Sir Arthur Wynne Morgan Bryant, CH, CBE (18 February 1899 - 22 January 1985), was a widely popular British historian and columnist for the Illustrated London News. His numerous books included studies of Samuel Pepys, more general accounts of English eighteenth- and nineteenth-century history, and a life of George V. Although his reputation has declined somewhat since his death, and his markedly right-wing views (particularly during the 1930s) have made him the subject of ad hominem attacks by Andrew Roberts, he continues to be read (if less frequently now than during his lifetime) and to be the subject of detailed historical studies.
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Arthur Bryant was the son of Sir Francis Morgan Bryant, who was at the time the chief clerk to the Prince of Wales, and his wife May. His father would later hold a number of offices in the royal secretariat, eventually becoming registrar of the Royal Victorian Order. Arthur grew up in a house bordering on the Buckingham Palace gardens near the Royal Mews. There he developed a feel for the trappings of traditional British protocol and a strong attachment to the history of England.[1]
He attended school at Pelham House, Sandgate, and Harrow School. He expected to join the British Army, but in 1916 won a scholarship to Pembroke College, Cambridge. Despite that, he went on to instead join the Royal Flying Corps in 1917 as a pilot officer.[1] While there, he served in the first squadron to drop bombs on the cities of the Rhineland in World War I. He was also the for a time the only British subject formally attached to an American pilot unit, a unit which had been sent overseas for training.[2]
In 1919 he enrolled at Queen's College, Oxford and studied modern history, obtaining distinction in the honours courses offered to ex-servicemen in 1920.[1]
He started work at a school operated by the London County Council, where he developed a strong sense of social justice and became convinced that education would be an effective way of uniting the people. It was this conviction of his which later led him to become a historian. Being tall, dark, and attractive made him very popular at the debutante balls he regularly attended, where he often persuaded his dancing partners to help him teach some of the less fortunate children at a children's library he had established in Charles Dickens's old house in Somers Town, London.[1][2]
He became a barrister at the Inner Temple in 1923, but left it later that year[1] to take the position as the headmaster of the Cambridge School of Arts, Crafts, and Technology, becoming in the process the youngest headmaster in England. He proved remarkably successful in gathering students to the school, raising the student enrollment from three hundred to two thousand in his three years there.[2] The following year he married Sylvia Mary Shakerley, daughter of Walter Geoffrey Shakerley, the third Baronet Shakerley, and the following year became a lecturer in history for the Oxford University delegacy for extramural studies, a position he would retain until 1936. His marriage would not last as long, and was dissolved in 1930. He also served as an advisor at the Bonar Law College at Ashridge. In 1929, he published his first book, The Spirit of Conservatism, with the students of the school in mind.[1]
In 1929, after having cataloged the extensive library of the Shakerley family, he was asked by a friend in the publishing business to produce a new biography of Charles II of England. Frank W. Notestein, then a professor at Yale University, suggested to him that he begin the work in medias res with Charles's escape following the Battle of Worcester, incorporating details of the subject's earlier life into the narrative thereafter. Based on this dramatic opening of the book, the Book Society chose it as their October, 1931, selection, and the book became a bestseller. Bryant's success with this volume convinced him that he could make his living as an author, and he turned his attention to that field for the remainder of his life. The book has been described as being both very readable and a serious, reputable scholarly work.[1] At that time, he also regularly began producing pageants. These included the Cambridge, Oxford, and Hyde Park pageants, and the Naval Night Pageant in Greenwich, which was attended by the King, Queen, Prince of Wales, British Cabinet, and members of the World Economic Conference. For the quality of his work in this field, he was acclaimed "the English Reinhardt".[2]
He helped found the National Book Association, and its subsidiary, the Right Book Club, which was created as an alternative to the Left Book Club. The new organization was not outstanding successful, however, although it did publish several of his following books.
