again, but continued as the leader of a Liberal faction. After an awkward reunion with Asquith's faction in 1923, Lloyd George led the Liberals from 1926 to 1931. He put forward innovative proposals for public works and other reforms in a series of coloured books, but made only modest gains in the 1929 election. After 1931, he was a mistrusted figure heading a small rump of breakaway Liberals who were opposed to the National Government. In 1940, he refused to serve in Winston Churchill's War Cabinet in 1940. He was elevated to the peerage in 1945, shortly before his death. Early life David George was born on 17 January 1863 in Chorlton-on-Medlock, Manchester, to Welsh parents William George and Elizabeth Lloyd George. William George had been a teacher in both London and Liverpool. He also taught in the Unitarian-administered Hope Street Sunday Schools, where he met Unitarian minister James Martineau. In March 1863, on account of his failing health, William George returned with his family to his native Pembrokeshire. He took up farming but died in June 1864 of pneumonia, aged 44. David was just over one year old. His widow, Elizabeth George (1828–96), sold the farm and moved with her children to her native Llanystumdwy in Caernarfonshire, where she lived in a cottage known as Highgate with her brother Richard. Richard Lloyd (1834–1917) was a shoemaker, a minister (first in the Scottish Baptists and then the Church of Christ), and a strong Liberal. Richard Lloyd was a towering influence on his nephew until his death in 1917 and was the first to encourage his nephew to take up a career in law and enter politics. David adopted his uncle's surname to become "Lloyd George." Lloyd George was educated at the local Anglican school, Llanystumdwy National School and later under tutors. He was brought up with Welsh as his first language; Roy Jenkins, another Welsh politician, notes that, "Lloyd George was Welsh, that his whole culture, his whole outlook, his language was Welsh." Though Lloyd George cited the influence of his childhood throughout his career, biographer John Grigg argues that his childhood was nowhere near as poverty-stricken as he liked to suggest. Though brought up a devout evangelical, Lloyd George privately lost his religious faith as a young man. Biographer Don Cregier says he became "a Deist and perhaps an agnostic, though he remained a chapel-goer and connoisseur of good