Robert Bernays
Encyclopedia
Robert Hamilton Bernays was a Liberal Party
, and later Liberal National
, politician in the United Kingdom
who served as a Member of Parliament
(MP) from 1931 to 1945.
Bernays was the third son and fourth and youngest child of a Church of England
clergyman who became Rector first of Stanmore
, and later (1924) of Finchley
, both in North London
. He was educated at Rossall School
and Worcester College, Oxford
where he was president of the Oxford Union
in 1925. After university he became a journalist on the Daily News
(which became the News Chronicle
in 1930 after a series of newspaper mergers), and practiced the profession until entering government, despite occasional clashes with his employers because of the independent line he took in the internal clashes among Liberal factions in the late 1920s and early 1930s. Finding himself dropped by the News Chronicle after it supplanted the Daily News in the summer of 1930, he traveled with the then leader of the Liberal Party in the House of Lords
, William Lygon, 7th Earl Beauchamp
, to Australia
, and thence, alone, to India
. The result was his book about Mahatma Gandhi
, Naked Fakir (1931; published as Naked Faquir in the United States in 1932).
He stood unsuccessfully for Parliament as a Liberal at Rugby
in the 1929 general election
(losing, after the campaign was interrupted and polling delayed for six weeks by the Labour candidate's death, to the incumbent Conservative, the future Chief Whip David Margesson); but, following the positive reception afforded Naked Fakir, he was adopted as Liberal candidate for Bristol North
— a seat once held by the distinguished Liberal Cabinet Minister Augustine Birrell
— at the 1931 general election
. He was elected with a majority of 13,214 over the incumbent, Labour
MP Walter Ayles
, who had twice won the seat, in 1923 and 1929, when the non-Labour vote was split between two other candidates. That there was no Conservative candidate, in an election that saw the Conservatives win 55% of the national vote, does much to explain the size of Bernays's majority; and this fact, coupled with Ayles's record of winning when he had two opponents rather than one — he lost to a single Liberal rival in both 1922 and 1924, while beating a Liberal and a Conservative in 1923 and a Liberal and an independent in 1929 — likewise explains why, throughout the period 1931-1935, one of Bernays's chief preoccupations was to ensure that the Conservatives should hold him in sufficiently high esteem to refrain from opposing him at the next election. (Writing to his married sister Lucy Brereton in July 1935, he commented that "my problem is not to capture the Liberal vote but to hold the Conservatives".
Bernays made a slow start in the House of Commons — his maiden speech was badly affected by the stammer which continued to plague him in debate (he preferred making prepared speeches rather than impromptu interventions because of it), and he was hors de combat for some time in 1932 after having his appendix removed. That autumn, however, he visited Germany for the first time to observe political developments there; he subsequently developed an expert knowledge of the country and was a consistent and determined critic of the Nazis after their accession to power in early 1933. His account of his journalistic and political travels between 1930 and 1933, Special Correspondent, was published in 1934.
When the official Liberal Party (the 'Samuelites', so named for party leader Herbert Samuel) left the National Government
, led by Ramsay MacDonald
, over the tariffs-versus-Free Trade
issue in November 1933, Bernays (along with three other followers of Samuel: Joseph Leckie
, William McKeag
, and J. P. Maclay) remained on the government benches, with the Liberal National Party
MPs (or 'Simonites,' led by Sir John Simon), although Bernays himself, unlike Leckie and McKeag, did not yet openly become a 'Simonite.' As early as July 1934, however, in a letter to Lucy Brereton, he was distinguishing himself from "[t]he poor old Samuel Liberals" and their "frightful position"; yet in December of the same year, writing to Lucy once more, he referred to the official Liberals as "we" and called Samuel his "leader"; while in March 1935 he told his sister that he was "very seriously thinking" of "asking for the government whip". In short, he agonized about his party affiliation for some time. He was re-elected at the 1935 general election
as a "Liberal independent of all groups in the party" — again without Conservative opposition, though with a drastically reduced majority (over Ayles) of 4,828 — and finally joined the Liberal Nationals in September 1936 (though he seems to have been in negotiations with them even before the 1935 election). His decision to end his period of vacillation may have been motivated by a sense that he had burned his bridges with the official Liberals (no longer 'Samuelite', since Samuel had lost his seat in 1935 and the party was now led by Sir Archibald Sinclair), and that it would be hard for him to advance in his political career as an independent Liberal; while as a Liberal National he would be eligible for office in the National Government without having to go the whole hog and become a Conservative (an option which, many entries in his diaries suggest, would have been not only politically but also personally repugnant to him). It may also have been connected with the tragic death of his mother Lillian, who, after a long period of depressive illness and voluntary residence in nursing homes, was found dead in the River Thames just before Christmas 1935. Bernays's sense that he needed to recover his psychological equilibrium and rebuild his career after his mother's death and the publicity it provoked is evident in his diary entries from early 1936. (A coroner's inquest recorded an open verdict on Mrs Bernays, but suicide must have been suspected, at a time when the stigma attached to it could still be seriously damaging to any relative of the victim who was a public figure in Britain.) Bernays's father remarried in 1937; Bernays acted as his best man.
