Anthony Eden

Biography

Anthony Eden was born in County Durham in 1897 into a landed family and educated at Eton. He served on the Western Front in the First World War, winning the Military Cross, and afterwards studied Persian and Arabic at Christ Church, Oxford.

He entered Parliament for Warwick and Leamington in 1923 and specialised in foreign affairs, serving as a junior Foreign Office minister and Lord Privy Seal before becoming foreign secretary in December 1935 at the age of 38. He resigned in February 1938 in protest at Neville Chamberlain's approach to Mussolini's Italy and became a leading Conservative critic of appeasement.

Eden returned to government on the outbreak of war, first as dominions secretary and briefly as secretary of state for war, and from December 1940 to 1945 was again foreign secretary and Winston Churchill's close deputy, also leading the House of Commons from 1942. Back at the Foreign Office from 1951, he regarded the 1954 Geneva Conference on Korea and Indochina as his greatest success.

He succeeded Churchill as prime minister in April 1955 and won a larger majority at a general election that May. His premiership was overshadowed by the Suez Crisis of 1956, when Britain and France intervened against Egypt's nationalisation of the canal but were forced to withdraw under American pressure. In poor health, he resigned in January 1957, was created Earl of Avon in 1961, and died in 1977.