John Eldon Gorst
1861 - 1911
Anglo - Egyptian and Foreign Office official, 1886 - 1907; British agent and consul-general in Egypt, 1907 - 1911.
The family of John Eldon Gorst was mainly from Lancashire, England; it had prospered under Queen Victoria's reign. Gorst (known as Jack to his friends) was born in New Zealand but was raised in London. His father and namesake, Sir John, returned to England from New Zealand after the last Maori War, where he embarked on an erratic career in Conservative Party politics. Gorst suffered a painful and unhappy childhood, because an abscess in his pelvis kept him bedridden or wearing a brace for almost seven years. Educated in day schools, at home by tutors, then at Eton and at Trinity College, Cambridge, he earned a degree in mathematics in 1882 and was called to the bar in 1885. Rather than face exclusion, like his father, from the largely aristocratic Tory Party inner circle, Gorst entered the diplomatic service in 1885; he was sent to Egypt.
Egypt was still formally under the sovereignty of the Ottoman Empire, but Muhammad Ali Pasha had managed to make it a virtually independent state from 1805 until 1842, when the Ottoman sultan recognized his right to pass the control of Egypt on to his descendants. Because of the building of the Suez Canal and European greed, Egypt became burdened with financial debts. Both France and Britain intervened and, in 1882, British troops occupied Egypt. By 1886, when Gorst arrived, Sir Evelyn Baring, later the Earl of Cromer, was consolidating his power as Egypt's de facto ruler. Gorst learned Arabic well enough to bypass an interpreter and cultivate friendships among the Egyptian Ottoman elite, including Khedive Abbas Hilmi II. Between 1890 and 1904, Gorst distinguished himself at Egypt's ministries of finance and interior. He helped organize and recruit Englishmen to extend British control in Egypt and the Sudan. In 1898 he succeeded Sir Elwin Palmer as financial adviser in Egypt - the most influential post after Cromer's. In 1904, Gorst, now Cromer's heir-apparent, returned to the Foreign Office, especially to act as Cromer's agent there.
In 1907, the Liberal cabinet sent Gorst back to Egypt to reduce Cromer's autocracy and to give selected Egyptians limited responsibility for their internal affairs. This "new policy" of "conciliation" and "moderation" would, the cabinet hoped, diminish Egyptian nationalism and appease hostile critics in Britain and Egypt. By working with the Egyptian ministers and the khedive, Gorst quickly and successfully undermined the nationalists. Unlike Cromer, he did not usually bully the Egyptian Ottoman elite.
Gorst, however, made three major mistakes. First, he alienated the Anglo - Egyptian officials and influential circles in Britain by reducing their influence on the veiled protectorate over Egypt. Second, in 1908, he appointed Boutros Ghali, a Coptic Christian, as prime minister to replace the elderly time server, Mustafa Fahmi. Ghali was able but hated by the nationalists for his record and distrusted by many Muslims for his faith. Third, Gorst sought in 1909 and 1910 to extend the Suez Canal Company's concession, mainly to provide development funds for the Sudan. He lost Ghali and the experiment in limited self-rule to a nationalist assassin, and a defiant Egyptian General Assembly rejected the concession extension.
Gorst's last year as British agent had an element of anticlimax. Despite alarmists who predicted further trouble for the British in Egypt, little or nothing occurred. Although his health deteriorated rapidly, Gorst's control and British influence in Egypt did not. It was enough for the agency to warn, bribe, or deport certain nationalists, suppress so-called seditious periodicals, and indulge in a limited amount of counterpropaganda.
Gorst died of cancer in July 1911, in Castle Combe, England. The khedive, whom he had befriended, rushed to comfort him on his deathbed.
Bibliography
Mellini, Peter. Sir Eldon Gorst: The Overshadowed Proconsul. Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 1977.
Sayyid-Marsot, Afaf Lutfi. Egypt and Cromer: A Study inAnglo - Egyptian Relations. New York: Praeger, 1969.
Tignor, Robert L. Modernization and British Colonial Rule inEgypt, 1881 - 1914. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1966.
— PETER MELLINI
