Member of Parliament for Brighton
What was the position of John Erskine, Lord Erskine from May 1940 to Nov 1941?
John Erskine , Lord Erskine John Francis Ashley Erskine , Lord Erskine GCSI , GCIE ( 12 April 1895 – 3 May 1953 ) was a British soldier , Conservative Party politician and administrator who served as Member of Parliament ( MP ) for Weston-super-Mare and Brighton . Erskine also served as the Governor of Madras Presidency from 1934 to 1940 . Erskine was born to Walter Erskine , 12th Earl of Mar on 12 April 1895 and had his education at Eton and Oxford University . On graduation , Erskine served in the British army and rose to become a major before entering politics . Erskine was elected to the House of Commons as a candidate of the Conservative Party from Weston-super-Mare and served as MP from 1922 to 1923 and from 1924 to 1934 . He also served as Assistant Government Whip from 1930 to 1934 . In 1934 , Erskine was appointed Governor of Madras Presidency , British India . Erskine served as the Governor of Madras Presidency from 1934 to 1940 . He was a close friend of Indian politician Chakravarthi Rajagopalachari though he disagreed with some of his policies . On the conclusion of his term , Erskine returned to the United Kingdom and served as the Member of Parliament for Brighton from 1940 to 1941 . Erskine retired from politics in his later life . He died on 3 May 1953 at the age of 58 . Family and early life . John Erskine was born on 12 April 1895 to Walter Erskine , 12th Earl of Mar and his wife Lady Violet Ashley Cooper ( 1868–1938 ) . He was the eldest of their two sons and had his education at Eton and Christ Church , Oxford University . John Erskine married Lady Marjorie Hervey , the elder daughter of the 4th Marquess of Bristol , on 2 December 1919 and had four sons . Military career . On outbreak of the First World War , Erskine enlisted in the Scots Guards . By the end of the war he was a Major in the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders . Politics . With an interest in politics and an allegiance to the Conservative Party , Erskine was appointed Assistant Private Secretary to Viscount Long in 1920 . At the 1922 general election , Erskine was elected as Conservative Member of Parliament for Weston-super-Mare . He lost his seat to a Liberal in the 1923 general election but easily regained it in 1924 and did not face a serious challenge there again . William Joynson-Hicks , then a rapidly rising Conservative Minister , appointed Erskine as his Parliamentary Private Secretary in 1922 , which gave him considerable interesting work to do . Joynson-Hicks was among the more controversial Ministers and had especial need to know that he had the support of Conservative backbenchers , and this Erskine was able to arrange . After the 1931 general election , Erskine was named as an unpaid Assistant Government whip on 12 November 1931 . This appointment effectively silenced Erskine in the Chamber of the House of Commons due to the tradition that Whips do not make speeches . Previously Erskine had been an effective and confident speaker who had taken a close interest in the affairs of India ( although he admitted never to having visited it ) . He followed the Round Table Conferences of the early 1930s closely . In his later years , Erskine served as a member of Parliament for the two-member Brighton constituency . However Erskines public support for native rule in India counted against him with Winston Churchill who had led the opposition to the Government of India Act 1935 . Although hopeful of appointment to government office , Erskine was given nothing . As Governor of Madras Presidency . On 22 May 1934 Erskine was appointed the new Governor of Madras . Although his appointment commenced in November , Erskine resigned his seat through appointment as Steward of the Chiltern Hundreds at the beginning of June . In 1934 , Erskine succeeded George Frederick Stanley as the Governor of Madras Presidency and served from 1934 to 1940 . Erskine was a supporter of the Justice Party and wanted the party to capture power in the Presidency during the 1937 elections . However , to his disappointment , the Indian National Congress won by a huge margin . Despite being the majority party in the Assembly and the Council , the Congress refused to form the government . Their objections stemmed from the special powers given to the Governor by the Government of India Act of 1935 . Erskine decided to form an interim provisional Government with non-members and opposition members of the Legislative Assembly . He first offered the Prime Minister post in the interim government to V . S . Srinivasa Sastri but Shastri refused to accept it . Then Erskine formed the interim Government with Kurma Venkata Reddy Naidu of the Justice Party as premier on 1 April 1937 . He also used the Minister for Public Health R . M . Palat to try and entice Congress legislators into supporting the government . Wary of his tactics , Congress leaders like S . Satyamurti started a campaign to convince Congress High Command ( Gandhi and Nehru ) to accept power within the limitations set by the Government of India Act . They also appealed to the British Government to give assurances that the Governors special powers will not be misused . On 22 June , Viceroy Linlithgow issued a statement expressing the British Governments desire to work with the Congress in implementing the 1935 Act . On 1 July , the Congress Working Committee ( CWC ) agreed to form Governments in the provinces they had won . On 14 July , Erskine had to swear in the Congress leader Chakravarthi Rajagopalachari as the Premier . Erskine had a cordial personal relationship with Rajagopalachari though they disagreed over some issues . When Rajagopalachari took a months leave , he requested Erskine to look after most of his duties . It is also alleged that Rajagopalachari suggested knighthoods for some his friends . However , there were disagreements over the constitution of the ministry . Erskine also opposed Rajagopalacharis usage of the Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1932 during the 1938 Anti-Hindi agitations:.. [ Rajagopalachari ] was too much of a Tory for me , for though I may want to go back twenty years , he wishes to go back two thousand and to run India as it was run in the time of King Ashoka . Erskine was also a regular visitor to the Nilgiri Hills . On a public reception accorded to him by the Kotagiri Panchayat Board in 1935 , he gave Kotagiri town the sobriquet , Princess among Hill Stations . The first regular radio service in the Madras Presidency commenced in 1938 when the All India Radio established its station in Madras . The Congress ministry resigned on 9 October 1939 over the outbreak of Second World War . Erskine declared an emergency and took over the reins of the administration . Rajagopalachari and other ministers were arrested as per Defence of India Act rules . On 21 February 1940 , Erskine repealed the unpopular law imposing compulsory study of Hindi in the Madras Presidency . Later life . With no hope of continuing a political career , and finding that representing the seat was very expensive , Erskine resigned his seat and went to live in his house at Ickworth near Bury St Edmunds . He continued to comment on Indian affairs , bemoaning the influence of Gandhi . His second son was killed in action in 1945 . Active in voluntary work locally , Erskine was appointed President of the Navy League . A major operation in the early 1950s damaged his health , and he died in 1953 during the lifetime of his father . References . - M . Stenton and S . Lees , Whos Who of British MPs Vol . IV ( Harvester Press , 1981 ) - John Francis Ashley Erskine in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography . - Obituary , The Times , 4 May 1953 .