Arthur Henderson

Arthur Henderson was born into poverty on September 13, 1863, in Glasgow, Scotland. Leaving school at age twelve to work in an iron foundry in Newcastle upon Tyne, Henderson joined the Friendly Society of Ironfounders, rising through self-education and moral fervor to become a union organizer and Methodist lay preacher. He was elected Mayor of Darlington in 1903, the first Labour mayor in Britain.

Henderson was a founding architect of the Labour Party, serving as its Leader on three separate occasions (1908–1910, 1914–1917, and 1931–1932). In 1918, along with Sidney Webb, he drafted the famous 1918 Labour Party Constitution containing the historic 'Clause IV'. During World War I, Henderson served in David Lloyd George's war cabinet, but became convinced that human survival demanded the total abolition of war through collective international disarmament and the League of Nations.

Serving as British Foreign Secretary in Ramsay MacDonald's government (1929–1931), Henderson re-established diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union and championed the League of Nations Covenant. In 1932, he was unanimously chosen by sixty nations to serve as President of the World Disarmament Conference in Geneva. Despite the rise of Hitler and fascist militarism, Henderson laboured relentlessly for peace until his physical exhaustion, being awarded the 1934 Nobel Peace Prize. He passed away in London on October 20, 1935.