward Mezes, an academic and advisor to Woodrow Wilson and Executive Director of the Inquiry group, the 1919 proposal to make Danzig a free city.[http://www.conflicts.rem33.com/images/Poland/rebirth.htm THE REBIRTH OF POLAND] at www.conflicts.rem33.com
He wrote numerous historical articles for the Encyclopædia Britannica editions of 1902 and 1911, signing them "J.W.He."
Works
- On Election by Lot at Athens (1891);{{cite journal|author=Underhill, G. E.|title=Review of On Election by Lot at Athens by J. W. Headlam|journal=The English Historical Review|volume=7|issue=XXV|pages=122–123|date=January 1892|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Q5GHauw0DbEC&pg=PA122}} {{cite book|title=pbk reprint of 1933 2nd edition|year=2014|isbn=978-1-107-65865-3|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LZFxBAAAQBAJ|postscript=; revision by D. C. MacGregor|last1=Headlam |first1=James Wycliffe |last2=MacGregor |first2=D. C. }}
- Bismarck and the Foundation of the German Empire (1899) (available [https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12400 online])
- A Short History of Germany and Her Colonies (1914) with Walter Alison Phillips and Arthur William Holland
- The history of twelve days, July 24 to August 4, 1914 (1915)
- The Dead Lands of Europe (1917)
- The German Chancellor and the Outbreak of War (1917)
- The Issue (1917)
- The Peace Terms of the Allies (1917)
- The Starvation of Germany (1917)
- British Documents on the Origins of the War 1898–1914 Volume XI The Outbreak of War Foreign Documents June 28 – August 4, 1914 (1926) editor
- Studies in Diplomatic History (1930)
- A Memoir of the Paris Peace Conference 1919 (1972) edited by Agnes Headlam-Morley, Russell Bryant and Anna Cienciala
References
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External links
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- {{Gutenberg author |id=4345| name=James Wycliffe Headlam}}
- {{Internet Archive author |sname=James Wycliffe Headlam}}
- {{Librivox author |id=14870}}
- [https://archivesearch.lib.cam.ac.uk/repositories/9/resources/1612 The Papers of Sir James Headlam-Morley] held at Churchill Archives Centre
- [http://web.ku.edu/~eceurope/hist557/lect15.htm From lecture notes of Anna M. Cienciala] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121107053609/http://web.ku.edu/~eceurope/hist557/lect15.htm |date=7 November 2012 }}, University of Kansas, referring several times to Headlam in relation to post-World War I views of Europe
- [http://www.lituanus.org/1989/89_1_02.htm Online article] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220823080706/http://www.lituanus.org/1989/89_1_02.htm |date=23 August 2022 }} on the Molotov–Ribbentrop pact, mentioning Headlam's views in the 1920s
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Category:Alumni of King's College, Cambridge
Category:People from County Durham
Category:Commanders of the Order of the British Empire