About the Author:
Patrick Jackson was born in Yorkshire in 1929, and read modern history at University College, Oxford. He worked in British government service, mainly in the Department of Transport, until his retirement in 1989. Since then he has devoted himself to historical research and writing, specializing particularly in Victorian parliamentary politics. In 1994, he published The Last of the Whigs, a political biography of Lord Hartington, and in 1997 Education Act Forster, a political biography of W. E. Forster. He is married -- with two grown children -- and lives in London.

Sir William Harcourt was a major figure in the Liberal politics of late Victorian Britain. Supported, as private secretary and inseparable companion, by his son Lewis, Harcourt served in all four of Gladstone's governments. He was home secretary from 1880-1885, and chancellor of the Exchequer in 1886, and again from 1892-1895. When Gladstone retired in 1894 Harcourt, who had served as deputy leader in the House of Commons, expected to succeed him as prime minister, but the queen preferred the much younger Lord Rosebery and most of Harcourt's colleagues, alienated by an overbearing manner, were unwilling to press his claims. Harcourt continued to serve as chancellor of the Exchequer under Rosebery, and his 1894 budget contained a comprehensive new system of graduated death duties whereby for the first time land was taxed on the same basis as personal property. Illustrated.

The FDU Press has particular strengths in literary studies, world history and politics, biography, film, ethnic studies, sociology, the Civil War, art, religion, local history, and urban studies.