The Corrupt Coterie

The Corrupt Coterie was a pre–First World War social circle made up largely of the children of “the Souls,” including the Asquiths, Grenfells, Horners, Listers, and Trees. Led by Raymond Asquith and symbolized by Lady Diana Manners, the group cultivated a deliberately unconventional identity, priding itself on intellectual seriousness paired with hedonism—political debate and poetry alongside gambling, extravagant parties, and recreational drug use. The Coterie reached peak notoriety in 1914–1915, attracting fierce criticism after the drowning of Sir Denis Anson and for continuing exuberant gatherings during wartime, which critics condemned as heartless “Dances of Death.” Their disdain for conventional emotion and morality shocked contemporaries, and the group was ultimately shattered by the war itself, which killed more than half its members, including Raymond Asquith, Edward Horner, and Patrick Shaw-Stewart.