When Neville Chamberlain
replaced Stanley Baldwin
as Prime Minister in May 1937, Bernays was appointed as Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health
in the National Government
, serving under Sir Kingsley Wood. Wood was succeeded, upon being appointed Secretary of State for Air
in May 1938, by Bernays's old friend and occasional political patron Walter Elliot
. Personal loyalty to Elliot (the two had remained friendly even after Elliot, in 1934, had married Katharine Tennant, whom Bernays himself had courted in the early 1930s) may have helped to keep Bernays in his job after the Munich crisis that autumn, when Harold Nicolson and many of Bernays's other friends and associates thought he should have followed through on his earlier threats to resign because of the government's policy of appeasement
of Hitler and the Nazis. He moved in July 1939 to become Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport
(under Euan Wallace
), and held that post until he left government when Winston Churchill
took over as Prime Minister in May 1940. (Although he was on friendly terms with Churchill during the 1930s and sometimes supported his attacks on the National Government over such matters as India, their association seems not to have been close enough to keep him in office when it became necessary for Churchill to find places in his administration for members of the Labour Party.)
He was also, especially after their ten-week trip to East Africa in early 1937 as members of a governmental commission on colonial education, a very close friend of the writer and National Labour MP Harold Nicolson
, in whose celebrated diaries he is frequently mentioned. This, along with remarks in Bernays's own diaries and letters (such as "I suppose that what I really want in a woman is that kind of mental affinity which I get from someone like H[arold] N[icolson]" and
"he is very fond of me as I am of him" , has led to suggestions that they were actually involved in a discreet homosexual relationship. Previously Hugh Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster
had reported, to King George V among others, that Bernays had been a lover of the 7th Earl Beauchamp — Westminster's brother-in-law — on their Australian travels in 1930. (Bernays remained on friendly terms with Beauchamp after's the latter's disgrace and departure for exile in Paris, visiting him there at least once, in April 1936.) Whatever the truth of these rumors (and his published diaries are full of appreciative comments about the beauty of young women, some of whom he seems to have pursued with a view to marriage, which may suggest that he was at most bisexual — as perhaps was Beauchamp, who fathered seven children), Bernays eventually, in 1942, married Nancy Britton, the daughter of George Bryant Britton
(Coalition Liberal M.P. for Bristol East
from 1918 to 1922). Interestingly, he had met Nancy shortly before the collapse of his relationship with Leonora Corbett
. They had two sons.
Bernays joined the Army as a sapper in 1942 and was commissioned as a subaltern into the Movement Control Section of the Royal Engineers
in January 1943; according to Who's Who
he was promoted to Captain in 1944,, although his casualty record with the Commonwealth War Graves Commission lists his rank as Lieutenant. After he died in a plane crash in the Adriatic Sea in January 1945, while flying from Italy to Greece as part of a parliamentary delegation to visit British troops, no by-election was called, and the Bristol North seat remained vacant until the 1945 general election
, when it was won by the Labour candidate William Coldrick
.
Liberal Party (UK)
The Liberal Party was one of the two major political parties of the United Kingdom during the 19th and early 20th centuries. It was a third party of negligible importance throughout the latter half of the 20th Century, before merging with the Social Democratic Party in 1988 to form the present day...
