For nearly 21 years after his resignation as Prime Minister in 1963, he abjured all titles, preferring to remain just plain "Mr." But on his 90th birthday Harold Macmillan finally gave in to the repeated entreaties of Queen Elizabeth II and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, and three weeks later, on Feb. 29, 1984, he was introduced into the House of Lords. He chose the title Earl of Stockton, after the working-class district in northern England that he had once represented as a Conservative Member of Parliament. Last week the Great Commoner, as he liked to be known to the end, died after a brief illness, at the age of 92. His death symbolized the passing of an era in British politics in which dedication to duty by privileged and talented men was combined with a tradition of fellowship and even of a sense of fun.
The ceremony at which Macmillan accepted the peerage was tinged with sadness. Robed in resplendent red with ermine trim, he seemed to personify Britain's decline as a great power. He stood frail and trembling, an aging lion leaning on a walking stick concealed beneath his robes. When it came time for him to affix his signature to the act of his ennoblement, Macmillan fumbled and had to be guided. Then, straight and firm, he held the paper containing the oath close to his failing eyes and read his pledge in a clear, ringing voice: "I Harold, Earl of Stockton, do swear by Almighty God that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty . . . "
Macmillan came to power during a brief but crucial episode in British history. In 1956 Britain and France invaded Egypt in response to Cairo's nationalization of the Suez Canal. But the British soon withdrew, confronted by the Eisenhower Administration's objections to the operation and a rising tide of criticism at home. In so doing, they also had to face a fact that they had resisted until then: the sun had set on the British Empire. After Prime Minister Anthony Eden resigned, ostensibly for health reasons, the Conservative Party chose Macmillan, a veteran politician, as his replacement.
Macmillan had first been elected to the House of Commons in 1924. During World War II, Winston Churchill dispatched him to North Africa as Minister- Resident at Dwight Eisenhower's Allied headquarters. In the 1950s he held a succession of Cabinet positions, including Minister of Defense, Foreign Secretary, and, just before going to 10 Downing Street, Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Setting out to restore the "special relationship" between Britain and the U.S., Macmillan liked to remind everyone that his mother was an American. He established a close rapport with President Eisenhower and later with President John F. Kennedy, who called him frequently during the Cuban missile crisis of 1962. "I was a sort of son to Ike," Macmillan explained, "and it was the other way round with Kennedy."
Macmillan gradually began reversing Churchill's famous adage, "I have not become the King's First Minister in order to preside over the liquidation of the British Empire." Macmillan's policy of accelerating independence for Britain's colonies was embodied in what was perhaps his most influential speech. "The wind of change is blowing through this continent," he told a hostile South African parliament in 1960. "Whether we like it or not, this growth of ((African)) national consciousness is a political fact."