The Betrayal of Ramsay MacDonald
From 1931 it looked as though Britain’s first Labour prime minister would be its last. Is it time to reappraise the political reputation of Ramsay MacDonald?
On November 9th, 1937 a radio message from the Reina del Pacifico sailing in Caribbean waters announced the death, from a heart attack, of Ramsay MacDonald, prime minister of Britain's first Labour government in 1924 and again in 1929-31 and, from 1931-35, leader of the National government. Recently retired, he was on a voyage with his daughter Sheila Lochhead to South America, in his words 'to seek that most elusive of all forms of happiness - rest'. According to a fellow passenger, the Bishop of Nassau, the seventy one-year-old MacDonald was 'obviously a tired man'. His deteriorating health over several years, specifically failing powers of memory, concentration and communication, suggests he was possibly suffering from the onset of dementia.
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