Merlin Hanbury-Tracy, 7th Baron Sudeley
Encyclopedia
Society of Antiquaries of London
The Society of Antiquaries of London is a learned society "charged by its Royal Charter of 1751 with 'the encouragement, advancement and furtherance of the study and knowledge of the antiquities and history of this and other countries'." It is based at Burlington House, Piccadilly, London , and is...
(born 17 June 1939) is a British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
peer
Peerage
The Peerage is a legal system of largely hereditary titles in the United Kingdom, which constitute the ranks of British nobility and is part of the British honours system...
, author and veteran right-wing activist. In 1941, at the age of three, he succeeded his first cousin once removed, the 6th Lord Sudeley, to the Barony of Sudeley
Baron Sudeley
Baron Sudeley is a title that has been created thrice in British history, twice in the Peerage of England and once in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. The first creation came in the Peerage of England in 1299 when John de Sudeley was summoned to Parliament as Lord Sudeley. On the death of the...
and until the House of Lords Act 1999
House of Lords Act 1999
The House of Lords Act 1999 was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that was given Royal Assent on 11 November 1999. The Act reformed the House of Lords, one of the chambers of Parliament. For centuries, the House of Lords had included several hundred members who inherited their seats;...
sat in that body as a hereditary peer.
A member of the Conservative Party
Conservative Party (UK)
The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...
all his adult life, he was sometime President and also Chairman of the Conservative Monday Club
Conservative Monday Club
The Conservative Monday Club is a British pressure group "on the right-wing" of the Conservative Party.-Overview:...
for seventeen years. He is Vice-Chancellor of the International Monarchist League
International Monarchist League
The International Monarchist League is an organisation dedicated to the preservation and promotion of the monarchical system of government and the principle of monarchy worldwide...
.
Sudeley, who lives in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, has been married and divorced twice; he has no children.
Family
Sudeley's father, Captain Michael Hanbury-Tracy, a Scots GuardsScots Guards
The Scots Guards is a regiment of the Guards Division of the British Army, whose origins lie in the personal bodyguard of King Charles I of England and Scotland...
officer, died from wounds received at Dunkirk.
His paternal grandfather, Lieutenant Felix Hanbury-Tracy, also an officer in the Scots Guards, was killed attacking German positions near Fromelles on 19 December 1914.
His maternal grandfather, Lieutenant-Colonel Collis George Herbert St. Hill, the Royal North Devon Hussars, then commanding the 2/5 Sherwood Foresters
Sherwood Foresters
The Sherwood Foresters was formed during the Childers Reforms in 1881 from the amalgamation of the 45th Regiment of Foot and the 95th Regiment of Foot...
, was killed by a sniper at Villers-Plouich, France, on July 8, 1917.
Sudeley served his National Service
National service
National service is a common name for mandatory government service programmes . The term became common British usage during and for some years following the Second World War. Many young people spent one or more years in such programmes...
obligations in the ranks of the Scots Guards.
Education
Eton College
Eton College, often referred to simply as Eton, is a British independent school for boys aged 13 to 18. It was founded in 1440 by King Henry VI as "The King's College of Our Lady of Eton besides Wyndsor"....
, and later read history at Worcester College, Oxford
Worcester College, Oxford
Worcester College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. The college was founded in the eighteenth century, but its predecessor on the same site had been an institution of learning since the late thirteenth century...
. As a young man, studying at Oxford, he was offered the position of Tutor to King Hassan II of Morocco
Hassan II of Morocco
King Hassan II l-ḥasan aṯ-ṯānī, dial. el-ḥasan ettâni); July 9, 1929 – July 23, 1999) was King of Morocco from 1961 until his death in 1999...
whilst on a visit to the country. He would have been charged with teaching the King how to hunt, swim and shoot. Although able to ride a horse, he declined, wishing to continue with his studies. Sudeley has also lectured at the University of Bristol
University of Bristol
The University of Bristol is a public research university located in Bristol, United Kingdom. One of the so-called "red brick" universities, it received its Royal Charter in 1909, although its predecessor institution, University College, Bristol, had been in existence since 1876.The University is...
.
Political activities
Sudeley was an active member of the House of LordsHouse of Lords
The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster....
for thirty nine years (since he was 21, the minimum age one can take one's seat), introducing several measures, most notably the debate to prevent the unlicensed export of historical manuscripts and in 1981 a Bill to uphold the Book of Common Prayer which was cleared on Second Reading. He was one of the hereditary peers expelled from the Upper House by the House of Lords Act 1999
House of Lords Act 1999
The House of Lords Act 1999 was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that was given Royal Assent on 11 November 1999. The Act reformed the House of Lords, one of the chambers of Parliament. For centuries, the House of Lords had included several hundred members who inherited their seats;...
