Robert Cunninghame-Graham 1st President of National Party of Scotland and the first MP to call himself a socialist died 20th March 1936.
To me Robert Cunninghame-Graham is one of the most interesting of our 19th/20th century politicians and is deserving of this longer than usual post.
please just like the post as a historical entity, and just dinnae……..
Cunninghame Graham was an author, traveller explorer, politician and adventurer, he was a man of extraordinary talents, tireless energy and considerable courage. His friend and contemporary Joseph Conrad remarked, “When I think of Cunninghame Graham, I feel as though I have lived all my life in a dark hole without seeing or knowing anything.” and I have to agree with him, I use the term Polymath now and then for some subjects I post about, he was that, and more.
Born in London in 1852, educated at Harrow, but always, always, a Scot to his marrow, Cunninghame Graham was a descendant of the Earls of Menteith and the son of a laird whose lands eventually extended from Gartmore in Stirlingshire to Ardoch in Dunbartonshire and Finlaystone in Renfrewshire. It was there that Robert was largely brought up, coming heavily under the influence of his Spanish grandmother.
After schooling, at Harrow, Robert finished his education in Brussels, Belgium, learning, among other things, the art of swordsmanship at which he became an expert.
In a crowded life — Cunninghame Graham was variously a Member of Parliament, a gaucho in South America, a fencing master, a founder member of both the Independent Labour Party and the Scottish National Party, a rancher, horse-trainer, buffalo hunter and Long Rider through North and South America — he wrote prolifically. He called himself, “Don Roberto,”. He also enjoyed a journey into Morocco, disguised as an Arab Sheik, he was, as they say, some man!
In 1872 Cunninghame Graham rode on horseback 600 miles up the river Parana to the Iguacu Falls, researching the role of the early Jesuits with the local Indians. His subsequent book, A Vanished Arcadia, was made into a film, The Mission starring Jeremy Irons. He lived for a time in Argentina, where his extended family had a ranch, by way of Uruguay and Paraguay. He became an expert horseman, riding with gauchos, and his admiration for these men was such that he often wore gaucho clothes when back home, he must have been quite a sight!
He wrote that one day on a knoll in the pampas he met a man who greeted him in halting Spanish. Cunninghame Graham suggested he speak in English and referred to the view. The man, said, perhaps hearing a Scots accent for the first time in 20 years, “Aye, but man, it’s naething tae the view off Dumyat.”
Don Roberto married to an equally colourful and talented woman that he met in Paris, Gabrielle de la Balmondiere, who had been described as a Chilean princess. In fact, she was an actress called Caroline Horsfall, who went on to be a published poet. Among her many admirers was WB Yeats.
His contact with poor people everywhere made him a socialist before that term was even coined. On returning from South America, he rapidly took up political campaigning and in 1886, there being no Labour Party, he stood on a radical ticket for the Liberals in North West Lanarkshire, winning comfortably.
On 12th September 1887 he was suspended from parliament for making what was called a “disrespectful reference” to the House of Lords. He was the first MP ever to be suspended from the House of Commons for swearing; the word was damn.
He was suspended from the House of Commons in December 1888 for protesting about the working conditions of chain makers. His response to the Speaker of the House, “I never withdraw”, was later used by George Bernard Shaw in Arms and the Man.
He truly was a courageous man – in 1887, he was beaten up badly by police at the original Bloody Sunday in Trafalgar Square and was jailed for six weeks.
His leftward move and meetings with James Keir Hardie led him to co-found the Scottish Labour Party with Keir Hardie, but has been largely airbrushed out of the history of the party, due to his Scottish Nationalist views.
Its manifesto included nationalisation of land and minerals, an eight-hour day, State insurance, the abolition of the House of Lords and all hereditary offices, home rule for Scotland, the abolition of the liquor tariff and the disestablishment of State Churches.
Yet Labour disappointed him, don’t they always, and after World War One – he volunteered a the age of 62 and became a horse-buyer for the Army – his growing nationalism saw him become president of the National Party of Scotland, the forerunner of the SNP. On 23rd June, 1928, in the King’s Park, Stirling, he presided at its inaugural rally.
