Claude Maxwell MacDonald
The Right Honourable Sir Claude Maxwell MacDonald,
KCB (1852 – 1915] was a
British diplomat.
 |
Sir Claude MacDonald, c. 1900 |
MacDonald was educated at
Uppingham School and
Sandhurst, and was a soldier-diplomat. He thought of himself as a 'soldier-outsider' as regards the Foreign Office. He presided over the
Tokyo Legation in years of harmony between Britain and
Japan (1900-12), swapping posts with Sir
Ernest Satow who replaced him as Minister in
Peking.
As a military man, MacDonald led the defence of the foreign legations in 1900 which were under siege during the
Boxer Rebellion, and he worked well with the Anglophile Japanese Colonel
Shiba Goro. On January 30, 1902, the first
Anglo-Japanese Alliance was signed in
London between the Foreign Secretary
Lord Lansdowne and
Hayashi Tadasu, the Japanese Minister. MacDonald was still in Tokyo when the alliance was renewed in 1905 and 1911. He also became Britain's first
ambassador to Japan when the status of the legation was raised to an embassy in 1905, and was made a
Privy Councillor in 1906.
*
Heads of the United Kingdom Mission in Japan*
Historic list of members of the Privy Council*
Anglo-Chinese relations*
Anglo-Japanese relations* 'Sir Claude MacDonald: Minister and first Ambassador in Tokyo', by Ian Nish, Ch.9,
British Envoys in Japan 1859-1972, ed. and compiled by
Hugh Cortazzi (Global Oriental, 2004) ISBN 1901903516