His next book was a three volume biography of Samuel Pepys, completed in 1938 and regarded as "one of the great historical biographies in the language" by John Kenyon.[1]
He also was a frequent contributor to several leading London papers and magazines, and wrote radio broadcasts on several subjects relating to his historical interests, as well as radio plays for the BBC. A collection of his scripts for these broadcasts was published in his book The National Character.[1]
Bryant made great use of his profession's advantage of allowing him to travel widely. His travels included Spain, Portugal, Germany, Italy, and the West Indies, and he was in France at the outbreak of World War II. He also married again, in 1941, to Anne Elaine Brooke, daughter of Bertram Willes Dayrell Brooke, one of the White Rajahs of Sarawak. His books during this decade dealt less prominently with the 17th century, and included a collection of Neville Chamberlain's speeches.[2]
His works during this period were received well for their style and readability, although they also tended to be less well-researched, which has caused them to be questioned by younger historians. Several of his works published in this period, including English Saga (1940), The Years of Endurance 1793-1802 (1942), and Years of Victory, 1802-1812, drew some notable criticism, particularly for the comparisons between Napoleon and Hitler which tended to be less than convincing. The shortcomings of these works, possibly combined with their unusual popularity, helped ensure that he never received the highest academic honours.[1]
He produced one major work in the decade, a two-volume collection of Alan Brooke, 1st Viscount Alanbrooke's diaries with additional commentary, The Turn of the Tide (1957) and The Triumph in the West (1959). These books created substantial controversy, given the criticism that Winston Churchill (who, when they appeared, was at the height of his popularity) received in them. Nevertheless they are still considered essential reading for anyone who wishes to understand British military history during the war.[1]
In the late 1970s, Bryant became friends with Diana Mosley, the notorious wife of British Union of Fascists leader Sir Oswald Mosley.
The books he wrote during the later years of his life included several volumes of broad outlines of the history of England. They include Set in a Silver Sea (1984), Freedom's Own Island (1986, edited posthumously by John Kenyon, and a third volume.[1]
He remained popular with a large readership, being the guest-of-honour at the Conservative Monday Club's 1966 annual dinner, his speech being on the subject of "The Preservation of our National Character". The dinner, at the Savoy Hotel, was sold out.
During the 1960s Bryant was knighted and made a Companion of Honour. J. H. Plumb (The Making of an Historian I p. 276) wrote that "both of his public honours, his Knighthood and his C.H., were given to him by Harold Wilson, whose favourite historian he had long been."
His marriage to Anne dissolved in 1976. In 1980, he announced his engagement to (Frances) Laura Canfield, the widow of John Spencer-Churchill, 10th Duke of Marlborough. The wedding did not take place before Bryant died in Salisbury in January 1985.[1] He is buried in Salisbury Cathedral.
His total output of work was remarkable. He wrote over forty books overall, which collectively sold somewhere over two million copies in total, most of the books published by William Collins, Sons and Co. Ltd.[1] Also, in collaboration with W. P. Lipscomb, he wrote a dramatization of the life of Pepys which ran for one hundred and fifty performances in London. In addition he was a frequent lecturer. He delivered addresses at many of the leading cities and schools in Great Britain, as well as in the United States and fourteen other European countries. These lectures included the 1935 Alfred Watson lectures sponsored by the Sulgrave Manor Trust. These lectures, on American history, literature, and biography, were later collected into the book The American Ideal.[2]
In 1936, Bryant was hired by the Illustrated London News to take over the "Our Note Book" section which had previously been written by G. K. Chesterton, whom he greatly respected (he paid tribute to Chesterton in an introduction he wrote to Chesterton's posthumously-published essay collection The Glass Walking-Stick). He continued writing his Illustrated London News column until his death, which occurred almost half a century after Chesterton's. Overall, Bryant produced about 2.7 million words for that magazine.[1]
It has been suggested by some that Bryant's work on Samuel Pepys gave insufficient credit to the scholarly work of Joseph Robson Tanner (1860-1931), upon which Andrew Roberts claims (in Eminent Churchillians) they were largely based.
J. H. Plumb gives this account of how G. M. Trevelyan passed Tanner's notes to Bryant:
Andrew Roberts, indicated that Bryant remained in contact with the Nazis even after the outbreak of World War II. The claims go on to say that although these were discovered by the British government, Bryant was not prosecuted. Roberts claims [4] that Bryant's production of several patriotic books at this time was effectively a smokescreen. Roberts alleged that Bryant had close contacts with Nazi Germany, more than would be indicated by his sympathetic view of Hitler as revealed in his books.
J. H. Plumb, one of Bryant's detractors, wrote (The Making of an Historian I p. 276):
Plumb's verdict is that Bryant killed off 'patrician history':
Plumb cites Trevelyan's possible heirs as Wedgwood and A. L. Rowse.
Another detractor is the British historian Andrew Roberts, who gave this, his personal verdict:
Roberts's polemical essay, prompted by the opening of archive material on Bryant, has been followed by a full academic study by Julia Stapleton. Bryant's first biographer was Pamela Street, a neighbour in Salisbury and historical collaborator, and daughter of the farmer-author A. G. Street.
  | 'A Crisis of Conservative Thought: The Hopes and Fears of Arthur Bryant', by Jeremy Black - The Social Affairs Unit - Web Review: A Crisis of Conservative Thought: The Hopes and Fears of Arthur Bryant |
| | Julia Stapleton, Durham University - School of Government & International Affairs : Staff Profiles - Durham University |
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