. He spoke out against the reform of the Lords, saying: "If it isn't broken why mend it?", and also that since he believed inherited titles were "inextricably" tied to the monarchy that it was "odd that they just want to touch one institution and not the other". He also cited the wealth of experience that the Lords had built up.
Since the early 1970s, Sudeley has been active in and sometime President of the Conservative Monday Club
Conservative Monday Club
The Conservative Monday Club is a British pressure group "on the right-wing" of the Conservative Party.-Overview:...
, and in 1991 he authored a booklet for them entitled and arguing for "The Preservation of the House of Lords".
In 1985 he was elected a Vice-Chancellor of the International Monarchist League
International Monarchist League
The International Monarchist League is an organisation dedicated to the preservation and promotion of the monarchical system of government and the principle of monarchy worldwide...
.
Western Goals Institute
The Western Goals Institute was a conservative pressure group in Britain, re-formed in 1989 from Western Goals UK, which originated in 1985 as an offshoot of the U.S. Western Goals Foundation...
, and on 25 September 1989, chaired a WGI dinner at Simpson's-in-the-Strand
Simpson's-in-the-Strand
Simpson's-in-the-Strand is one of London's oldest traditional English restaurants. Situated in the Strand, it is part of the Savoy Buildings, which also contain one of the world's most famous hotels, the Savoy....
for El Salvador's
El Salvador
El Salvador or simply Salvador is the smallest and the most densely populated country in Central America. The country's capital city and largest city is San Salvador; Santa Ana and San Miguel are also important cultural and commercial centers in the country and in all of Central America...
President, Alfredo Cristiani
Alfredo Cristiani
Alfredo Félix Cristiani Burkard, popularly known as Alfredo Cristiani was President of El Salvador from 1989 to 1994....
, and his inner cabinet.
In 2001, the then Conservative Party leader Iain Duncan Smith
Iain Duncan Smith
George Iain Duncan Smith is a British Conservative politician. He is currently the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions and was previously leader of the Conservative Party from September 2001 to October 2003...
publicly distanced the party from the Monday Club until it ceased to "promulgate or discuss policies relating to race"; he also indicated that no Conservative MPs should contribute to Right Now!, a quarterly magazine with which Sudeley was a Patron, after an article in it called Nelson Mandela
Nelson Mandela
Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela served as President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999, and was the first South African president to be elected in a fully representative democratic election. Before his presidency, Mandela was an anti-apartheid activist, and the leader of Umkhonto we Sizwe, the armed wing...
a terrorist. On (2 June 2006), The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
quoted Sudeley as stating, in a report of the Monday Club's Annual General Meeting, that "Hitler did well to get everyone back to work". It also reported him saying that "True though the fact may be that some races are superior to others", going on to suggest that such rhetoric might interfere with the Monday Club's hopes of being accepted again in Conservative Party
Conservative Party (UK)
The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...
circles.
He is Patron of the Bankruptcy Association (4th Lord Sudeley was foreclosed upon by Lloyds Bank
Lloyds Bank
Lloyds Bank Plc was a British retail bank which operated in England and Wales from 1765 until its merger into Lloyds TSB in 1995; it remains a registered company but is currently dormant. It expanded during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and took over a number of smaller banking companies...
in 1893, when his debt was covered twice over by large assets), and Convenor of the Forum for Stable Currencies
Forum for Stable Currencies
Forum for Stable Currencies is a political advocacy group in the United Kingdom seeking economic democracy through freedom from national debt. Founded in 1998, the group is a non-governmental organization without governmental funding...
. Lord Sudeley is also Lay Patron of the Prayer Book Society and a past President of the Montgomeryshire Society.
Interests
Sudeley once described in Who's WhoWho's Who (UK)
Who's Who is an annual British publication of biographies which vary in length of about 30,000 living notable Britons.-History:...
one of his hobbies as "Ancestor Worship", with "Conversation" being listed in Debrett's
Debrett's
Debrett’s is a specialist publisher, founded in 1769 with the publication of the first edition of The New Peerage. The name "Debrett's" honours John Debrett...
. His enduring love throughout his life, and in which he continues to take an active interest, has been for the former family seat of Toddington Manor
Toddington Manor
Toddington Manor is a 19th century country house in the English county of Gloucestershire, near the village of Toddington. It is in the gothic style and was designed by Charles Hanbury-Tracy, 1st Baron Sudeley for himself and built between 1819 and 1840...
in Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn, and the entire Forest of Dean....
