Death
He died in January 1963, aged 56, after a sudden flare of Lupus erythematosus, an autoimmune disease. His death left an opening for Harold Wilson in the party leadership; Wilson won the next general election for Labour 21 months later.
The abrupt and unexpected nature of his death led to some speculation that foul play might have been involved, the most popular conspiracy theory involving a supposed KGB plot to ensure that Wilson (alleged by the supporters of these theories to be a KGB agent himself) became prime minister. This claim was given new life by Peter Wright's controversial 1987 book Spycatcher, but the only evidence that ever came to light was the testimony of Soviet defector Anatoliy Golitsyn. Golitsyn was a controversial figure who also claimed, for example, that the Sino-Soviet split was a charade intended to deceive the West. His claims about Wilson were repeatedly investigated and never substantiated.
Gaitskell is buried in the churchyard of St John-at-Hampstead Church, north London. His wife was buried alongside him following her own death 26 years later.
Read more about this topic: Hugh Gaitskell
Famous quotes containing the word death:
“Sin their conception, their birth weeping,
Their life a general mist of error,
Their death a hideous storm of terror.”
—John Webster (c. 1580–1638)
“The things a man has to have are hope and confidence in himself against odds, and sometimes he needs somebody, his pal or his mother or his wife or God, to give him that confidence. He’s got to have some inner standards worth fighting for or there won’t be any way to bring him into conflict. And he must be ready to choose death before dishonor without making too much song and dance about it. That’s all there is to it.”
—Clark Gable (1901–1960)
“But the life of Spirit is not the life that shrinks from death and keeps itself untouched by devastation, but rather the life that endures it and maintains itself in it. It wins its truth only when, in utter dismemberment, it finds itself.... Spirit is this power only by looking the negative in the face, and tarrying with it. This tarrying with the negative is the magical power that converts it into being. This power is identical with what we earlier called the Subject.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)