The Group was founded in February 1917 by people close to government and interested particularly in the shaping of reconstruction after the First World War. For the best part of twenty years, the Chairman was Thomas Jones (TJ), the first Deputy Secretary of the Cabinet Office. He had been originally recruited by Lloyd George to draw up the ‘manifesto’, which was used by Lloyd George to make his successful bid to replace Asquith as Prime Minister in late 1916. The Group’s name derives from the address of a private house in the centre of Westminster where it briefly first met.
The Group functioned by meeting once a week in ‘term’ time over a modest lunch to discuss some current topic, occasionally with a guest speaker. In the early days, members included politicians such as Arthur Greenwood, Philip Kerr (Lord Lothian), Walter Elliot and, later, Elwyn Jones; civil servants apart from TJ, like Vaughan Nash (Asquith’s private Secretary) and Wilfred Eady; academics like RH Tawney, GDH Cole and AE Zimmern; journalists such as Gerald Barry, Ivor Brown, Kingsley Martin, CH Rolph and the cartoonist David Low; and others of diverse background like J J Mallon, the long-serving Director of Toynbee Hall, Jack Catchpool, founder of the YHA, and John Hilton, broadcaster and early consumer champion.
Despite all the difficulties, the Group kept going during World War II. Although no records were kept of what was discussed, the minute books have pasted copies of the cartoons of David Low from which it can be inferred how closely the Group followed the twists and turns of the war.
In the 1950s, the Group became less informal and the membership grew. Under the long leadership of John Pimlott (Herbert Morrison’s private secretary who had been, like Tawney, connected with Toynbee Hall) and, later, Arthur Peterson (Permanent Under Secretary, Home Office), the Group developed programmes under Chatham House rules of weekly speakers where a talk would be followed by discussion. At the Group’s 50thanniversary dinner, the speaker was TJ’s daughter, Eirene White, then Minister of State at the Welsh Office.
After moving between a number of temporary venues, the Group has for some years met in the Athenaeum. Members do not have to be members of the Athenaeum and most, indeed, are not. Current pressures on working lives and lunchtimes mean that nowadays the membership is predominantly retired. The Group, however, retains above all the interest in public affairs that brought its members together in the first place.
The Group’s archives are held in the London School of Economics Library: Archives and Special Collections.
Notes with thanks to Dr Robert Morris, CVO
