John Stuart Hay (27 September 1875 – 26 April 1949) was an English historian and author He was best known for producing the first full-length biography of the Roman emperor Elagabalus, The Amazing Emperor Heliogabalus. Hay later produced the Hay Plan to counter the Irish Conscription Crisis of 1918. After the war, he moved to Athens, Greece, and worked as an antiquities dealer until his death.
Early life
John Stuart Hay was born on 27 September 1875 in Shuttleworth, Lancashire. He grew up in a middle-class background and lived in Seaforth, Lancashire, before moving to Croydon in 1891. His education started at Whitgift Grammar School, now known as Whitgift School, in Croydon. Leaving it at the age of eighteen, he subsequently joined St John's College to read modern history.
Hay's middle-class upbringing can be evidenced by his inclusion in the 1896 Oxford University calendar in which he is listed as a “commoner”, the term used to describe students who lacked a scholarship or exhibition and thus could pay the tuition on their own. Hay attended St John's from 1895 to 1899 and was active in the college debating society. He graduated in 1899 with a 3rd class degree.
Religion and early career
On 11 March 1902, he arrived at Beda College in Rome, a seminary in which he trained to become a Roman Catholic priest. He spent the next two years at Beda College and was ordained as a Roman Catholic priest by the Archbishop of Trebizond, Edmund Stonor.
Hay's experience with Catholicism strangely came to an end in 1905 when he was received into the Church of England. He initially took a position at a small Oxford church called St Peter-in-the-East, which closed in 1965 and now operates as the library for St. Edmund's college on the Oxford campus. During Hay's time, it was a small church that served a congregation of mainly Oxford students and staff. Hay spent two years in this church, from 1906 to 1908, where he had nearby access to the vast library of his alma mater St John's College to aid his research into Emperor Elagabalus.
The Amazing Emperor Heliogabalus
In 1911, Hay published The Amazing Emperor Heliogabalus, the first biography of Roman emperor Elagabalus. Published by Macmillian, the book includes an introduction by the prominent classicist John Bagnell Bury who Hay cites as contributing significantly to research.
World War One and the 'Hay Plan'
After publishing The Amazing Emperor Heliogabalus in 1911, Hay decided to once again return to Catholicism in 1912 and stayed in the Catholic Church for the rest of his life. He made friends with significant figures within the Church and, during the war, attempted to use his friendships to turn the tide of Irish conscription, although damaging his prospects in the British military at the same time.
Hay joined the newly formed British Intelligence Corps on 9 September 1914 and was awarded the rank of Lieutenant. The Intelligence Corps awarded Hay a temporary commission under a condition known as “Temporary Gentleman”, a derogatory term placed upon temporary officers by their more experienced comrades. These “TGs” have undergone little training as the commissions were awarded on a merit-based approach or, in the case of Hay, by the needs of the service.
The Intelligence Corps was only founded in August 1914 by an initial cadre of fifty officers. Initially, the Corps was designed as a small force to accompany the British Expeditionary Force to France. It collected information on enemy movements and coordinated observations from the air. The Corps was then expanded for the first time in September 1914. The cadre included Hay, who was a valuable asset for information-gathering purposes, due to his ability to understand German, French, Italian, and Greek.
Hay's medal records indicate that he served on the Western Front during the war and was most likely involved in collecting information on enemy movements. By 1918, Hay was promoted to captain and attached to the Department of Information under English press Baron Lord Northcliffe.
The Hay Plan
On 20 July 1918, Hay received an order from William Sutherland, Lloyd George's Parliamentary Private Secretary, a member of the House of Commons who acted as the “eyes and ears” for the Prime Minister. This order, which came from David Lloyd George, was used by Hay to devise a plan to persuade Irish nationalists to volunteer to join the French Army as a way out of the conscription crisis that Ireland was undergoing in 1918.