Page:EB1922 - Volume 31.djvu/870

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828
MACKENSEN—MACNAMARA

the Imperial Conference for complete unity of action in time of War between Dominion fleets and those of the mother country. He could feel, when in the autumn he passed from the Admiralty to the Home Office, that he left behind him a much stronger fleet than he had found. As Home Secretary he had charge of the Welsh Church Disestablishment bill.

When war broke out in Aug. 1914 he had the arduous duty of safeguarding the country against the machinations of spies a task in which it was impossible to give entire satisfaction to a sensitive public. When Mr. Asquith's Coalition Ministry was formed in the summer of 1915 he was made Chancellor of the Exchequer, and a still more difficult task was imposed on him to find the money to carry on the war. By the 4! % War Loan a subscription of nearly 600,000,000 was obtained. He also raised a loan of 100,000,000 in the United States on the joint credit of England and France. In the autumn he introduced a supplementary war budget for the year, providing over 100,000,- ooo by new taxation. Income-tax was raised 40%, and the abatement and exemption limits lowered; the rates of super-tax were seriously heightened; all the old duties on sugar, tea, to- bacco, cacao, coffee, motor spirit and patent medicines were al- most doubled; the import of luxuries such as motor-cars, cinema films, clocks and musical instruments was restrained by an ad valorem duty of 331%; and an excess profits tax of 50% was imposed. Other methods of financing the war which he adopted were War Savings Certificates, which realized over 40,000,000 in their first year; 5% Exchequer bonds, replaced after a year for a short time by 6% Exchequer bonds; but for current expenses he relied mainly on the sale of Treasury bills, of which at the end of his period of office in Dec. 1916 there were over 1,000,000,000 outstanding. In his 1916 budget he raised taxation still further. Income-tax was increased to 55. in the pound and excess profits tax to 60%; there were further increases on sugar, cacao and coffee; higher duties were imposed on motor vehicles; there were new taxes on amusements, railway tickets, matches and mineral waters. He calculated that the country was raising over 300,- 000,000 in the year by new taxation imposed since the war; and he budgeted for a net revenue of 502,000,000 to meet an esti- mated expenditure of 1,825,000,000. He enunciated the doc- trine that Great Britain ought never again to be dependent for supplies or many essential commodities on a nation like Germany which in peace had plotted and prepared for war; and he said that Government was prepared to assist the development of British foreign trade.

Mr. McKenna went out of office with Mr. Asquith in Dec. 1916, and, along with other Liberal leaders who had refused to serve under Mr. Lloyd George, lost his seat at the General Elec- tion of Dec. 1918. He made no attempt to reenter the House, but accepted the position of chairman of the London City & Mid- land Bank in 1919. He speedily gained a position of financial authority in the City. He married in 1908 Pamela, daughter of Sir Herbert Jekyll, and had two sons. (G. E. B.)

MACKENSEN, AUGUST VON (1849- ), Prussian field- marshal, was born Dec. 6 1849 at Hausleipnitz in the Prussian province of Saxony. His career was in the cavalry, and he at one time commanded at Danzig the well-known regiment of Hussars who wore a silver skull and crossbones on their busbies. As the commander of the XVII. Army Corps he was brought into close touch with the German Crown Prince at a time when the heir to the imperial dignity had been sent to Danzig in order to with- draw him from the temptation of meddling with politics. In 1914, at the outbreak of the World War, Mackensen was appointed to the command of the IX. Army on the eastern front, and won victories over the Russians at Kutno, Lodz and Lowitz. After April 1915 he led the German troops in western Galicia and helped to break through the Russian line at Gorlice. On June 20 of the same year he was made a field-marshal. In the advance into Russia Mackensen took Litovsk on Aug. 26 and Pinsk on Sept. 15 1915. Later in the autumn of the same year he was in command of the army sent against Serbia, and in 1916 he commanded the expedition against Rumania. In Nov. 1918, after the conclusion of the Armistice, when the German troops

were being brought home from the Balkans, he was detained by the French and interned at Neusatz, where, in spite of many protests from the German Government, he remained until he was set at liberty at the beginning of Dec. 1919.


