MAUNDY GREGORY Purveyor of Honours.

Hardback. Political jobbery and corruption flourished during Lloyd George's last years as Prime Minister, and in particular to the sale of honours. Not only did Lloyd George establish a price scale, starting with £10,000 for a knighthood, but many of those whom he honoured were 'gross illiterate profiteers, doubtful in their reputations, vulgar in their lives', in the words of 'The Banker'. At the centre of this web of corruption and intrigue was J. Maundy Gregory, who operated as honours broker in chief and proved to be the most successful, selling more knighthoods and baronetcies than any other, and got away with it for a longer period of time. There was another, perhaps darker side to Gregory's life: his friendship with Edith Rosse, a middle-aged former actress who died under mysterious circumstances in 1932, leaving Gregory £18,000 just when he desperately needed money to save himself from exposure. Illus., Bibliog. and Index. 256pp. 8vo. h/back. V. lightly browned pp. o/w Vg+ in sl. sunned Vg+ dw. which has tiny green sticker 'spot' to sp.