Stratford Canning

Lord Stratford de Redcliffe was for half a century one of the princes of our Diplomatic Service. He lived 94 years, served four sovereigns, was an experienced diplomat before Waterloo, was still in service ten years after the European upheavals of the middle 19th century, and still had 22 years left for the enjoyment of private leisure. He served his famous cousin George Canning, and in 1807 began his long connection with Constantinople.

 

At 24 he was busy countering the influence of Napoleon with the Turks. Single-handed, and on his own authority, he negotiated the treaty of Bukarest in 1812 between Russia and Turkey. He was home for a time and sat in the House of Commons, but he was recalled to his proper work at 51, when he was sent again to Constantinople to undertake the fixing of Greek frontiers.

 

Rightly or wrongly he had become so closely connected with Turkish policy that when he was nominated ambassador to Russia in 1833 the Tsar refused to receive him. Sent back to the Porte in 1842 he remained our ambassador without a break for the next 16 years.

His position was unequalled in diplomatic Europe. His status was semi-royal. He was the last of the ambassadors to act and speak independently, almost as a sovereign at a foreign court. His extraordinary influence was exercised for good; he induced the Sultan to effect internal reforms and to safeguard the right of Christians in Turkey.

Before leaving Turkey for good in 1858 he obtained a permit for the young Layard to excavate and to remove his finds, and among the results are the Assyrian sculptures in the British Museum. Canning's closing years were given to writing verse, a drama on Alfred, theology, and reminiscences. His mind was clear to the last.

 

He died in August 1880 and was buried here at Frant, and his statue is with those of two kinsmen in the Abbey, with an epitaph by Tennyson.

 

 

 

 

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