Night of the Long Knives (1962)
Concerned that traditional Conservative voters were expressing their disapproval with the government's economic policies by switching to the Liberals, Harold Macmillan planned to replace his Chancellor of the Exchequer, Selwyn Lloyd, with Reginald Maudling.
The reshuffle was also an attempt to reinvigorate the party, bringing in younger and more dynamic figures and replacing some of the older and less capable ministers.
After discussions with Conservative Party chairman Iain Macleod and Home Secretary Rab Butler, a reshuffle was planned for autumn 1962.
Macmillan was overtaken by events when Butler leaked the details of the reshuffle to press baron Lord Rothermere over lunch on 11 July.
Macmillan faced sharp criticism over the scale of the changes, and his political opponents both within the Conservative Party and in the Opposition characterised him as ruthless and opportunistic.
Despite the dramatic changes in the Cabinet, the Conservatives were rocked by a series of scandals in 1963 and Macmillan retired in October of that year, citing ill health.
With Conservative unpopularity stemming from economic issues, they discussed replacing Selwyn Lloyd as Chancellor of the Exchequer with Reginald Maudling.
[5] Butler was in favour of the move, and together with Macleod, they worked out an orderly reshuffle of several Cabinet posts, including the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Events overtook him when, on 11 July, Butler lunched with Lord Rothermere, proprietor of several newspapers, including the Daily Mail.
He attempted to mollify Lloyd by suggesting that he consider a career in the city as chairman of Martins Bank, and hinted at the possibility of a peerage.
[7] Macmillan suggested on several occasions, including at his meeting with Lloyd to dismiss him as chancellor, that he felt there was a conspiracy within the party to replace him as prime minister.
[8] His intimations of party disloyalty and the speed and surprise of the sackings were particularly hurtful to Lloyd, who was loyal to Macmillan, and remained so even after his dismissal.
[11] The sackings were mockingly named after the 1934 Night of the Long Knives, when Adolf Hitler had many Sturmabteilung supporters of Ernst Röhm either executed or arrested.
His political opponents made capital from this: Liberal MP Jeremy Thorpe, in a humorous twist on a biblical phrase, observed that "Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his friends for his life.
Conservative MP Gilbert Longden, employing a similar humorous twist on Rudyard Kipling's "If—", congratulated him on keeping his head, while all around him were losing theirs.
Labour recovered by early 1963 as the exceptionally harsh winter that year drove up unemployment and the economy unexpectedly faltered.
