Autograph Letter Signed ('HJ Gladstone') from Herbert John Gladstone, urging his friend and Liberal colleague Sir Francis Henry Evans to vote against the Government in Lord FitzMaurice's motion of no confidence over the handling of the Boer War.-+*

2pp., 12mo. On paper with mourning border. Headed by Gladstone 'Private'. Good, on lightly-aged paper. The letter concerns Lord FitzMaurice's motion of no confidence in the government, held in the House of Commons the following day. (The resolution, which had been introduced following British reversals in the Boer War, was defeated by 352 votes to 139.) Gladstone writes that he hopes that he was not 'too "stiff"' with Evans. 'The situation at the time was a bit acute, 70 men asking for that wh. I knew to be impossible. But I know that some are placed differently to others & undoubtedly you with your S. A. connection and Southampton are in a tight place.' He advises Evans to take his own course, '& though I hope you wont vote with the Govt. whatever you do I shall know is from the best motives.' Sir Francis Henry Evans (1840-1907), who served as Liberal MP for Southampton, 1888-1895 and 1896; and Maidstone, 1901-1906.