The Conversion of Lord Ripon in 1874

Abstract

Lord Ripon’s reception into the Catholic Church early in September 1874 caused a minor sensation in the world of politics and a howl of no-popery protest in the non-Catholic press. Ripon’s conversion took London society and even his closest friends by surprise. Victorians had long accustomed themselves to the steady drift of ritualists and Puseyites to Rome, but were puzzled when this wealthy nobleman, evangelical Anglican, ex-Christian-Socialist friend of F. D. Maurice, and Grand Master of the English Freemasons, was received into the Catholic Church on the Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin on September 8, 1874.

An Imperial Prime Minister? W.E. Gladstone and India, 1880?1885

“…He sought and attained the inclusion of educated Indians in their own system of local governance, even if the apathy of those potentially involved proved a recurring disappointment. 37 To be sure, Ripon's reform of local government was hardly revolutionary. As Gopal observes, "the resolution of May 1882 is not to be found at the head-waters of Indian nationalism."…”