The Big Draw

Phil May

Cartoon by Phil May of William Ewart Gladstone (1809-1898), part of the DM 668 accession from the National Liberal Club.

The National Liberal Club's Gladstone Library was founded fifteen years after the Club itself, in 1897, and was placed into the hands of a board of trustees in 1899, the year after William Ewart Gladstone's death. In tribute to Gladstone, the library was kept and increased by a board of trustees until 1976, when it was sold to the University of Bristol in order to keep it intact and safe, as it would have remained unstaffed at the NLC.

A staff cartoonist for Punch magazine, Phil May was born in 1864, the second son of Phillip May, and engineer from Staffordshire. He was educated at St. George's School, Leeds, and worked on the Sydney Bulletin for three years, St. Stephen's Review for a further two years, then travelled America fo rthe Graphic before joining the staff of Punch. He published 3 volumes of cartoons and sketches between 1891 and 1896, and died in August of 1903.

William Ewart Gladstone was born in Liverpool in 1809, and died at Hawarden in 1898. He had a long and prestigious political career, including terms as Chancellor of the Exchequer, before becoming Prime Minister for the first time in 1868. In 1873, he was to hold the offices of Prime Minister and Chancellor of the Exchequer, which raised a grave constitutional crisis that was never adequately resolved. He resigned office in 1894.

Image copyright University of Bristol Information Services - Special Collections.

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