, and later Liberal National
National Liberal Party (UK, 1931)
The National Liberal Party, known until 1948 as the Liberal National Party, was a liberal political party in the United Kingdom from 1931 to 1968...
, politician in the United Kingdom
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...
who served as a Member of Parliament
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
(MP) from 1931 to 1945.
Bernays was the third son and fourth and youngest child of a Church of England
Church of England
The Church of England is the officially established Christian church in England and the Mother Church of the worldwide Anglican Communion. The church considers itself within the tradition of Western Christianity and dates its formal establishment principally to the mission to England by St...
clergyman who became Rector first of Stanmore
Stanmore
Stanmore is a suburban area of the London Borough of Harrow, in northwest London. It is situated northwest of Charing Cross. The area is home to Stanmore Hill, one of the highest points of London, high.-Toponymy:...
, and later (1924) of Finchley
Finchley
Finchley is a district in Barnet in north London, England. Finchley is on high ground, about north of Charing Cross. It formed an ancient parish in the county of Middlesex, becoming a municipal borough in 1933, and has formed part of Greater London since 1965...
, both in North 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...
. He was educated at Rossall School
Rossall School
Rossall School is a British, co-educational, independent school, between Cleveleys and Fleetwood, Lancashire. Rossall was founded in 1844 by St. Vincent Beechey as a sister school to Marlborough College which had been founded the previous year...
and 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...
where he was president of the Oxford Union
Oxford Union
The Oxford Union Society, commonly referred to simply as the Oxford Union, is a debating society in the city of Oxford, Britain, whose membership is drawn primarily but not exclusively from the University of Oxford...
in 1925. After university he became a journalist on the Daily News
Daily News
Daily News or The Daily News is the name of several daily newspapers around the world, including:- Australia :* Daily News - United Kingdom :...
(which became the News Chronicle
News Chronicle
The News Chronicle was a British daily newspaper. It ceased publication on 17 October 1960, being absorbed into the Daily Mail. Its offices were in Bouverie Street, off Fleet Street, London, EC4Y 8DP, England.-Daily Chronicle:...
in 1930 after a series of newspaper mergers), and practiced the profession until entering government, despite occasional clashes with his employers because of the independent line he took in the internal clashes among Liberal factions in the late 1920s and early 1930s. Finding himself dropped by the News Chronicle after it supplanted the Daily News in the summer of 1930, he traveled with the then leader of the Liberal Party in the House of Lords
House 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....
, William Lygon, 7th Earl Beauchamp
William Lygon, 7th Earl Beauchamp
William Lygon, 7th Earl Beauchamp KG, KCMG, PC , styled Viscount Elmley until 1891, was a British Liberal politician. He was Governor of New South Wales between 1899 and 1901, a member of the Liberal administrations of Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman and H. H...
, to Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
, and thence, alone, to India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
. The result was his book about Mahatma Gandhi
Mahatma Gandhi
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi , pronounced . 2 October 1869 – 30 January 1948) was the pre-eminent political and ideological leader of India during the Indian independence movement...
, Naked Fakir (1931; published as Naked Faquir in the United States in 1932).
He stood unsuccessfully for Parliament as a Liberal at Rugby
Rugby (UK Parliament constituency)
Rugby is a parliamentary constituency in Warwickshire, England. It elects one Member of Parliament to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom using the first past the post system....
in the 1929 general election
United Kingdom general election, 1929
-Seats summary:-References:*F. W. S. Craig, British Electoral Facts: 1832-1987*-External links:***...
(losing, after the campaign was interrupted and polling delayed for six weeks by the Labour candidate's death, to the incumbent Conservative, the future Chief Whip David Margesson); but, following the positive reception afforded Naked Fakir, he was adopted as Liberal candidate for Bristol North
Bristol North (UK Parliament constituency)
Bristol North was a borough constituency which returned one Member of Parliament to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom from 1885 until it was abolished for the 1950 general election.- Members of Parliament :...
