SAYE AND SELE, Rt Hon 21st Baron DL (1920-2024)

[colinp]

The 21st Lord Saye and Sele (Nathaniel Thomas Allen FIENNES) died on 20 January 2024 aged 103 - see oblt in the Telegraph -  Lord Saye and Sele, custodian of Broughton Castle and one of the first soldiers to enter Belsen – obituary (telegraph.co.uk)

He was the son of Ivo Murray TWISLETON-WYKEHAM-FIENNES, 20th Baron (1885-1968) and (m 1919) Hersey Cecilia Hester BUTLER (1889-1968).  He m 1958 Mariette Helena SALISBURY-JONES  and had 4 sons (two sons predeceased him) and a dau.  

His elder surviving son Hon Martin Guy FIENNES b 1961 succeeds as 22nd Baron Saye and Sele (subject to proving his claim).  He m 1996 Pauline Kang Chai LIAN and has issue:

Hon Guy Winston Ye b 1997 (ha)

Hon Ned Richard Ling b 1999

Hon Ivo Nathaniel Lei b 2000

EXTRACTS:

Lord Saye and Sele, custodian of Broughton Castle and one of the first soldiers to enter Belsen – obituary

‘All I have to say is that if anyone ever denies the Holocaust, I’m very glad to stand up and tell them that I saw Belsen’

Nathaniel Fiennes, Lord Saye and Sele, who has died aged 103, was a land agent who devoted much of his energy to restoring and maintaining Broughton Castle, the beautiful moated medieval mansion near Banbury, Oxfordshire which had been in his family since 1377. 

Known as Nat to family and friends, Lord Saye was 21st in a line that started in 1447. The first Lord Saye fought at Agincourt and was Treasurer of England before being beheaded in Jack Cade’s Rebellion of 1450 (“He can speak French; and therefore he is a traitor,” Shakespeare’s rebel explains in Henry VI Part 2).

Another ancestor, the 8th Lord Saye, was a key figure in the Parliamentarian opposition to King Charles I along with John Hampden and John Pym. Saye raised troops to fight against the king at the inconclusive Battle of Edgehill in 1642, and in retaliation Royalist troops occupied Broughton Castle from October 1642 to 1644. Charles I had nicknamed him “Old Subtlety” in the years preceding the Civil War. After it, Lord Saye promoted a middle way and opposed the King’s execution. He was pardoned by Charles II and died in 1662. 

The wider family now includes the actor brothers Ralph (The English Patient) and Joseph Fiennes (Shakespeare in Love) and the explorer Sir Ranulph Fiennes.

Broughton Castle became the family seat in 1448, when William Fiennes, 2nd Baron Saye and Sele, married a descendant of William of Wykeham, Bishop of Winchester and founder of Winchester College and New College, Oxford, who had bought the house in 1377. 

In the 1550s, under Elizabeth I, the family modernised Wykeham’s manor house, built in the early 1300s, after which, apart from the addition of plaster ceilings in the 18th century, it remained almost unchanged. Broughton Castle is therefore a prime example of a late medieval mansion, enhanced by Tudor architects but unspoiled by any later alterations. James Lees-Milne described it as “the most romantic house imaginable. English to the core.”

The Fiennes family (which extended the name to Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes in the mid-19th century) were well off but never hugely wealthy. Much of what they did have in land and money was dissipated by the colourful 15th Baron (known as “The Regency Buck”) who by 1847 had gambled and drunk his way through most of the family fortune, even selling the swans from the Castle moat. Most of the rest was lost by the horse-racing extravagances of the 17th Baron in the late 19th Century….

Lord Saye was realistic about the place of the aristocracy in the modern world. He did not attend the House of Lords, needing a full-time job to help with Broughton’s costs, and anyway believing it was right to abolish the voting rights of hereditary peers. He was often mistaken for the gardener, and was not too proud to turn himself into the car-park attendant on busy days, still going out in a hi-vis vest in his early 90s.

“One’s got to be prepared to live in a modest way,” he observed. “It’s no good thinking you’ve got to have a Bentley and a butler - that’ll break you.”

But he had no doubts about the vital importance of the hereditary principle in preserving Britain’s architectural heritage for the public benefit. In 1988, when the Environment Secretary Nicholas Ridley argued that if hereditary owners could not afford to maintain their stately piles they should sell out to those who could, he disagreed strongly, suggesting that the family link to a property was the most cost-effective way of preserving the fabric and “soul” of a place….

He was born Nathaniel Thomas Allen Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes on September 22 1920, the eldest son of Ivo Murray Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes. His mother, Hersey, was the daughter of Sir Thomas Butler, Yeoman Usher of the Black Rod. Nat was born in his grandfather’s grace-and-favour apartment in the Victoria Tower of the House of Lords, making him – perhaps uniquely – a Lord born in the Lords. In 1965, in a move characteristic of his discomfort with showiness and excess, Nat would relinquish the names Twisleton-Wykeham by deed poll….

