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1st Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference
1st Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference
Host country	United Kingdom
Dates	1 May 1944–; 16 May 1944
Cities	London
Heads of Government	6
Chair	Winston Churchill; (Prime Minister of the United Kingdom)
Follows	1937 Imperial Conference
Precedes	1946
Key points
	Supporting the Moscow Declaration; Coordination of war effort

The 1944 Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference was the first Meeting of the Heads of Government of the British Commonwealth. It was held in the United Kingdom, between 1–16 May 1944, and was hosted by that country's Prime Minister, Winston Churchill.

The conference

Outline

The conference was attended by the Prime Ministers of all of the Dominions within the Commonwealth except Ireland and Newfoundland. Attendees included Prime Minister John Curtin of Australia, Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King of Canada, Prime Minister Peter Fraser of New Zealand and Prime Minister Jan Smuts of South Africa. Also attending was Prime Minister Sir Godfrey Huggins of the self-governing colony of Southern Rhodesia, and representing India was The Maharaja of Jammu and Kashmir. Members of the Churchill War Cabinet and the High Commissioners of the Dominions also attended.

Ireland did not participate although at the time the British Commonwealth still regarded Ireland as one of its members. Ireland had not participated in any equivalent conferences since 1932.

The British Commonwealth leaders agreed to support the Moscow Declaration and reached agreement regarding their respective roles in the overall Allied war effort.^[1]

Prior to the conference, Robert McIntyre and Douglas Young, the leaders of the Scottish National Party, lobbied King, Fraser, Smuts, Huggins, and Curtin, asking them to raise the issue of Scottish independence at the conference and to invite Scotland to take part in it and all future Commonwealth Conferences. Curtin viewed it as an internal matter for the British government, King was sympathetic, and the remainder simply voiced their acknowledgement of the communiques.^[2]

Participants

Ministers

Nation	Name	Portfolio
United Kingdom	Winston Churchill	Prime Minister (chairman)^[3]
	Clement Attlee	Deputy Prime Minister^[4]
	The Lord Beaverbrook	Lord Privy Seal
	Sir John Anderson	Chancellor of the Exchequer
	Anthony Eden	Foreign Secretary^[5]
	Herbert Morrison	Home Secretary^[6]
	The Viscount Cranborne	Dominions Secretary
	Oliver Stanley	Colonial Secretary
	Leo Amery	India and Burma Secretary
	Sir Percy Grigg	War Secretary
	A. V. Alexander	First Lord of the Admiralty
	Sir Archibald Sinclair, Bt	Air Secretary
	Sir Stafford Cripps	Minister of Aircraft Production
	Brendan Bracken	Minister of Information
	Ernest Bevin	Minister of Labour and National Service
	Oliver Lyttelton	Minister of Production
	The Lord Woolton	Minister of Reconstruction
	The Lord Cherwell	Paymaster General
Australia	John Curtin	Prime Minister^[7]
Australia	Stanley Bruce	High Commissioner
Canada	William Lyon Mackenzie King	Prime Minister^[8]
Canada	Vincent Massey	High Commissioner
India	Hari Singh	The Maharaja of Jammu and Kashmir
India	Sir Feroz Khan Noon	Delegate
New Zealand	Peter Fraser	Prime Minister^[9]
New Zealand	Bill Jordan	High Commissioner
South Africa	Jan Smuts	Prime Minister^[10]
South Africa	Deneys Reitz	High Commissioner
Southern Rhodesia	Sir Godfrey Huggins	Prime Minister^[11]

Military

Service	Head	Name
Army	Chief of the Imperial General Staff	Field Marshal Sir Alan Brooke
Navy	First Sea Lord	Admiral of the Fleet Sir Andrew Cunningham
RAF	Chief of the Air Staff	Marshal of the Royal Air Force Sir Charles Portal

AUS General Sir Thomas Blamey
UK Lieutenant-general Sir Hastings Ismay
NZL Lieutenant-general Edward Puttick

Diplomats and civil servants

AUS Sir Frederick Shedden Secretary, Department of Defence
CAN Norman Robertson
UK Sir John Stephenson
UK Sir Richard Hopkins Permanent Secretary to the Treasury

References

^ Ehrman, John (1956). Grand Strategy Volume V, August 1943-September 1944. London: HMSO (British official history). p. 332.
^ National Library of Scotland, Edinburgh. Acc. 10090, Papers of Dr Robert Douglas McIntyre, MB ChB, DPH, Duniv, JP. File 19: Letters to Commonwealth Prime Ministers 1944, and argument with Douglas Young 1951. Accessed 6 August 2014.
^ Churchill at the time was Minister of Defence and First Lord of the Treasury
^ Attlee was at the time Lord President of the Council
^ Eden was at the time Leader of the House of Commons
^ Morrison was at the time Minister of Home Security
^ Curtin was at the time Minister for Defence Coordination
^ Mackenzie King was at the time Secretary of State for External Affairs and President of the Privy Council
^ Fraser was at the time Minister of Foreign Affairs
^ Smuts was at the time Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister of Defence
^ Huggins was also Minister for Native Affairs