— a seat once held by the distinguished Liberal Cabinet Minister Augustine Birrell
Augustine Birrell
Augustine Birrell PC, KC was an English politician, barrister, academic and author. He was Chief Secretary for Ireland from 1907 to 1916, resigning in the immediate aftermath of the Easter Rising.-Early life:...
— at the 1931 general election
United Kingdom general election, 1931
The United Kingdom general election on Tuesday 27 October 1931 was the last in the United Kingdom not held on a Thursday. It was also the last election, and the only one under universal suffrage, where one party received an absolute majority of the votes cast.The 1931 general election was the...
. He was elected with a majority of 13,214 over the incumbent, Labour
Labour Party (UK)
The Labour Party is a centre-left democratic socialist party in the United Kingdom. It surpassed the Liberal Party in general elections during the early 1920s, forming minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929-1931. The party was in a wartime coalition from 1940 to 1945, after...
MP Walter Ayles
Walter Ayles
Walter Henry Ayles was a British Labour Party politician who served as a Member of Parliament for 11 years between 1923 and 1953....
, who had twice won the seat, in 1923 and 1929, when the non-Labour vote was split between two other candidates. That there was no Conservative candidate, in an election that saw the Conservatives win 55% of the national vote, does much to explain the size of Bernays's majority; and this fact, coupled with Ayles's record of winning when he had two opponents rather than one — he lost to a single Liberal rival in both 1922 and 1924, while beating a Liberal and a Conservative in 1923 and a Liberal and an independent in 1929 — likewise explains why, throughout the period 1931-1935, one of Bernays's chief preoccupations was to ensure that the Conservatives should hold him in sufficiently high esteem to refrain from opposing him at the next election. (Writing to his married sister Lucy Brereton in July 1935, he commented that "my problem is not to capture the Liberal vote but to hold the Conservatives".
Bernays made a slow start in the House of Commons — his maiden speech was badly affected by the stammer which continued to plague him in debate (he preferred making prepared speeches rather than impromptu interventions because of it), and he was hors de combat for some time in 1932 after having his appendix removed. That autumn, however, he visited Germany for the first time to observe political developments there; he subsequently developed an expert knowledge of the country and was a consistent and determined critic of the Nazis after their accession to power in early 1933. His account of his journalistic and political travels between 1930 and 1933, Special Correspondent, was published in 1934.
When the official Liberal Party (the 'Samuelites', so named for party leader Herbert Samuel) left the National Government
National Government 1931-1935
See also First National MinistryThe United Kingdom's National Government was composed of members of the following parties:*National Labour*Conservative Party*Liberal Party*Liberal Nationals...
, led by Ramsay MacDonald
Ramsay MacDonald
James Ramsay MacDonald, PC, FRS was a British politician who was the first ever Labour Prime Minister, leading a minority government for two terms....
, over the tariffs-versus-Free Trade
Free trade
Under a free trade policy, prices emerge from supply and demand, and are the sole determinant of resource allocation. 'Free' trade differs from other forms of trade policy where the allocation of goods and services among trading countries are determined by price strategies that may differ from...
issue in November 1933, Bernays (along with three other followers of Samuel: Joseph Leckie
Joseph Leckie
Joseph Alexander Leckie was a British Liberal, later Liberal National politician and leather manufacturer.-Education and business life:...
, William McKeag
William McKeag
William McKeag was a British politician, soldier and solicitor. His political affiliations changed over the years from Liberal to National Liberal, back to Liberal and finally to Conservative but he never wavered from a fierce loyalty to his native North East of England and was described in his...
, and J. P. Maclay) remained on the government benches, with the Liberal National Party
National Liberal Party (UK, 1931)
The National Liberal Party, known until 1948 as the Liberal National Party, was a liberal political party in the United Kingdom from 1931 to 1968...