Lord Saye inherited the title on his father’s death in 1968. In 1958 he married Mariette, the daughter of Major-General Sir (Arthur) Guy Salisbury-Jones, GCVO, CMG, CBE, MC, with whom he had a daughter and four sons, of whom the youngest is the writer William Fiennes. 

Lord Saye experienced great tragedy in his personal life. In The Music Room, published in 2009, William Fiennes recalled the shadows cast over family life by the death in 1968 of his parents’ third son, Thomas, aged nearly three, and the increasingly wayward behaviour of his eldest brother, Richard.

From the age of two Richard had suffered from epilepsy; brain damage sustained during repeated seizures meant that, though often happy and delightful, he could also be aggressive and sometimes violent.

Lord and Lady Saye showed saintly patience with their son and loved him unconditionally. But one image in The Music Room gives a sense of the burden they carried. After Richard, in a fury, had driven a metal bar through two windows, William recalled chancing upon his father outside, his head down and his palm pressed against a buttress. “I asked him what he was doing,” William wrote. “He said he was asking the house for some of its strength.”

In the 1990s Richard moved to live at an epilepsy centre in Cheshire but would often stay with his parents at weekends. It was during one of these visits, in 2001, that he died during an epileptic seizure aged 41.

Lord Saye and Sele is survived by his wife, his daughter, the artist Susannah Fiennes, and two sons, of whom the elder, Martin, born in 1961, inherits the title and the castle.

Lord Saye and Sele, born September 22 1920, died January 20 2024 

[colinp]

He was the oldest living peer.  The oldest living peer is now the Earl of Elgin and Kincardine b 17 Feb 1924

It is (possibly) unusual in recent years for there to be no centenarian peer or baronet living

[BREMENMURRAY]

He regularly greeted paying visitors to his home. I had a conversation with him in 2018.He had a great interest in the Cathedrals of England his brother having been Dean of Lincoln. He told me one his favourites was "the Ship of the Fens "Ely Cathedral

[dpth...@gmail.com]

Probably he was only 15th Baron, as Burke's has it. He was 21st Baron if the 1447 creation was not to heirs male, as it is usually presumed to be. Here is some history of this old Peerage:


Sir William Fiennes, d.1359; m.Joan de Say, dau of Geoffrey, 2nd Lord Say; on the death of her niece Elizabeth in 1399 she and her sister, and their issue, became co-heirs to that Barony
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Sir William, of Herstmonceux (1 Aug 1357-18 Jan 1403); m.Elizabeth Batesford [Batisford]
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James (ca 1395-k.by a mob 4 Jul 1450), cr ca 1447 Lord Saye and Sele, probably with remainder to issue male; m.Emiline Cromer [or Crowmer] (d.5 Jan 1452)
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William, 2nd Lord Saye and Sele (ca 1428-k.a. Barnet 14 Apr 1471); m.Margaret Wykeham alias Perrott
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Henry, 3rd Lord Saye and Sele, d.1 Aug 1476; m.Anne Harcourt; GEC and Burke’s say he was b. ca 1460, but his son was b.1471; he and his successors until 1603 are sometimes called “de jure” Lords, because never summoned to Parliament, but the creation seems to have been by Patent, not by summons
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Richard, 4th Lord Saye and Sele (1471-30 Sep/1 Oct 1501); m.Elizabeth Croft
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Edward, 5th Lord Saye and Sele (ca 1500-7 Mar 1528 [per GEC; Collins says 25 Sep 1529]); m.ca 1518 Margaret Danvers
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Sir Richard, 6th Lord Saye and Sele (1520-3 Aug 1573 [1579, per Collins]); m.Ursula Fermor
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Richard, 7th Lord Saye and Sele (ca 1557-d.shortly before 6 Feb 1613); his predecessors since 1471 not having taken their seats in Parliament, and having sometimes not used the title at all, in 1604 he obtained a patent confirming to him the Barony, but this time with remainder to issue general, to descend as if the title had been cr by summons; this is sometimes presumed to be a new creation; he m.1st by 1581 Constance Kingsmill (fl Apr 1587); m.2nd Mrs Elizabeth Paulet, née Codingham (d.1632)
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William, 8th and 2nd Lord Saye and Sele, cr 1624 Viscount of Saye and Sele (28 May 1582-14 Apr 1662); m.ca 1602 Elizabeth Temple (d.1648)
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James, 2nd Viscount Saye and Sele, 9th and 3rd Lord Saye and Sele (ca 1603-15 Mar 1674); m.before 1631 Hon. Frances Cecil (d.1684); on his death the Barony of Saye and Sele as confirmed in 1604 fell into abeyance between his daus, while the 1447 Barony, if it still existed independently, and the Viscountcy, devolved on the heir male
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Hon. Elizabeth Fiennes (ca 1631-28 Mar 1674; see Part 1, above); m.1649 Sir John Twisleton [Twistleton] (d.4 Dec 1682), who had been cr a Baronet by Cromwell in 1658, which title was not recognized after the Restoration
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Cecil TWISLETON, d.1723; in 1715, on the death of her cousin Cecill Ellis she became sole heiress general of the 1st Lord Saye and Sele of the 1604 confirmation, and thus de jure 4th Baroness Saye and Sele; she m.1st shortly before 1670 George Twisleton, of Woodhall; m.2nd Robert Mignon; the surname of her descendants was interchangeably spelled as Twisleton or Twistleton
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Fiennes TWISLETON, de jure 5th Lord Saye and Sele (ca 1670-4 Sep 1730); m.1692 Mary Clarke
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John, de jure 6th Lord Saye and Sele (bap 16 Jan 1698-1763); he petitioned for the Barony but no action was taken; he m.30 Dec 1733 Anne Gardner (d.14 Jan 1769)
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Thomas, 7th Lord Saye and Sele, confirmed 1781 (ca 1735-1 Jul 1788); m.14 Dec 1767 Elizabeth (bap 19 Feb 1741-1 Apr 1816), dau of Sir Edward Turner, 2nd Bt.
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Ven. Thomas James, Archdeacon of Colombo (28 Sep 1770-15 Aug 1824); m.1st 4 Nov 1788 (sep 1794, div 1798) Charlotte Ann Frances Wattel [Wattell];m.2nd 17 Jun 1798 Anne Ash [Ashe]
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Rev. Frederick, 1849 TWISLETON-WYKEHAM-FIENNES, 10th Lord Saye and Sele (4 Jul 1799-26 May 1887); m.1st 4 Jun 1827 Hon. Emily Wingfield (1798-20 Jun 1837); m.2nd 18 Aug 1857 Hon. Caroline Leigh (18 Feb 1825-dsp 21 Jul 1909)
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John Fiennes TWISLETON-WYKEHAM-FIENNES, 11th Lord Saye and Sele (28 Feb 1830-8 Oct 1907); m.24 Apr 1856 Lady Augusta Sophia Hay-Drummond (13 Oct 1837-23 Jul 1915)
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Geoffrey Cecil, 12th Lord Saye and Sele (3 Aug 1858-2 Feb 1937); m.20 Feb 1884 Marion Ruperta Murray Lawes (d.27 Jul 1946)
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Ivo Murray, 14th Lord Saye and Sele (15 Dec 1885-21 Oct 1968); m.16 Oct 1919 Hersey Cecilia Hester Butler (d.31 Oct 1968)
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Nathaniel Thomas Allen, 15th Lord Saye and Sele (22 Sep 1920-20 Jan 2024); m.4 Dec 1958 Mariette Helena Salisbury-Jones

