The Rhodes Trust
Cecil Rhodes's testamentary endowment, controlling the Rhodes Scholarships and bankrolling the Milner Group from 1902 onward
Also known as: Rhodes Trust, the Trust, Rhodes Scholarships
The body established by Cecil Rhodes's seventh will (1899) to administer his estate after his death in 1902. The Trust funded the Rhodes Scholarships, which drew young men from the Dominions, the United States, and Germany into Oxford; it bankrolled Milner Group political projects; and through its successive secretaries — Parkin, Wylie, Dawson, Grigg, Lothian, Elton — it served as the Group's institutional treasury (AAE 72-73). 'The real control of the trust has rested with the Milner Group from 1902 to the present. Milner was the only really active trustee and he controlled the bureaucracy which handled the trust' (AAE 73).
Origin in the Seven Wills
Rhodes wrote seven wills between 1877 and 1899. In the first five he left his fortune to a secret society 'patterned on the Jesuits' to be devoted to 'the extension of British rule throughout the world' and, ultimately, 'the recovery of the United States of America as an integral part of a British Empire' (AAE 28). The sixth and seventh wills did not mention the secret society — they directed the fortune to a public-facing scholarship scheme — but Quigley argues at length that this was a presentational change, not a change of purpose. 'The creation of the secret society was the essential core of Rhodes's plans at all times. Stead, even after Rhodes's death, did not doubt that the attempt would be made to continue the society' (AAE 30). The scholarships were 'merely a façade to conceal the secret society, or, more accurately, they were to be one of the instruments by which the members of the secret society could carry out his purpose' (AAE 28). Rhodes told Stead in 1894 that the society would work through 'various projects for propaganda, the formation of libraries, the creation of lectureships, the dispatch of emissaries on missions of propaganda throughout the Empire, and the steps to be taken to pave the way for the foundation and the acquisition of a newspaper which was to be devoted to the service of the cause' (AAE 30). Every one of these instruments was created after his death, financed by the Trust.
The Trustees
Rhodes's seventh and final will (1899) named seven trustees: Lord Milner, Lord Rosebery, Lord Grey (Albert Grey), Alfred Beit, L. L. Michell, B. F. Hawksley, and Dr. (Leander Starr) Jameson (AAE 29). Of these, Milner was 'the only really active trustee' (AAE 73). Through the next half-century, Quigley shows, additions to the board were almost uniformly Milner Group selections: Otto Beit, Rudyard Kipling, Leopold Amery, Stanley Baldwin, Geoffrey Dawson, H. A. L. Fisher, Sothern Holland, and Sir Edward Peacock (AAE 73). 'If we look at the list of Rhodes Trustees, we see that the Milner Group always had complete control. Omitting the five original trustees, we see that five of the new additions were from the Milner Group, three were from the Rhodes clique, and three represented the outside world. In the 1930s the Board was stabilized for a long period as Amery, Baldwin, Dawson, Fisher, Holland, and Peacock, with Lothian as secretary. Six of these seven were of the Milner Group, four from the inner core' (AAE 73).
The Secretary as Operational Officer
The board met irregularly; day-to-day control of the Trust rested with the Secretary, who in turn was always a Milner Group nominee. Quigley enumerates them: George Parkin (1902-1920) — the Canadian imperialist Milner had brought from Upper Canada College; Geoffrey Dawson (1921-1922), editor of The Times; Edward Grigg (1922-1925); Lord Lothian (1925-1940), Milner's South African protégé who would die as Ambassador to Washington; Lord Elton thereafter (AAE 73). 'All of them clearly Milner's nominees,' Quigley adds (AAE 73). The Oxford Secretary, handling local work during Parkin's extended absences, was Francis Wylie of Brasenose (1903 onward), 'named by the influence of Lord Rosebery, whose sons he had tutored' (AAE 73). The combination — Milner-aligned Secretary, Wylie at Oxford, Milner-aligned trustees — made the Trust an effectively closed system. Money flowed where the Milner Group wanted it to flow: to Oxford colleges, to The Round Table magazine, to Chatham House, to dependents and pensioners of the inner circle.
The Rhodes Scholarships as Recruitment
The Rhodes Scholarships were not, in Quigley's reading, a charitable scheme. They were a recruitment pipeline. 'In his "Confession of Faith" Rhodes outlined the types of persons who might be useful members of this secret society. As listed by the American Secretary to the Rhodes Trust, this list exactly describes the group formed by Milner in South Africa: "Men of ability and enthusiasm who find no suitable way to serve their country under the current political system; able youth recruited from the schools and universities; men of wealth with no aim in life; younger sons with high thoughts and great aspirations but without opportunity"' (AAE 29). The first cohort of American Scholars arrived in 1904; Frank Aydelotte, later American Secretary to the Trust, would become a key American Round Tabler. Dean Rusk, Secretary of State 1961-1969, was a Rhodes Scholar (1931-1933) and, in Quigley's reading, 'as much a member of the [Establishment] nexus as Alger Hiss, the Dulles brothers, Jerome Greene, James T. Shotwell, John W. Davis, Elihu Root, or Philip Jessup' (T&H 950). The Scholarship's selection criteria — character, leadership, scholarship, athletic ability — institutionalized the Group's hiring filter on a global scale.
