Foreign News: Derby Sale

The strong tide of super-taxation in the British Isles has long been breaking up the great estates and driving limpet peers to incorporate them selves. Last week the Earl of Derby (Darbi) sold large property holdings in Liverpool and nearby Bootle and in Kirkdale and Walton to one Philip E. Hill, London financier, for about $8,500,000. The Earl, however, still retains his famed country seat at Knowlsey, also nearby.

This sale—the largest in England for years—follows those of his holdings in Whitfield and Colne (1923) and of the whole town of Bury (1925), which fetched about $4,860,000.

The property in Liverpool, Bootle, Kirkdale and Walton consisted of free hold and ground rents on 20,000 houses, Lord Derby retaining all his rights as lord of the various manors. These rights have endured ever since the creation of the earldom in 1485.

It has been said of Edward George Villiers Stanley, 62, present and 17th Earl of Derby, that he could no more do a mean action than stoop to flatter a fool. In that apothegm is the key to the understanding of his character. A big, burly, slightly flabby man, he looks for all the world like an overdressed butcher or a well-to-do farmer, an oversized mustache accentuating his incongruous appearance. His voice is loud, deep, hearty. In a stolid English way he is a friendly man, although he has few intimates. He is somewhat downright in his opinions and there is no nonsense about either them or him. In short, he is a typical product of Victorianism: ultraconservative, even to attending church regularly and dissecting the sermon at a heavy mid-day dinner, decorously genial, upright—no breath of scandal has ever touched his life—and painstakingly methodical.

In 1908 he succeeded his father, the 16th Earl, who was noted for his generosity, his stables and his conservative manners; he referred always to King Edward as “the King, my august master.” The present Earl was educated at Wellington College and spent his early years in the army, holding many frilled, gold-laced positions. He entered politics with little enthusiasm and no ambition. Appointed Postmaster General in 1903, he applied his ponderous brain to the telephone system and subsequently nationalized it, the wisdom of which step has been disputed ever since.

In fact, Lord Derby had two ambitions. The first did not count; it was to be Prime Minister. When the chance came he turned his back on it. A life of political ambiguity had evidently settled his pristine urge. During the war he became Director General of Recruiting and author of the famed Derby Scheme, which gave the nation’s manhood its last chance to join the colors before conscription overtook it. He next became Secretary of State for War, a post which he relinquished in 1918 to become one of the most popular Ambassadors to France that Britain has ever had. And in 1920, “tired of the limelight,” he resigned. Urged to become Secretary for War once again, he refused and, instead, put on horn-rimmed spectacles and went to Ireland as Mr. Edwards.

Back in England again he devoted himself more assiduously to his remaining ambition—to win the Derby horse race which his ancestor had established, now 147 years ago. The race had not been won by a member of his own family since 1787, when the 12th Earl secured the distinction. In 1924 fame overtook this ambition and the race was won for him by Sansovina. He gave the stake money ($53,460) to his trainer, the Hon. George Lambton.

Since then he has been pretty much in seclusion and has been heard of mainly in regard to the sales of his property and the invitation he sent to U. S. Senator William Edgar Borah to visit England.