, personally designed by the 1st Lord Sudeley
Charles Hanbury-Tracy, 1st Baron Sudeley
Charles Hanbury-Tracy, 1st Baron Sudeley , known as Charles Hanbury until 1798 and as Charles Hanbury Tracy from 1798 to 1838, was a British Whig politician....
to replace the mediaeval moated manor house built on land which had been in the family for 1,000 years. In its successful blend of the Perpendicular Gothic and Picturesque styles, Toddington is the fore-runner of the Houses of Parliament.
At Easter 1985, in conjunction with the century-old Manorial Society of Great Britain
Manorial Society of Great Britain
The Manorial Society of Great Britain was founded in 1906. It has a membership of approximately 1,900, comprising Lords of the Manor and feudal barons, peers, as well as historians, mainly from the United Kingdom but also some from Ireland.Its aims are:...
(of which he sits on the Governing Council), Sudeley held a conference at his old home entitled "The Sudeleys - Lords of Toddington", taking the history of his family back to Charlemagne
Charlemagne
Charlemagne was King of the Franks from 768 and Emperor of the Romans from 800 to his death in 814. He expanded the Frankish kingdom into an empire that incorporated much of Western and Central Europe. During his reign, he conquered Italy and was crowned by Pope Leo III on 25 December 800...
and Becket's murder. On 21 November 2006 he arranged a further conference at the Society of Antiquaries
Society of Antiquaries
Society of Antiquaries can refer to:*Society of Antiquaries of London*Society of Antiquaries of Scotland*Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne*Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland...
in Visual Aspects of Toddington in the 19th century.
Sudeley is an historian who has written a history of the English Gentleman for a German pharmaceutical magazine Die Waage, read by 30,000 German doctors; and is completing a history of the House of Lords to give ascendancy to its Tory
Tory
Toryism is a traditionalist and conservative political philosophy which grew out of the Cavalier faction in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. It is a prominent ideology in the politics of the United Kingdom, but also features in parts of The Commonwealth, particularly in Canada...
as opposed to Whig history
Whig history
Whig history is the approach to historiography which presents the past as an inevitable progression towards ever greater liberty and enlightenment, culminating in modern forms of liberal democracy and constitutional monarchy. In general, Whig historians stress the rise of constitutional government,...
interpretation.
Sudeley is also author of a satire on Greek mythology (published in John Pudney
John Pudney
John Sleigh Pudney was a British journalist and writer. He was known for short stories, poetry, non-fiction and children's fiction .-Education:...
's Pick of Today's Short Stories) and a quantity of politically incorrect short stories mostly published in London Miscellany. In the recent years Sudeley style-edited a definitive monograph on Azerbaijan's architecture translated from the Russian.
Sources
- Copping, Robert, The Monday Club - Crisis and After May 1975, page 25, published by the Current Affairs Information Service, Ilford, Essex, (P/B).
- Sudeley, The Rt. Hon.The Lord, Lords Reform - Why Tamper with the House of Lords, Monday Club publication, December 1979, (P/B).
- Sudeley, The Rt. Hon.The Lord, A Guide to Hailes Church, nr. Winchcombe, Gloucester, 1980, (P/B), ISBN 0714020583
- Sudeley, The Rt. Hon.The Lord, The Role of Hereditary in Politics, in The Monarchist, January 1982, no.60, Norwich, England.
- Sudeley, The Rt. Hon.The Lord, Becket's Murderer - William de Tracy, in Family History magazine, Canterbury, August 1983, vol.13, no.97, pps: 3 - 36.
- Sudeley, the Rt. Hon.The Lord, essays in The Sudeleys - Lords of Toddington, published by the Manorial Society of Great Britain, London, 1987,(P/B)
- Sudeley, The Rt. Hon.The Lord, The Preservation of The House of Lords Monday Club, London, 1991, (P/B).
- London Evening Standard newspaper, 27 March 1991 - article: An heir of neglect - A Life in the Home of Lord Sudeley (pps:32-33).
- Births, Deaths & Marriages, Family Record Centre, Islington, London.
- Mosley, Charles, (editor) Burke's Peerage, Baronetage, & Knightage 106th edition, Switzerland, (1999), ISBN 2-940085-02-1
- Sudeley, The Rt. Hon.The Lord, The Sudeley Bankruptcy in London Miscellany June 1999 edition.
- OK! magazine, London, issue 175, 20 August 1999, (7-page report on his wedding).
- Mitchell, Austin, M.P., Farewell My Lords, London, 1999, (P/B), ISBN 1-902301-43-9
- Gliddon, Gerald, The Aristocracy and The Great War, Norwich, 2002, ISBN 0-947893-35-0
- Sudeley, The Rt. Hon.The Lord, Usery or Taking Interest for Lending Money, published by the Forum for Stable Currencies, 2004, (P/B).
- Perry, Maria, The House in Berkeley Square", London,2003.