MPs (or 'Simonites,' led by Sir John Simon), although Bernays himself, unlike Leckie and McKeag, did not yet openly become a 'Simonite.' As early as July 1934, however, in a letter to Lucy Brereton, he was distinguishing himself from "[t]he poor old Samuel Liberals" and their "frightful position"; yet in December of the same year, writing to Lucy once more, he referred to the official Liberals as "we" and called Samuel his "leader"; while in March 1935 he told his sister that he was "very seriously thinking" of "asking for the government whip". In short, he agonized about his party affiliation for some time. He was re-elected at the 1935 general election
United Kingdom general election, 1935
The United Kingdom general election held on 14 November 1935 resulted in a large, though reduced, majority for the National Government now led by Conservative Stanley Baldwin. The greatest number of MPs, as before, were Conservative, while the National Liberal vote held steady...
as a "Liberal independent of all groups in the party" — again without Conservative opposition, though with a drastically reduced majority (over Ayles) of 4,828 — and finally joined the Liberal Nationals in September 1936 (though he seems to have been in negotiations with them even before the 1935 election). His decision to end his period of vacillation may have been motivated by a sense that he had burned his bridges with the official Liberals (no longer 'Samuelite', since Samuel had lost his seat in 1935 and the party was now led by Sir Archibald Sinclair), and that it would be hard for him to advance in his political career as an independent Liberal; while as a Liberal National he would be eligible for office in the National Government without having to go the whole hog and become a Conservative (an option which, many entries in his diaries suggest, would have been not only politically but also personally repugnant to him). It may also have been connected with the tragic death of his mother Lillian, who, after a long period of depressive illness and voluntary residence in nursing homes, was found dead in the River Thames just before Christmas 1935. Bernays's sense that he needed to recover his psychological equilibrium and rebuild his career after his mother's death and the publicity it provoked is evident in his diary entries from early 1936. (A coroner's inquest recorded an open verdict on Mrs Bernays, but suicide must have been suspected, at a time when the stigma attached to it could still be seriously damaging to any relative of the victim who was a public figure in Britain.) Bernays's father remarried in 1937; Bernays acted as his best man.
When Neville Chamberlain
Neville Chamberlain
Arthur Neville Chamberlain FRS was a British Conservative politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from May 1937 to May 1940. Chamberlain is best known for his appeasement foreign policy, and in particular for his signing of the Munich Agreement in 1938, conceding the...
replaced Stanley Baldwin
Stanley Baldwin
Stanley Baldwin, 1st Earl Baldwin of Bewdley, KG, PC was a British Conservative politician, who dominated the government in his country between the two world wars...
as Prime Minister in May 1937, Bernays was appointed as Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health
Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health
The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health was a junior ministerial office in the United Kingdom Government.The Ministry of Health was created in 1919 as a reconstruction of the Local Government Board...
in the National Government
National Government 1935-1940
Members of the Cabinet are in bold face.-Source:*D. Butler and G. Butler, Twentieth Century British Political Facts 1900–2000....
, serving under Sir Kingsley Wood. Wood was succeeded, upon being appointed Secretary of State for Air
Secretary of State for Air
The Secretary of State for Air was a cabinet level British position. The person holding this position was in charge of the Air Ministry. It was created on 10 January 1919 to manage the Royal Air Force...
in May 1938, by Bernays's old friend and occasional political patron Walter Elliot
Walter Elliot
Walter Elliot may refer to;*Walter Elliot Scottish Indian civil servant*Walter Elliot , British MP*Walter Elliot , British MP- See also :...
. Personal loyalty to Elliot (the two had remained friendly even after Elliot, in 1934, had married Katharine Tennant, whom Bernays himself had courted in the early 1930s) may have helped to keep Bernays in his job after the Munich crisis that autumn, when Harold Nicolson and many of Bernays's other friends and associates thought he should have followed through on his earlier threats to resign because of the government's policy of appeasement
Appeasement
The term appeasement is commonly understood to refer to a diplomatic policy aimed at avoiding war by making concessions to another power. Historian Paul Kennedy defines it as "the policy of settling international quarrels by admitting and satisfying grievances through rational negotiation and...
of Hitler and the Nazis. He moved in July 1939 to become Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport
Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport
Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport was a junior position at the British Ministry of Transport. The office was renamed Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of War Transport in 1941, but resumed its former name at the end of the Second World War.-Parliamentary Secretaries to the...
(under Euan Wallace
Euan Wallace
Captain David Euan Wallace, MC, MP, PC was a British Conservative politician who briefly served as Minister of Transport during World War II...
