Imperial Marriage: An Edwardian War and Peace

Certain lives epitomize an age, its glamour, its successes, and its broken dreams. Such were the lives of Lord Edward Cecil, his wife Violet, and Alfred Milner with whom she fell in love. The adventurous Guards officer Edward Cecil married Violet Maxse in 1894, as Britain reached its imperial zenith. During the Boer War, as Chief Staff Officer to Baden-Powell, he was besieged at Mafeking, while in Cape Town Violet, young, attractive and enterprising, fell in love with Alfred Milner, the High Commissioner responsible for British policy. Her love for him dominated the rest of her life.