I.

Introduction

Chamberlain, (Arthur) Neville (1869-1940), British businessman and politician, British Prime Minister (1937-1940), known for his appeasement policy in the immediate pre-World War II period. The son of Joseph Chamberlain and half-brother of Austen, he was born in Birmingham and educated at Rugby School and Mason College, Birmingham University. From 1890 to 1897 he managed his father’s plantation in the Bahamas before returning to Birmingham where he launched a successful business career in metallurgy. Turning to politics, Chamberlain was elected a local councillor in 1911 and he became lord mayor of the city in 1915. He resigned from the post during his second annual term to take up the post of director-general of National Service in 1917, but was dismissed in the same year by David Lloyd George.