He was friends with everyone from Buffalo Bill Cody to George Bernard Shaw, had his portrait painted by Sir John Lavery, knew the Glasgow Boys cirlce of artists personally, was close friends with the writers Joseph Conrad and G.K Chesterton, and generally personified the word kenspeckle. A writer of over 30 books himself, there is a seat dedicated to Cunninghame Graham in the Scottish Storytelling Centre in Edinburgh with the inscription: “R B ‘Don Roberto’ Cunninghame Graham of Gartmore and Ardoch,
Few Scots actually know of yer man, but In Entre Rios, in the north east of Argentina is the Instituto Magnasco, in Gualeguaychu (pronounced Wally-wy-chew) there is a Cunninghame Graham library and museum! His books are available there to read on the premises, and the Smith’s library is based on that facility.
The Journalist and author, the late Rennie of the Stirling Smith Art Gallery and Museum wrote a booklet about Robert Cunninghame-Graham, called Braw Gallant, he wrote of the man : “He was a pioneer of socialism and Scottish nationalism, fought unemployment and poverty, backed the rights of native peoples against colonialism and short-sighted development, supported free speech, was an active conservationist, got caught up in the Irish question, attacked brutal wars when it was not fashionable to do so and was prepared to die or be imprisoned for his beliefs.
“The words knightly and chivalrous come to mind.”
Robert Cunninghame-Graham retired to Argentina, where he continued to be active, he would still ride daily while in his 80′s, he died on this day in 1936 of pneumonia at the Plaza Hotel in Retiro. Such was his standing he lay in state in the Casa del Teatro and received a countrywide tribute led by the President of the Republic of Argentina, before his body was shipped home to be buried beside his wife, in the ruined Augustinian Priory on the island of Inchmahome, Lake of Menteith, Stirlingshire. There is a memorial to him at at Castlehill, Dumbarton. The monument, which is built of Scottish stone, but also contains stones from Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay.
Between these stones is a medallion of Cunninghame Graham (in his latter years) by the Liverpool born artist Alexander Proudfoot, RSA, who taught sculpture at Glasgow School of Art. Below the medallion is an epitaph which reads:
"Robert Bontine Cunninghame Graham 1852-1936 - Famous Author - Traveller and Horseman - Patriotic Scot and Citizen of the World - As Betokened by the Stones above. Died in Argentina, interred in Inchamahome - He Was a Master of Life - A King Among Men”
On the Argentinian stone, there is a portrait of his favourite horse Pampa, an Argentine mustang which he had rescued from pulling trams in Glasgow and rode for some 20 years and the inscription:
“To Pampa my black Argentine who I rode for twenty years without a fall. May the earth lie light upon him as lightly as he trod upon its face. Vale…or until so long. Don Roberto.”
One of Pampa’s hooves is buried beneath the monument.
The monument suffered considerable damage through vandalism during the 1970s and was moved in May 1981 to the village of Gartmore (where, until 1900, Gartmore House had been the principal seat of the Cunninghame Graham family), and was unveiled on Cunninghame Graham’s birthday (24 May) by the Argentinian Ambassador. It is currently in the care of the National Trust for Scotland. Despite the removal of the monument to Gartmore, the Cunninghame Graham Memorial Park at Castlehill is affectionately known as “the Mony” and the original site of the Memorial marked by a stone.
In 2012 the National Trust for Scotland carried out significant conservation work on the monument which was completed in time for the 160th anniversary of Cunninghame Graham’s birth. A new stone was added to commemorate another of Don Roberto’s horses, Pingo, and a new information panel was placed nearby, as seen in the photos, the painting is Don Roberto on Pampas, and recently sold at Christies for over 31 thousand pounds.
The last two pics are my own from a visit to Kelvingrove Art Gallery l in 2024.
Aye ah ken this post has gone on a wee bit more than my usual, I hope you have enjoyed reading it, but please, go have a look at this wee article about the man by Dominic Hilton, on The Critic web page, it is quite amusing. https://thecritic.co.uk/from-gaucho-to-rive-gauche-and….
