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(Redirected from Walter Monckton, 1st Viscount Monckton of Brenchley) English lawyer and politician (1891–1965)

The Right HonourableThe Viscount Monckton of BrenchleyGCVO KCMG MC PC QC
Monckton (left) with Admiral Andrew Cunningham in 1942

Minister of Defence
In office 20 December 1955 – 18 October 1956
Prime Minister	Anthony Eden
Preceded by	Selwyn Lloyd
Succeeded by	Antony Head

Personal details
Born	Walter Turner Monckton (1891-01-17)17 January 1891 Plaxtol, Kent, UK
Died	9 January 1965(1965-01-09) (aged 73)
Political party	Conservative
Spouse(s)	Polly Colyer-Fergusson Bridget Monckton, 11th Lady Ruthven of Freeland (m. 1947)
Children	Gilbert, Valerie

Walter Turner Monckton, 1st Viscount Monckton of Brenchley, GCVO, KCMG, MC, PC, QC (17 January 1891 – 9 January 1965) was a British lawyer and politician.

Early years

Monckton was born in the village of Plaxtol in north Kent. He was the eldest child of paper manufacturer Frank William Monckton (1861–1924), and his wife, Dora Constance (d. 1915). He was head boy of his preparatory school, The Knoll, at Woburn Sands in Buckinghamshire, and attended Harrow School from 1904 to 1910. He played cricket for Harrow against Eton in the famous Fowler's match in 1910. He chose to enter Balliol College, Oxford, as a commoner, despite in 1910 having won an Exhibition to Hertford College. Whilst at Oxford, he played a first-class match for the combined Oxford and Cambridge Universities cricket team in 1911. In 1912 he obtained a third class in Classical Moderations and in 1914 a second in modern history. He was elected president of the Oxford Union in 1913.

Career

Monckton was called to the bar at the Inner Temple in 1919. In 1927 he was appointed legal advisor to the Simon Commission. He took silk in 1930.

Monckton served as advisor to King Edward VIII during the abdication crisis, having been Attorney General to the Duchy of Cornwall since 1932. He was Recorder of Hythe from 1930 to 1937. Thanks to his royal connections, he was appointed constitutional advisor to the last Nizam of Hyderabad.

He worked in propaganda and information during the Second World War and became Solicitor General in Winston Churchill's 1945 caretaker government, although he refused to join the Conservative Party.

After the 1945 general election, Monckton returned to legal practice. He also continued to serve as advisor to the Nizam of Hyderabad.

He finally joined the Conservative Party after the war and became a Member of Parliament for Bristol West at a 1951 by-election. Churchill soon appointed him to the cabinet as Minister of Labour and National Service, in which post he served from 1951 to 1955. He was Anthony Eden's Minister of Defence from 1955 to 1956, but was the only cabinet minister to oppose his Suez policy, and was moved in October to the post of Paymaster General, serving until the change of administration in early 1957.

Monckton was created Viscount Monckton of Brenchley, of Brenchley in the County of Kent on 11 February 1957. He had wanted to become Lord Chief Justice of England and indeed had been promised the job by Churchill and the two subsequent prime ministers, but in 1957 he decided instead to join the board of Midland Bank.

Monckton was chairman of Midland Bank (1957–1964), President of the Marylebone Cricket Club (1956–1957) despite reportedly once describing the club's main committee as making the Tory Cabinet look like "a band of pinkos", President of Surrey County Cricket Club (1950–1952 and 1959–1965), Chairman of the Iraq Petroleum Company (1958), and Chancellor of the University of Sussex (1961–1965).

In 1960 he headed the Monckton Commission (sometimes known as the "Advisory Commission on Central Africa"), whose report concluded that the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland could not be maintained except by force or through massive changes in racial legislation. It advocated a majority of African members in the Nyasaland and Northern Rhodesian legislatures and giving these territories the option to leave the Federation after five years.

Personal life

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He married Polly Colyer-Fergusson, daughter of Sir Thomas Colyer-Fergusson, the family who owned Ightham Mote, Sevenoaks. In 1947, he married, secondly, Bridget Monckton, 11th Lady Ruthven of Freeland, CBE, the wartime head of the ATS counterpart in India, the Women's Army Corps (India), and also of the Women's Royal Indian Naval Service (WRINS).

He was succeeded in the viscountcy by his son Gilbert, born of his first marriage, on his death in 1965 at the age of 73.

Arms

Coat of arms of Walter Monckton
	Crest A martlet Or. Escutcheon 1st & 4th Sable on a chevron between three martlets Or three mullets Sable (Monckton) 2nd & 3rd Or a chevron Gules a chief Vair (St Quintin). Supporters On either side a horse Argent crined and unguled Or gorged with a chain Gold pendant therefrom an escutcheon Sable charged with a roses also Argent barbed and seeded Proper quartering St Quintin (Gules a chevron Or a chief Vair). Motto Famam Extendere Factis Badge Within an annulet a martlet Or.

References

^ ODNB.
"No. 41000". The London Gazette. 12 February 1957. p. 979.
Devlin, Patrick, Easing the Passing, 1985. P 93
Woodhouse, David (2021). Who Only Cricket Know: Hutton's men in the West Indies, 1953/54. London: Fairfield Books. p. 125. ISBN 9781909811591.
R Blake, (1977). A History of Rhodesia, Knopf, p. 331. ISBN 0-394-48068-6.
P Murray, (2005). British Documents on the End of Empire: Central Africa, Part I, Volume 9, pp.lxxiv-v, lxxx. ISBN 978-0-11290-586-8
Burke's Peerage. 1959.

