Enoch Powell
(1912-1998), Politician, classical scholar, linguist and poet(John) Enoch Powell
Sitter in 32 portraits
Started his career in 1938 as Professor of Greek at Sydney University. After the War he joined the Conservative Party and was elected MP in 1950. Controversial throughout his career, he held strong views on issues such as race, national identity, immigration and the United Kingdom's entry into the European Economic Community, which later became the European Union. He is renown for his 1968 'Rivers of Blood' speech in which he warned of what he considered would be the consequences of continued unchecked immigration from the Commonwealth to Britain. In a statement the day after the speech Edward Heath dismissed him from his shadow cabinet saying in a statement "I have told Mr Powell that I consider the speech he made in Birmingham yesterday to have been racialist in tone and liable to exacerbate racial tensions. This is unacceptable from one of the leaders of the Conservative Party".
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