ABSTRACT
Russell was undoubtedly damaged by his cold personal manner and his anxiety to show that aristocrats could offer national leadership. Since the political situation forced Liberals and Peelites to attempt to work together, it was generally agreed that Russell was too partisan to head such a coalition; the Peelite Aberdeen was appointed prime minister instead, in December 1852. In April he commented that he felt he had 'done my duty' to the past and the future simply by introducing it. When the government was finally defeated on it in June, he resigned. Russell’s career is open to misinterpretation because of his personal and familial vanity, his preference for aristocratic colleagues, and his habit of justifying his actions by reference to the principles of past generations of Whigs. Reading Russell's biography in 1889, he commented that it 'takes two volumes Palmerston's occupies five.