MACLAGAN, WILLIAM DALRYMPLE (1826–1910), Archbishop of York, was born in Edinburgh June 18 1826. He began life in the army, retiring as lieutenant in 1852 in order to go to Cambridge to study for the Church. He became a London rector, first at Newington and then at St. Mary Abbott's, Kensington, and in 1878 was nominated by the Crown to the bishopric of Lichfield. In 1891 he was made Archbishop of York. In 1899 he sat as assessor with Dr. Temple, Archbishop of Canterbury, when the decision was given against the use of incense and other ritualistic practices, and though himself a strong High Churchman he loyally upheld the primate's “opinion.” He resigned his archbishopric in 1908, and died in London Sept. 19 1910.


M'MAHON, SIR ARTHUR HENRY (1862- ), British soldier and administrator, was born Nov. 28 1862, the son of Gen. C. A. M'Mahon, F.R.S. He was educated at Haileybury and afterwards entered Sandhurst, where he obtained a sword of honour in 1882. In 1883 he joined the army, and in 1885 was appointed to the Indian Staff Corps and entered the Punjab frontier force. In 1890 he joined the Indian Political Department, and after acting as political agent in various small states was in 1901 appointed revenue and judicial commissioner in Baluchistan. From 1903 to 1905 he was commissioner in Seistan, also acting as arbitrator on the boundary question between Persia and Afghanistan in Seistan. In 1906 he received the K.C.I. E. From 1905 to 1911 he was agent and chief commissioner in Baluchistan, and from 1911 to 1914 Foreign Secretary to the Government of India. He was appointed Master of Cere- monies to King George V. during his visit to India (1912) and in 1914 became first High Commissioner for Egypt under the British Protectorate. He retired from this office in 1916 and was created G.C.M.G.

MACNAGHTEN, EDWARD MACNAGHTEN, BARON (1830- 1913), British judge, was born in London Feb. 3 1830, the son of Sir Edmund Macnaghten, 2nd bart., of Dundarave, co. Antrim, whose baronetcy he succeeded to on the death of his elder brother, the 3rd bart., in 191 1. He was educated at Queen's College, Belfast, and Trinity College, Cambridge, where he was bracketed senior classic in 1852. He was an enthusiastic oarsman, winning the Colquhoun sculls at Cambridge (1851), and the diamond sculls at Henley (1852). He was called to the bar in 1857, and became Q.C. in 1880, and a lord of appeal and life peer in 1887, having previously refused a judgeship. He sat as Con- servative member for co. Antrim from 1880-5, anc l f r co- Antrim (northern division) from 1885-7. Among the many important cases in which he came into prominence as a lord of appeal were the Taff Vale case of 1900-1, the Osborne judgment of 1909, both of these being concerned with points of trade- union law, and the Scottish Church case of 1904. He was also one of the arbitrators in the boundary dispute of 1899 between Chile and Argentina. Lord Macnaghten died in London Feb. 1 7 1913. His life peerage became extinct, but he was succeeded as 5th bart. by his son Edward (1850-1914).

MACNAMARA, THOMAS JAMES (1861- ), British politician, was born at Montreal Aug. 23 1861. He was educated at St. Thomas's school, Exeter, and was afterwards trained as an elementary-school teacher at the Borough Road training college for teachers. He taught in various schools until 1892, when he became editor of the Schoolmaster. He was elected a member of the London School Board in 1894; in 1895 he unsuccessfully contested Deptford as a Radical, and in 1896 was elected president of the National Union of Teachers. He was elected for North Camberwell in 1900, and in 1907 entered the Government as parliamentary secretary to the Local Government Board. In 1908 he became parliamentary secretary to the Admiralty, retaining this office until 1915, when he became financial secretary to the Admiralty. He lost his seat in 1918, but the same year was elected for North-West Camberwell. In 1920 he became Minister of Labour in succession to Sir Robert Home.