Alexander Montagu, 10th Earl of Sandwich

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Family crest of the Earls of Sandwich

Alexander Victor Edward Paulet Montagu, 10th Earl of Sandwich (born May 22, 1906 in London , † February 25, 1995 ) was a British conservative politician .

life and career

Montagu was the eldest son of George Montagu, 9th Earl of Sandwich , and his wife Alberta Sturges. He spent his school career at Eton College and Trinity College at the University of Cambridge . After the death of his grandfather in 1916, he carried the courtesy title Viscount Hinchingbrooke . In August 1924, at the age of 17, he and his grandmother Lady Agneta Harriet Yorke, Countess of Sandwich (daughter of Charles Philip Yorke, 4th Earl of Hardwicke ), traveled the world via Southampton via San Francisco (September 1924), Honolulu , Beijing, Hong Kong, Delhi, Calcutta back to England. He then worked for some time in the factory hall of an engineering office. In 1926 he joined the 5th (Huntingdonshire) Battalion of the Northamptonshire Infantry Regiment of the British Army, where he made it to lieutenant. He then joined the Conservative Party and was private secretary to then Lord President of the Council Stanley Baldwin from 1932 to 1934 and treasurer of the Junior Imperial League from 1934 to 1935 .

Parliamentarians

At the beginning of the Second World War , he was only used briefly in France in 1940, only to be elected to the House of Commons as a member of the South Dorset constituency , to succeed Viscount Cranborne , a year later . Montagu, who was known as Hinch - borrowed from his title of courtesy at the time - was considered a radical backbencher , founded the Tory Reform Committee in 1943 , was its founding chairman and remained in that office for a year. It was at this time that he was writing the essays on Tory Reform , a response to the party's orientation towards liberalism and an attempt to find a new conservatism . He was re-elected to West Dorset in the following five general elections (until 1962). When his father died in 1962, he inherited the dignity of the Earl of Sandwich . Due to the associated membership in the House of Lords , he could no longer sit in the House of Commons.

In doing so, he made the biggest mistake of his career for his political career. Instead of supporting the official Conservative Party candidate in his old constituency, Angus Maude , he supported the anti-EC League candidate, Sir Piers Debenham . This fragmentation of the Conservative electorate led to the election of Labor candidate Guy Barnett .

In order to work again in the House of Commons, he gave up all his titles of nobility for life in 1964, in accordance with the Peerage Act 1963 passed the year before . He then ran, unsuccessfully, as a candidate for the Conservative Party in the constituency of Accrington in the 1964 general election .

Anti-European politician

In the election campaign he went against the opinions of his own party regarding a closer relationship with the EC. Montagu, an ardent imperialist , hated the European Common Market. He immediately declared his opposition to this political direction of his party. Loyal Conservatives called him a traitor to the party . Angus Maude said of him: I have known Lord Sandwich long enough not to be greatly surprised by everything he does. Harold Macmillan, who was friendly to the common market in Europe (who had just become his brother-in-law), classified him as follows: He belongs to that small group of people who really hate me.
Although he was no longer a member of parliament, Montagu was president of the anti-European Common Market League from 1962 to 1984 . He also joined the Conservative Monday Club in 1964 and authored The Conservative Dilemma in 1970 . A renewed candidacy in the 1970 elections was no longer supported by the party - his age was officially given as the reason, but his anti-EU opinion was probably decisive. He fought unsuccessfully against Great Britain joining the EC in 1973, declaring that he did not want to submit to the rule of frogs and Huns .

family

Mapperton House

Montagu married Rosemary Peto, goddaughter of Queen Maud of Norway and the only daughter of Major Ralph Peto , on July 27, 1934 . The marriage ended in divorce in 1958. The marriage had seven children:

  1. John Edward Hollister Montagu, 11th Earl of Sandwich (born April 11, 1943)
  2. (George Charles) Robert Montagu of Old Manor House , Evershot , Dorset (born November 25, 1949). married Donna Marzia Brigante Colonna in 1970.
  3. Lady Sarah Jane Helen Montagu (born August 25, 1935). She married Alessandro Enrico Ballarin on July 21, 1959 (divorced 1971).
  4. Lady (Elizabeth) Anne Montagu (born February 8, 1937). She married on July 8, 1961 Torquil Norman Patrick Alexander (born April 11, 1933), son of Henry Nigel St. Valery Norman and Patricia Moyra Annesley.
  5. Hon Henrietta Maria Montagu (born January 14, 1940)
  6. Lady Katharine Montagu (born February 22, 1945), married Nicholas Victor Hunloke, a grandson of Victor Cavendish, 9th Duke of Devonshire , on July 15, 1965 through his daughter Lady Anne Cavendish, her future stepmother.
  7. Lady Julia Frances Montagu (April 12, 1947 - May 19, 1995), married (1) on December 20, 1972 (divorced 1976) Martin Lee-Oakley and (2) 1976 Peter Gerald Edward Booth, with whom she has children .

In his second marriage, Montagu married on June 7, 1962 Lady Anne Cavendish , the youngest daughter of Victor Cavendish, 9th Duke of Devonshire , divorced in 1945 from Henry Philip Hunloke (1906–1978) and widow of Christopher Holland-Martin († 1960). The marriage was annulled in 1965 .

Montagu lived in Mapperton House in Dorset, whose important garden he expanded with an orangery in 1970.

Publications

  • Full Speed ​​Ahead !: Essays in Tory Reform , Simpkin Marshall Limited, 1941
  • The Conservative Dilemma , The Monday Club, 1970

Title (style)

  • 1906–1916: Hon. Alexander Montagu
  • 1916–1962: Alexander Montagu, Viscount Hinchingbrooke
  • 1962–1964: Alexander Montagu, 10th Earl of Sandwich
  • 1964–1995: Victor Montagu Esq.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Das Magazin 8/2013 April 26, 2013
  2. ^ Mapperton Gardens ( Memento of February 22, 2014 in the Internet Archive )
predecessor Office successor
George Montagu Earl of Sandwich
1962–1964
(waived) 		John Montagu
(from 1995)
personal data
SURNAME Montagu, Alexander, 10th Earl of Sandwich
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Montagu, Alexander Victor Edward Paulet, 10th Earl of Sandwich; Montagu, Victor, Viscount Hinchingbrooke
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British Conservative politician, Member of the House of Commons
DATE OF BIRTH May 22, 1906
PLACE OF BIRTH London
DATE OF DEATH February 25, 1995