The Marquess Curzon of Kedleston | |
|---|---|
 Lord Curzon as Viceroy of India | |
| 11th Viceroy and Governor-General of India | |
| In office 6 January 1899 – 18 November 1905 | |
| Monarchs | |
| Deputy | Lord Ampthill |
| Preceded by | The Earl of Elgin |
| Succeeded by | The Earl of Minto |
| Leader of the House of Lords | |
| In office 3 November 1924 – 20 March 1925 | |
| Monarch | George V |
| Prime Minister | Stanley Baldwin |
| Preceded by | The Viscount Haldane |
| Succeeded by | The Marquess of Salisbury |
| In office 10 December 1916 – 22 January 1924 | |
| Monarch | George V |
| Prime Minister |
|
| Preceded by | The Marquess of Crewe |
| Succeeded by | The Viscount Haldane |
| Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs | |
| In office 23 October 1919 – 22 January 1924 | |
| Monarch | George V |
| Prime Minister |
|
| Preceded by | Arthur Balfour |
| Succeeded by | Ramsay MacDonald |
| Lord President of the Council | |
| In office 3 November 1924 – 20 March 1925 | |
| Monarch | George V |
| Prime Minister | Stanley Baldwin |
| Preceded by | Lord Parmoor |
| Succeeded by | The Earl of Balfour |
| In office 10 December 1916 – 23 October 1919 | |
| Monarch | George V |
| Prime Minister | David Lloyd George |
| Preceded by | The Marquess of Crewe |
| Succeeded by | Arthur Balfour |
| President of the Air Board | |
| In office 15 May 1916 – 3 January 1917 | |
| Monarch | George V |
| Prime Minister |
|
| Preceded by | The Earl of Derby |
| Succeeded by | The Viscount Cowdray |
| Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs | |
| In office 20 June 1895 – 15 October 1898 | |
| Monarch | Victoria |
| Prime Minister | The Marquess of Salisbury |
| Preceded by | Sir Edward Grey |
| Succeeded by | St John Brodrick |
| Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for India | |
| In office 9 November 1891 – 11 August 1892 | |
| Monarch | Victoria |
| Prime Minister | The Marquess of Salisbury |
| Preceded by | Sir John Eldon Gorst |
| Succeeded by | George W. E. Russell |
| Member of the House of Lords | |
| as an Irish representative peer 21 January 1908 – 20 March 1925 | |
| Preceded by | Lord Kilmaine |
| Succeeded by | The Baroness Ravensdale (in barony) The Viscount Scarsdale (in viscountcy) No successor (as Irish representative peer) |
| Member of Parliament for Southport | |
| In office 27 July 1886 – 24 August 1898 | |
| Preceded by | George Augustus Pilkington |
| Succeeded by | Herbert Naylor-Leyland |
| Personal details | |
| Born | George Nathaniel Curzon 11 January 1859 Kedleston, Derbyshire, England |
| Died | 20 March 1925 (aged 66) London, England |
| Political party | Conservative |
| Spouses | |
| Children | |
| Parent |
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| Alma mater | Balliol College, Oxford |
George Nathaniel Curzon, 1st Marquess Curzon of Kedleston, KG, GCSI, GCIE, PC, FRS, FRGS, FBA (11 January 1859 – 20 March 1925), styled The Honourable between 1858 and 1898, then known as The Lord Curzon of Kedleston between 1898 and 1911, and The Earl Curzon of Kedleston between 1911 and 1921, was a prominent British statesman, Conservative politician and writer who served as Viceroy of India from 1899 to 1905.
Born in Derbyshire into an aristocratic family, Curzon was educated at Eton College and Balliol College, Oxford, before entering Parliament in 1886. In the following years he travelled extensively in Russia, Central Asia and the Far East, and published several books on the region in which he detailed his geopolitical outlook and underlined the perceived Russian threat to British control of India. In 1891, Curzon was named Under-Secretary of State for India, and in 1899 he was appointed Viceroy of India. During his tenure, he pursued a number of reforms of the British administration, attempted to address the British maltreatment of Indians, undertook the restoration of the Taj Mahal, and sent a British expedition to Tibet to counter Russian ambitions. He also presided over the 1905 Partition of Bengal. Curzon later came into conflict with Lord Kitchener, Commander-in-Chief, India, over issues of military organisation. Unable to secure the backing of the government in London, he resigned later that year and returned to England.
In 1907, Curzon became Chancellor of Oxford University, and the following year he was elected to the House of Lords. During the First World War, he served in H. H. Asquith's coalition cabinet as Lord Privy Seal, and from late 1916 he was Leader of the House of Lords and served in the war cabinet of Prime Minister David Lloyd George and the War Policy Committee. He was appointed Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs in October 1919 and lent his name to Britain's proposed Soviet-Polish boundary, the Curzon Line. He also oversaw the division of the British Mandate of Palestine and the creation of the Emirate of Transjordan, and was the chief Allied negotiator of the 1922 Treaty of Lausanne which defined the borders of modern Turkey. In 1921, he was created a marquess. On Bonar Law's retirement as Prime Minister in 1923, Curzon was a contender for the office but was passed over in favour of Stanley Baldwin. He remained as Foreign Secretary until 1924 when the Baldwin government fell, and died a year later at the age of 66.