The Order of the Allied Masonic Degree By Harold Prestige. 2nd edition by Frederick Smyth. viii + 121 pp. Illustrated. Published by Centennial Council No.110, 1999.

When I first arrived in the Grand Lodge Library in 1971 my curiosity was aroused by a rather elderly brother who appeared early in the morning on the same day of each week.
    He was given access to the 19th century masonic periodicals and spent the whole day going through a volume, page by page, making occasional notes.
    I soon learned that he was an eminent freemason, Harold Prestige CBE, and that he was involved in primary research which he hoped would lead to a centenary history of the Grand Council of the Allied Masonic Degrees.
    He achieved his aim for the centenary of the Grand Council in 1979, his history being quickly appreciated as the nearest that could be achieved to a definitive history of the origins of the various degrees which comprise the Order and of the Grand Council itself.
    Money being tight after the rabid inflation of the mid 1970s, his book was published in a very limited edition and very quickly sold out, secondhand copies being sold at a significant premium.
    Centennial Council is to be congratulated, first for considering a reprint of Prestige's volume and, secondly, for securing the services of Brother Frederick Smyth to edit and bring up-to-date Prestige's work.
    A Past Master of Quatuor Coronati Lodge No.2076, the premier lodge of masonic research, and for many years indexer of its Transactions, Brother Smyth has a knowledge of the smaller additional degrees in freemasonry which is probably unrivalled today.
    As a skilful editor, rather than re-writing Brother Prestige's history, he has skilfully integrated into it the results of research since 1979 and added new information, reflecting changes and developments in the last 20 years.
    The Grand Council of the Allied Masonic Degrees could be described as a deliberate accident. The five degrees that it encompasses were masonic orphans, practised as true side degrees.
    They drifted somewhat until a group of masonic enthusiasts met as the Metropolitan Lodge of the Order of St Lawrence at the Alexandra Palace, London, on 9 August 1879.
    Here, they discussed, among other matters, the formation of a College of Side Degrees, to take in control a number of disparate and unconnected degrees being practised in pockets around England and Wales.
    In 1880, to avoid a loose and uncontrollable federation, the Grand Council of the Allied Masonic Degrees was formed to bring some form of control over the degrees of St Lawrence the Martyr, Knight of Constantinople, Grand Tilers of Solomon, Red Cross of Babylon, Grand High Priest and Secret Monitor.
    The progress of the Grand Council was not uneventful and involved argument and careful diplomacy. Individual groups which valued their independence were slow to join and very keen to protect their idiosyncrasies.
    Brothers Prestige and Smyth sympathetically retell the torturous problems and the careful compromises which established the authority of the Grand Council, but preserved the delightful differences of the formerly independent groups.
    Central to this formative period was the problem of the Secret Monitor, especially after the formation, in 1887, of the Grand Council of the Order of the Secret Monitor.
    The problem was to gently fester for more than 30 years until Colonel Napier-Clavering (a fellow Northumbrian) held office as both Grand Master of the Allied Masonic Degrees and Grand Supreme Ruler of the Order of the Secret Monitor.
    With considerable northern bluntness and diplomacy, despite the fact that he was terminally ill with cancer, Napier-Clavering unravelled a Gordian knot, transferring all authority over the Secret Monitor to the Grand Council of the Order.
    In a very succinct manner, the history traces not only the origins and development of the Grand Council, but has sections on the history of each of the constituent degrees.
    These include relations with Grand Councils abroad, relations with the other degrees and Orders at home and useful appendices covering rulers and administrators.
    There is also the original Constitution of the Order, a list of councils active and extinct, the agreement with the Secret Monitor and the rituals and Year Books (a marvellous source of information, often neglected).
    There is also the inspiring address to the Grand Council by Brigadier Geoffrey Galloway, when he relinquished office as Grand Master in 1992.
    For any masonic student who is interested in building up a basic library and for any member of the Order this is a ‘must have’ book which I heartily recommend as a basic text on the subject.
    From conversations with the late Brother Prestige I know how difficult the research was and the paucity of primary material available. In continuing his work, Brother Smyth not only pays tribute to the originator, but also gives service to the Order, which it would be impossible to top, unless a cache of new records is discovered.
    John Hamill