), and held that post until he left government when Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, was a predominantly Conservative British politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century and served as Prime Minister twice...
took over as Prime Minister in May 1940. (Although he was on friendly terms with Churchill during the 1930s and sometimes supported his attacks on the National Government over such matters as India, their association seems not to have been close enough to keep him in office when it became necessary for Churchill to find places in his administration for members of the Labour Party.)
He was also, especially after their ten-week trip to East Africa in early 1937 as members of a governmental commission on colonial education, a very close friend of the writer and National Labour MP Harold Nicolson
Harold Nicolson
Sir Harold George Nicolson KCVO CMG was an English diplomat, author, diarist and politician. He was the husband of writer Vita Sackville-West, their unusual relationship being described in their son's book, Portrait of a Marriage.-Early life:Nicolson was born in Tehran, Persia, the younger son of...
, in whose celebrated diaries he is frequently mentioned. This, along with remarks in Bernays's own diaries and letters (such as "I suppose that what I really want in a woman is that kind of mental affinity which I get from someone like H[arold] N[icolson]" and
"he is very fond of me as I am of him" , has led to suggestions that they were actually involved in a discreet homosexual relationship. Previously Hugh Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster
Hugh Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster
Hugh Richard Arthur Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster GCVO DSO was the son of Victor Alexander Grosvenor, Earl Grosvenor and Lady Sibell Mary Lumley, the daughter of the 9th Earl of Scarborough...
had reported, to King George V among others, that Bernays had been a lover of the 7th Earl Beauchamp — Westminster's brother-in-law — on their Australian travels in 1930. (Bernays remained on friendly terms with Beauchamp after's the latter's disgrace and departure for exile in Paris, visiting him there at least once, in April 1936.) Whatever the truth of these rumors (and his published diaries are full of appreciative comments about the beauty of young women, some of whom he seems to have pursued with a view to marriage, which may suggest that he was at most bisexual — as perhaps was Beauchamp, who fathered seven children), Bernays eventually, in 1942, married Nancy Britton, the daughter of George Bryant Britton
George Bryant Britton
George Bryant Britton was an English boot and shoe manufacturer and Liberal Party Member of Parliament.-Date of Birth:According to usually reliable sources, i.e. Who Was Who, Oxford University Press and Leigh Rayment's peerage page, Britton was born in 1863. Another source however indicates he...
(Coalition Liberal M.P. for Bristol East
Bristol East
Bristol East is a borough constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elects one Member of Parliament by the first past the post system of election.-Boundaries:...
from 1918 to 1922). Interestingly, he had met Nancy shortly before the collapse of his relationship with Leonora Corbett
Leonora Corbett
Leonora Corbett was a British film actress.On leaving school she studied art but later decided that she would prefer the stage. She made her debut at Cambridge and later appeared on the London stage before appearing on the screen, with Love on Wheels her film debut.-Selected filmography:* Love on...
. They had two sons.
Bernays joined the Army as a sapper in 1942 and was commissioned as a subaltern into the Movement Control Section of the Royal Engineers
Royal Engineers
The Corps of Royal Engineers, usually just called the Royal Engineers , and commonly known as the Sappers, is one of the corps of the British Army....
in January 1943; according to Who's Who
Who's Who
Who's Who is the title of a number of reference publications, generally containing concise biographical information on a particular group of people...
he was promoted to Captain in 1944,, although his casualty record with the Commonwealth War Graves Commission lists his rank as Lieutenant. After he died in a plane crash in the Adriatic Sea in January 1945, while flying from Italy to Greece as part of a parliamentary delegation to visit British troops, no by-election was called, and the Bristol North seat remained vacant until the 1945 general election
United Kingdom general election, 1945
The United Kingdom general election of 1945 was a general election held on 5 July 1945, with polls in some constituencies delayed until 12 July and in Nelson and Colne until 19 July, due to local wakes weeks. The results were counted and declared on 26 July, due in part to the time it took to...
, when it was won by the Labour candidate William Coldrick
William Coldrick
William Coldrick was a Labour Co-operative politician in the United Kingdom.He was elected as Member of Parliament for Bristol North at the 1945 general election. When that constituency was abolished in boundary changes for the 1950 general election, he was returned to Parliament for the new...
.