Cambridge Apostles

Founded in 1820 in two of principal the College S of the University of Cambridge, the Secret society of the Cambridge Apostles (Apostles of Cambridge) joins together since nearly two centuries the great names of the Littérature, of the Politique, the Philosophie, the Mathématiques and the economy of the the United Kingdom. Several members of the Bloomsbury Group formed part of it, but also some of the spies of Cambridge, without forgetting John Maynard Keynes, Bertrand Russell or Ludwig Wittgenstein.

Origins

The Secret society of Cambridge Apostles, also known under the name of “Cambridge Conversazione Society”, gathers since nearly two hundred years a intellectual elite within the Université of Cambridge. It was created in 1820 by George Tomlinson, a student of Cambridge which became later bishop of Gibraltar.

The term of “Apôtres” comes owing to the fact that the first members were twelve, the such twelve disciples of Christ. Since the origins until our days, the majority of Apostles are students; rare among them are the graduates or the teachers. For a long time, the company recruited its members in two of the most famous establishments of Cambridge: King' S College and Trinity College. From now on, it is not any more the case.

Angels and Apostles

As its name of “Conversazione Society indicates it”, it is especially about a club of discussion. The meetings are held once per week, traditionally Saturday evening, and one of the members delivers a conference on a subject prepared in advance. Then is held a general debate during which Apostles nourish toasts with sardine called the “steaks of whale”.

Apostles hold up to date a leather register connected (the “Book”) whose successive volumes go back to their founder and contain quantity of handwritten annotations on the whole of the subjects tackled by the speakers. The “book” is in the “Arch”, where one arranges the whole of the documents inherent in the company.

Once obtained their university degree, old Apostles name the “Angels”. From time to time, all both or three years and in the greatest secrecy, Apostles invite the totality of the Angels to dine in one on the colleges on Cambridge. Formerly took place an annual dinner, generally with London.

The students which one considers the admission call the “Embryos” and each one of them is seen invited to one evening where Apostles or not decide to accept it in their rows, while itself is unaware of that its commensaux thinks of recruiting it. If all occurs as well as possible, the ritual of initiation will then oblige it to swear the secrecy and to listen to the reading of the curses incurred in the event of failure with the rules, text written in the neighborhoods of 1850 by one of the members, the theologist Fenton John Anthony Hort.

Sometimes one reproaches Apostles the secret character of their association, as well as the quasi-absence of women among them, but also, and perhaps above all, the number impressing of Angels which made a brilliant career in Cambridge or exerted the highest responsibilities in the media, the government and the Église of England, which seems in contradiction with the levelling ideals preached by the university. In any event, many are old Apostles which evoked the depth of the feeling of fidelity which attached them to their comrades, and that their life during. The philosopher Henry Sidgwick wrote in his memories which its attachment towards this company was the bond most extremely that he had known during his existence.

The cohesion of the group

In the years which preceded the First World War, Apostles acquired the celebrity outside Cambridge thanks to the emergence of the intellectual coterie of the Bloomsbury Group. John Maynard Keynes, Lytton Strachey and its brother James Strachey, G.E. Moore, Desmond MacCarthy, Leonard Woolf and Rupert Brooke, old Apostles, counted among the founders of Bloomsbury.

In the immediate entourage of Bloomsbury were other Apostles, for example the novelist E. Mr. Forster, the painter Roger Fry (lover of Vanessa Bell) and the poet Julian Bell (wire of Vanessa Bell, nephew of Leonard Woolf and lover of Anthony Blunt).

But especially, in the field of the Philosophy and the political economy, a mutual influence was exerted durably between five of the most famous Apostles: the economist John Maynard Keynes on the one hand, and on the other hand four large English analytical thinkers of the 20th century, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Alfred North Whitehead, G.E. Moore and Bertrand Russell. There still, of the additional bonds with the group of Bloomsbury seem to have been very narrow.

Less glorious was renewal of notoriety of Apostles since 1951, when were born the suspicions which were to lead to the Scandale Five of Cambridge, in other words the business from the Espion S Britannique S with the service of the Soviet Union since the Années 1930 until the end of the Cold war. At least five men having access to the military secrecies of the British government transmitted information to the KGB (initially NKVD). Among the first four uncovered spies, one discovered two old Apostles, formerly students with Trinity College: Guy Burgess, officer of MI6, and Anthony Blunt, officer of MI5, Historian of art, director of the Institute Courtauld and person in charge of the collections of tables of the queen Elisabeth II. Blunt and Burgess were known to maintain a connection Homosexuel since many years. On the other hand, the two other double agents, Donald Maclean and Kim Philby, did not belong to Cambridge Conversazione Society.

Remained the question of the “fifth man”, i.e. of an additional “mole” whose intelligence services British knew the existence while being unaware of its identity. A long time one suspected the financier Victor Rothschild, old Apostle, which had lent a London apartment to his/her comrades spies, but nothing could prove that it was with the current of their activities. Contrary, the American press baron Michael Straight, him also old Apostle, admitted in 1963 having worked for the KGB. Anthony Blunt had contacted it since 1933, with the return of his voyage in Soviet Union, and the history does not say if Straight were its only recruit. She does not say either which is the “fifth man”, nor even if manpower of this network are limited to five spies.

For this period, popular mythology has associated Cambridge Conversazione Society not only with Bloomsbury, but also to the spies of Trinity College, their Marxist ideology and the homosexuality which seems to have prevailed among many Apostles.

Old Apostles

The date which appears between brackets is that of the admission among Apostles.

Sources

This article is inspired partly by the article.

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