Pugh, Martin. "Monckton, Walter Turner". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/35061. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.); cited as ODNB.

Sources

The life of Viscount Monckton of Brenchley, Frederick Winston Furneaux-Smith, 1969
Walter Monckton, H. Montgomery Hyde, 1991, ISBN 1-85619-045-5
Cricinfo profile

External links

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded byOliver Stanley	Member of Parliament for Bristol West 1951–1957	Succeeded byRobert Cooke
Legal offices
Preceded byDavid Maxwell Fyfe	Solicitor-General for England May 1945 – July 1945	Succeeded byFrank Soskice
Political offices
Preceded byAlfred Robens	Minister of Labour and National Service 1951–1955	Succeeded byIain Macleod
Preceded bySelwyn Lloyd	Minister of Defence 1955–1956	Succeeded byAntony Head
VacantTitle last held byThe Earl of Selkirk	Paymaster General 1956–1957	Succeeded byReginald Maudling
Peerage of the United Kingdom
New creation	Viscount Monckton of Brenchley 1957–1965	Succeeded byGilbert Monckton

v t e Defence secretaries of the United Kingdom
Ministers for co-ordination of defence	Sir Thomas Inskip Lord Chatfield
Ministers for defence	Winston Churchill Clement Attlee A. V. Alexander Manny Shinwell Winston Churchill Harold Alexander Harold Macmillan Selwyn Lloyd Sir Walter Monckton Anthony Head Duncan Sandys Harold Watkinson Peter Thorneycroft
Secretaries of state for defence	Peter Thorneycroft Denis Healey Lord Carrington Ian Gilmour Roy Mason Fred Mulley Francis Pym John Nott Michael Heseltine George Younger Tom King Malcolm Rifkind Michael Portillo George Robertson Geoff Hoon John Reid Des Browne John Hutton Bob Ainsworth Liam Fox Philip Hammond Michael Fallon Gavin Williamson Penny Mordaunt Ben Wallace Grant Shapps John Healey

v t e Paymasters general of the United Kingdom
Parnell Stanley Knatchbull Baring Macaulay Granville Stanley Colchester Stanley Pleydell-Bouverie Lowe Donoughmore Lovaine Wilson Cowper Hutt Goschen Monsell Cave Dufferin Childers Adam Cave Plunket Wolverton Beauchamp Thurlow Beauchamp Brownlow Jersey Windsor Seale-Hayne Hopetoun Marlborough Crossley Causton Ashby Strachie Newton Henderson Compton-Rickett Walters vacant Chamberlain Joynson-Hicks Boyd-Carpenter Gosling vacant Sutherland Onslow Arnold vacant Walters Rochester Hutchison Munster Winterton vacant Cranborne vacant Hankey Jowitt Cherwell vacant Greenwood Marquand Addison Macdonald Cherwell Selkirk vacant Monckton Maulding Mills H. Brooke Boyd-Carpenter Wigg vacant Shackleton Hart Lever Eccles Macmillan Dell Williams A. Maude Pym Parkinson J. Gummer Clarke P. Brooke Caithness Ryder Belstead Cope Heathcoat-Amory Willetts Bates Robinson Primarolo Jowell F. Maude Hancock B. Gummer Stride Norman Dowden Mordaunt Ellis Argar Philp Quin Glen Thomas-Symonds

Cabinet of Sir Winston Churchill (1951–1955)

Prime Minister First Lord of the Treasury	Sir Winston Churchill (1951–1955)
Lord Chancellor	The Lord Simonds (1951–1954) The Viscount Kilmuir (1954–1955)
Lord President of the Council	The Lord Woolton (1951–1952) The Marquess of Salisbury (1952–1955)
Lord Privy Seal	The Marquess of Salisbury (1951–1952) Harry Crookshank (1952–1955)
Chancellor of the Exchequer	Rab Butler (1951–1955)
Foreign Secretary	Sir Anthony Eden (1951–1955)
Home Secretary Welsh Secretary	Sir David Maxwell Fyfe (1951–1954) Gwilym Lloyd George (1954–1955)
Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries	Derick Heathcoat-Armory (1954–1955)
Secretary of State for the Colonies	Oliver Lyttelton (1951–1954) Alan Lennox-Boyd (1954–1955)
Minister for Coordination of Transport, Fuel and Power	The Lord Leathers (1951–1953)
Minister of Defence	Winston Churchill (1951–1952) The Earl Alexander of Tunis (1952–1954) Harold Macmillan (1954–1955)
Minister of Education	Florence Horsbrugh (1951–1954; in cabinet 1953–1954 only) Sir David Eccles (1954–1955)
Minister of Health	Harry Crookshank (1951–1952)
Ministry of Housing and Local Government	Harold Macmillan (1951–1954) Duncan Sandys (1954–1955)
Minister of Labour and National Service	Sir Walter Monckton (1951–1955)
Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster	The Lord Woolton (1952–1955)
Minister of Materials	The Lord Woolton (1953–1955)
Paymaster General	The Lord Cherwell (1951–1953)
Secretary of State for Scotland	James Stuart (1951–1955)

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