Stratford Canning Viscount Stratford de Redcliffe

Stratford Canning Stratford de Redcliffe, Viscount 1786-1880, British diplomat. He entered (1807) the foreign office under the aegis of his cousin, George Canning. Sent (1808) to Turkey, he negotiated the Treaty of Bucharest (1812) between Turkey and Russia. He served in Switzerland (1814-18), at the Congress of Vienna, and in Washington (1819-23), where he negotiated concerning disputes arising from the War of 1812. In Turkey again (1825-29, 1831), he helped settle the frontier problem with Greece. After a period in Parliament he returned (1842) to Turkey, remaining with interruptions until 1858. Stratford exercised enormous influence over Sultan Abd al-Majid , but the documentary evidence does not support the belief of his contemporaries that he encouraged Turkish intransigence in the face of Russian demands in 1853 and thus brought on the Crimean War . He appears rather to have counseled moderation and attempted to avert the war. He was created a viscount in 1852.

Bibliography: See his Eastern Question (1881); biography by E. F. Malcolm-Smith (1933); study by L. G. Byrne (1971).

Stratford de Redcliffe, Stratford Canning, 1st Viscount (1786–1880). Diplomat. Son of a London merchant and cousin of George Canning, Stratford Canning was sent to Eton and King's College, Cambridge, before entering the Foreign Office. He was in Constantinople at the time of the battle of Navarino (1827) and again as ambassador 1841–58. He urged the Turks to resist Russian demands in the exchange which led to the Crimean War.

Stratford de Redcliffe, Stratford Canning, 1st Viscount (1786–1880). Diplomat. Son of a London merchant and cousin of George Canning, Stratford Canning was sent to Eton and King's College, Cambridge, before entering the Foreign Office. He served in Denmark, Turkey, Switzerland, and the USA. He was in Constantinople at the time of the battle of Navarino (1827) and again as ambassador 1841–58. He urged the Turks to resist Russian demands in the exchange which led to the Crimean War. In 1852 he was made viscount and in 1869 was given the Garter. His title, which the Complete Peerage understandably calls ‘a strange medley’, commemorates the 15th-cent. Cannynges who were associated with St Mary Redcliffe, Bristol. Canning, with a handsome presence and majestic manner, was one of the grandest of old-style diplomats. Malmesbury wrote that his talents were undisputed but that he was so ‘despotic and irritable’ that they were only of use in certain situations.

J. A. Cannon