Beit Trust and Affiliated Endowments
Alongside the Rhodes Trust, Quigley identifies a satellite system of imperial endowments substantially under Milner Group influence. The Beit Trust, established by Alfred Beit (the South African mining magnate and Rhodes's closest business partner), funded the Beit Railway projects and the Beit Professorship of Colonial History at Oxford (AAE 73-74). The Beit Professorship — held by H. E. Egerton 1905-1920 and Reginald Coupland 1920 onward — was, by Coupland's tenure, an unambiguous Milner Group fief; Coupland chaired the 1937 Peel Commission on Palestine partition (AAE 76). The Carnegie United Kingdom Trust supplied additional money after 1925 (T&H 951). The Astor money flowed in through Cliveden and through the Astor purchase of The Times (1922). Sir Abe Bailey, a South African gold magnate, funded The Round Table from 1910 (AAE 99) and the Royal Institute of International Affairs from 1919 (T&H 132). 'Money for the widely ramified activities of this organization came originally from the associates and followers of Cecil Rhodes, chiefly from the Rhodes Trust itself, and from wealthy associates such as the Beit brothers, from Sir Abe Bailey, and (after 1915) from the Astor family' (T&H 951).
Rhodes House (1929)
Rhodes House at Oxford, opened in 1929, formalized the Trust's institutional presence in the University. It housed the Trust's offices, the secretary, the books on colonial history transferred from the Bodleian, and the Beit Professor's lecture hall (AAE 74). The building consolidated what had previously been scattered: the Group's Oxford operations now had a physical headquarters distinct from All Souls. Rhodes House also became the Oxford reception point for visiting Scholars, the venue for the Trust's annual gatherings, and (during the inter-war period) a discreet conference site for Round Table editorial meetings. Quigley notes that the Trust also funded the Rhodes Memorial Lectureship, of which Abraham Flexner held one — Flexner returned to America to found the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton, which Quigley identifies as a deliberate replica of All Souls (T&H 952). The architectural fact reflects the institutional fact: Rhodes Trust money flowed into the construction of the Anglo-American academic establishment from Oxford to Princeton.
After Lothian (1940 onward)
Lord Lothian's death in December 1940, while serving as Ambassador to Washington and continuing as Secretary of the Rhodes Trust, marked the end of the founding generation's direct administration. Lord Elton replaced him as Secretary, but Elton was a different sort — a Labour-leaning historian, an outsider to the original Kindergarten. Through the late 1940s and 1950s the Trust continued to award Scholarships and to fund its established programmes, but the close coordination with The Times, The Round Table, and the Royal Institute of International Affairs that had defined the inter-war period thinned. In Tragedy and Hope (1966) Quigley reports that the Trust's role had been substantially absorbed by larger American foundation money — the Carnegie Corporation, the Rockefeller Foundation, the Ford Foundation — which now financed the post-imperial form of the Anglo-American network through institutions like the CFR and the Institute for Advanced Study (T&H 950-952). The Trust itself remains active today, administering the Rhodes Scholarships; the broader political-funding role Quigley documents has been quietly retired.
Cited in
- anglo-american-establishment · p. 2 Quigley
The Rhodes Scholarships, established by the terms of Cecil Rhodes's seventh will, are known to everyone. What is not so widely known is that Rhodes in five previous wills left his fortune to form a secret society.
- anglo-american-establishment · p. 5 Quigley
It set up and controls the Rhodes Trust.
- anglo-american-establishment · p. 28 Quigley
The scholarships were merely a façade to conceal the secret society, or, more accurately, they were to be one of the instruments by which the members of the secret society could carry out his purpose.
- anglo-american-establishment · p. 29 Quigley
Men of ability and enthusiasm who find no suitable way to serve their country under the current political system; able youth recruited from the schools and universities; men of wealth with no aim in life; younger sons with high thoughts and great aspirations but without opportunity.
- anglo-american-establishment · p. 30 Quigley
The creation of the secret society was the essential core of Rhodes's plans at all times. Stead, even after Rhodes's death, did not doubt that the attempt would be made to continue the society.
- anglo-american-establishment · p. 73 Quigley
The real control of the trust has rested with the Milner Group from 1902 to the present. Milner was the only really active trustee and he controlled the bureaucracy which handled the trust.
- anglo-american-establishment · p. 73 Quigley
As secretary to the trustees before 1929, we find, for example, George Parkin (1902-1920), Geoffrey Dawson (1921-1922), Edward Grigg (1922-1925), and Lord Lothian (1925-1940) — all of them clearly Milner's nominees.
- anglo-american-establishment · p. 73 Quigley
If we look at the list of Rhodes Trustees, we see that the Milner Group always had complete control.
- anglo-american-establishment · p. 73 Quigley
In the 1930s the Board was stabilized for a long period as Amery, Baldwin, Dawson, Fisher, Holland, and Peacock, with Lothian as secretary. Six of these seven were of the Milner Group, four from the inner core.
- anglo-american-establishment · p. 74 Quigley
In 1929, when Rhodes House was opened, these and other books on the subject were moved from the Bodleian to Rhodes House, and the Beit Professor was given an office and lecture hall in Rhodes House.
- tragedy-and-hope · p. 144 Quigley
The money for the organizational work came originally from the Rhodes Trust.
- tragedy-and-hope · p. 950 Quigley
Dean Rusk, Secretary of State after 1961, formerly president of the Rockefeller Foundation and Rhodes Scholar at Oxford (1931-1933), is as much a member of this nexus as Alger Hiss, the Dulles brothers, Jerome Greene, James T. Shotwell, John W. Davis, Elihu Root, or Philip Jessup.
- tragedy-and-hope · p. 951 Quigley
Money for the widely ramified activities of this organization came originally from the associates and followers of Cecil Rhodes, chiefly from the Rhodes Trust itself, and from wealthy associates such as the Beit brothers, from Sir Abe Bailey, and (after 1915) from the Astor family.