The Cliveden Set was an upper class group of politically influential people who were "in favour of friendly relations with Nazi Germany".E. Black, '' (27/11/19) on Plymouth Live Prominent members included the Conservative MP Nancy Astor (Viscountess Astor), her husband Waldord Astor (Viscount Astor), and Edward Wood (Lord Halifax). In 1936, Waldorf Astor attended the Nuremberg rally at Hitler's invitation.Madge Dresser, 'Appalling or admirable? The complex legacy of Bristol's first woman MP' in The Bristol Cable Issue 21 (Oct.-Dec. 2019) The same year, the Set wrote to Prime Minister Baldwin in support of Hitler's invasion of the Rhineland.T. Golway, ' (24/01/00) on Observer Nancy Astor was "fiercely" antisemiticT. Finn, '' (28/11/19) on History of government and "chronically suspicious of Jews", believing in the "anti-Semitic fantasy of Jewish power". She discouraged her husband from employing Jews at his newspaper, The Observer and suspected Jews were behind what she saw as "appalling anti-German propaganda" in New York newspapers. Astor would mimic Jewish businessmen. She made "frequent outbursts against Jews". When speaking to fellow Conservative MP Alan Graham in 1938, Astor's used much antisemitic language, including informing Graham, "Only a Jew like you would dare to be rude to me". She said of Chaim Weizmann that he was "the only decent Jew I have ever met". Nancy Astor believed that Nazism would solve "problems associated with Communism and the Jews". Writing to US ambassador Joseph P. Kennedy, Astor advised that it would take more than Hitler giving "a rough time" to "the killers of Christ" before she would support launching "Armageddon to save them".Edward J. Renehan, Jr., The Kennedys at War: 1937-1945 (Doubleday, 2002) According to David Feldman, director of the Pears Institute for the Study of Antisemitism at Birkbeck, University of London, the Viscountess blamed antisemitism on the Jews: at an event held by a wealthy Jewish family, she said, "Did I not after all believe there must be something in the Jews themselves that had bought them persecution throughout all the ages?"Z. Tidman, '' (29/11/19) in The Independent Lady Astor's son, Jakie Astor, said that "the Jews" were one of his mother's "dragons to slay".Letter, '' (31/08/00) in The Daily Telegraph Astor received an endorsement from Churchill as she stood for election.
