Person:Edward Fairfield (1)

"In 1895...Charles' brother Edward Fairfield, then Assistant Undersecretary at the Colonial Office, found himself cast as the victim in another miscarriage of justice. The Jameson Raid, as it was known, was supported by the Colonial Secretary, Joseph Chamberlain. Volunteers, supporting a rebellion of predominantly British settlers who hoped to create a united South Africa, led by Sir Leander Starr Jameson, attempted to raid the Boer colony of the Transvaal. The foray was opposed by Edward, who was convinced that it would replace the anti-African Boer government with something still more dangerous. His position was in direct opposition to that of his superior, Chamberlain. In July, Edward Fairfield seemed to be vindicated when the raiders, who had, after all, launched an attack on a friendly state without any declaration of war, were put on trial in England and convicted. Four were condemned to death, although not actually killed, others were sent to prison. But Edward, who had so vehemently argued against the action, found himself a scapegoat for Chamberlain, and was charged with sending approval for the raid to go ahead. Broken by the stress and the public shame, Edward died in 1897, still waiting for the hearing that might have cleared his name.

"Space can here be spared only for that charming, popular, human, slightly flippant, slightly dissipated personality Edward Fairfield, of whom Sir Harry Johnston has left an engaging portrait (thinly disguised) in his novel The Gay-Dombeys. Fairfield began his official career in the West Indian department under Taylor, who admired his abilities.

The result was that life others of his generation he was over-driven, collapsed under the strain of the preliminaries to the War and died in the spring of 1897. Fairfield was known to be a Radical who believed in the policy toward South Africa represented by the Pretoria Convention of 1881. He was regarded as a strong opponent of Rhodes..."

References also cited on pages 358-9 and 732.

"Liberalism was out of fashion in the 1890s, and the dying Gladstone was distressed to see politicians of every shade subscribing to the imperial heresy: but there had always been voices of restraint of modesty in England, men who pleaded for gentler values, or plainer ambitions, or who believed in the true equality of all peoples, or wondered if the British Empire really was constituted by divine appointment. Even in 1897 there were dissentients - men like Edward Fairfield of the Colonial Office, who was said to 'look down upon the British Empire as a profound mistake', or the poet Wilfrit Blunt, who fought the Empire vehemently on every front..."

"Rhodes' self-confidence was not in fact misplaced, for the British parliamentary inquiry was to be a travesty of parliamentary procedure, carefully staged. Chamberlain saw to it that Sir Hurcules Robinson was unable to leave his duties in South Africa to give evidence, by keeping his replacement, Sir Alfred Milner, in England. It was arranged that Robinson's imperial secretary, Graham Bower, and the Colonial Office official Edward Fairfield (who died before he could do this duty) would shoulder the blame for official knowledge of the conspiracy, and deny any involvement by Robinson or Chamberlain."