High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The Rt Hon. Frederick Edwin Smith, 1st Earl of Birkenhead, GCSI, PC, KC (12 July 1872 – 30 September 1930), best known to history as F. E. Smith, was a British Conservative statesman and lawyer of the early 20th century. He was a skilled orator, noted for his staunch opposition to Irish nationalism, his wit, pugnacious views, and hard living and drinking. He is perhaps best remembered today as Winston Churchill`s greatest personal and political friend until Birkenhead`s death at age fifty-eight from pneumonia caused by cirrhosis of the liver.