Edward left one further gift for Philip, for whom he had such high hopes, stating in his will that it was his ‘special wish’ that his son should ‘maintain some connection with my parliamentary constituency’. This request merely emphasized an undertaking that he had sought from Philip before he died. Sybil remembered that when their father was ‘very ill and they knew he was not going to recover, they asked my brother to take his place’.27 It was also reported in the newspapers the day after Edward died that ‘it is freely stated that Mr Philip Sassoon … will be put forward’ as parliamentary candidate for Hythe.28
It was not unusual for sons to follow their fathers into politics, but the final decision on the candidate would be made by the party leader, Andrew Bonar Law. The former MP Sir Arthur Colefax was also staking a claim to the seat and his experience was much greater than Philip’s, who had made his first public political speech just a few weeks previously, an address to the Primrose Leaguefn13 in opposition to Home Rule for Ireland. Bonar Law was advised, however, to give the young Sassoon the chance to stand. This was not purely down to sentiment, but was chiefly because of the large financial contributions that the Sassoon and Rothschild families had made to the local constituency party funds over many years. Both Philip and Colefax addressed the meeting at Folkestone town hall where the local Conservative Party adopted their candidate, but it was clear that the overwhelming majority were with Sassoon.
Philip’s selection meant that there was no time to grieve for his father, as the by-election was to be held on 11 June. He threw himself into the campaign, building on the goodwill people felt towards Edward, and working hard to fulfil his father’s final wish that he should be elected. In his election address Philip set out his credentials as the Conservative and Unionist candidate: opposing home rule as something which would in his opinion cause grave troubles in Ireland, supporting tariff reform to give preference to goods imported from the British Empire, and calling for further investment in new battleships for the Royal Navy.29 He could certainly rely on the support of the Folkestone fishermen, who had carried Edward Sassoon’s banner and party colours on their boats moored in the harbour at the general election in 1910, and did the same during Philip’s campaign. They were set against the Liberal government’s free-trade policies that allowed French fishermen to land their fish in Folkestone tariff free, while British vessels were charged if they brought any of their catch into French ports. Philip also received backing from the licensed victuallers in the constituency, continuing the traditional support the Tories enjoyed from the drinks industry.30 He upset some of the more traditionalist Conservative MPs during the by-election by supporting the suffragette campaign for votes for women. At his first public meeting of the campaign, he was accused by some in the audience of being too young, but the newspapers reported that he ‘promised to grow out of that if they gave him the chance’.31 His performance at the meeting was also reported by the local newspapers as an ‘amazing success’.
On polling day the weather was fine, which was good for encouraging voters to turn out and, just in case, Philip’s campaign used motor cars to drive their supporters to the polling stations. The voters of the Hythe constituency safely returned to Parliament the young man they had known since he was a boy, with a majority almost exactly the same as his father had enjoyed at the previous general election. At the age of just twenty-three, Philip also had the distinction of being the ‘baby of the House’.fn14 Contemporaries of Philip’s such as Patrick Shaw Stewart were working to make their fortune, with the hope later of taking a seat in Parliament. Sir Philip Sassoon had now secured both through inheritance. Edward Sassoon’s vision of the life that was to open out for Philip had come to pass, but while the efforts of his ancestors could help to deliver him to the House of Commons, he would have to make his own reputation once there.
Max Beerbohm, the well-known satirist of the politicians of the day, depicted a sleek and impassive Philip Sassoon sitting cross-legged in the lotus position on the green benches, between two large, booming and red-faced Tories.32 He called the caricature Philip Sassoon in Strange Company. Philip was very different in appearance and manner from the knights of the shires and veteran soldiers of colonial wars who adorned the House of Commons. There were also very few Jewish MPs, and over 90 per cent of the Conservatives were practising members of the Church of England. But Parliament was starting to change with more businessmen and middle-class professionals, as well as the growing representation of workers and trade unionists from the Labour Party. The House of Commons Philip entered in June 1912 featured some of the greatest names in the history of that chamber, including statesmen like David Lloyd George, Arthur Balfour and Winston Churchill. It was also a time of political uncertainty as the Liberal government led by Prime Minister Herbert Asquith, whose wife Margot had been a close friend of Philip’s mother, was beginning to run into trouble. There had been Lloyd George’s great and controversial ‘People’s Budget’ in 1909, followed by the constitutional crisis over reform of the House of Lords, and the ongoing and intractable problems of the government of Ireland. The Conservatives had been in opposition for over six years, but they had high hopes of getting back into power at the next election.
Philip waited until November 1912 to make his maiden speech, speaking against the government bill on Irish home rule. Max Aitken (later Lord Beaverbrookfn15), the Canadian businessman, MP and newspaper proprietor, remembered that ‘It was an indifferent performance but it brought forth a flood of notes of congratulations not because he had made a good speech but because he had big houses and even bigger funds to maintain them.’33 Philip looked to put these to good effect as well, by hosting a grand lunch at Park Lane before the great Hyde Park demonstration in support of Ulster loyalism, with guests including the Unionist leader, Sir Edward Carson, and senior Conservatives like Lord Londonderry, F. E. Smith and Austen Chamberlain. Philip’s Unionist credentials were further established when it was reported that at a speech in Folkestone he had suggested that he would pay for a ship to take local army reservists to Ireland to support the cause of Ulster remaining free from the interference of home rule government in Dublin – although it was a promise that he later denied having made.34 These actions may reflect his early ambitions in politics and a desire to make a good impression, rather than a genuine conviction on his part. He was trying to be helpful in aligning himself with issues close to the heart of the leadership of the Conservative Party, but he otherwise made no great impression in Parliament in his first two years in the House of Commons. He certainly became much more liberal in his views on issues like Irish home rule after the war.
The years 1912 and 1913 marked a turning point in Philip’s life, and that of his sister Sybil. With their parents gone, youth had ended and adult life had been thrust upon them. This also brought them closer together. Sybil had been educated in Paris, while Philip was at school in England. Now they would both live in London. In 1913 Philip and Sybil had individual portraits painted by the family friend, John Singer Sargent, who captured their beauty and poise, presenting them both on the brink of fulfilling their youthful promise. More interesting was a second portrait Philip commissioned from his friend the young artist Glyn Philpot. In this darker painting Philpot depicts Sassoon dressed in the same formal clothes as in the Sargent portrait, but instead of looking away and into the distance, Philip’s head is turned and lowered a fraction to look at us. While still elegant, he appears a more human, lonely and less certain figure, carrying the weight of the responsibilities that have been placed upon him.
On 6 August 1913 Sybil, at nineteen, was married after a brief courtship to George, Earl of Rocksavage, the dashing heir of the Marquess of Cholmondeley. Philip had introduced Sybil to ‘Rock’; they had known each other through their mutual friend Lady Diana Manners. Sybil’s marriage added to Philip’s relative isolation at this time. She would depart on a honeymoon of almost a year in India, and when they returned set up home at Rock’s family estate in Norfolk, Houghton Hall, and their townhouse at 12 Kensington Palace Gardens. The marriage also caused a severe rift with many of their Jewish relations, particularly the Rothschilds, who took exception to Sybil marrying outside their religion. Philip gave