[dpth...@gmail.com]

1. Debrett's has him as 21st Lord, counting from the creation of the title in 1447, and on the theory that it was created by summons, and thus descendable to and through females, subject to abeyance rules when a line ends with two or more daughters.

2. Burke's has him as 15th Lord, on the theory that the 1447 barony was created by patent and was descendable to heirs male (presumably of the grantee's body), and that therefore the 1604 creation is the only surviving one.

3. There is a third, though unlikely, possibility. If the 1447 creation was by patent, it is possible (though this would be very unusual for an English title) that the remainder was to heirs general, without division in the case of a line ending in two or more sisters. In that case the late Peer was 22nd Lord. This is because on the death of the 9th & 3rd Lord in 1674, his elder daughter survived him by thirteen days, and she, not her daughter, would be considered de jure 10th and 4th Baroness.

[S. S.]

I don't think No. 3 is probable. It would be very unusual for a title at this date to have been made with remainder to the heirs general without division, better yet we would have had at least some inclination as to why or evidence pointing thereto. No. 2 could probably be true if only we could find out the evidence of creation, e.g. LP etc for this dignity. Though my question has been why summon by writ with the odd designation of "Lord Saye and Sele" at such an early point in history? Putting aside the indications of the double names chosen in the title, I think it likely this title was indeed created by LP, unless the Roll of Parliament or other evidence comes to light indicating that this was indeed by writ. 

S.S.

[dpth...@gmail.com]

More interesting things about this title:

1. I don't recall whether we mentioned it in a recent discussion of multiple peers holding the same title, but on the death of the 2nd Viscount Saye and Sele (9th and 3rd Baron Saye and Sele) in 1674, the Viscountcy of Saye and Sele, along with the 1447 Barony (if its remainder was to heirs male) devolved on the heirs male, who held those titles until extinct in 1781. This may be why the Twisletons, who had been de jure Barons Saye and Sele since 1715, did not have their title confirmed until 1781.

2. Possibly for the same reason the Twisletons did not add "Fiennes" to their surname until 1825. At the same time they added "Wykeham", which had not been used in the family since the death of Margaret Wykeham, alias Perrott, wife of the 2nd Lord who died in 1471. The "Wykeham" name was significant because it was through the marriage of the 2nd Lord that the familyh acquired the Broughton estate, and it was this Wykeham connection that made them "founders kin" at New College Oxford, and Winchester College.  Margaret Wykeham was great-great-niece of William Wykeham, Bishop of Winchester.

3. And about the numbering of Barons, and whether the 1447 Barony still exists, here are the footnotes from the first edition of Complete Peerage:

"(a) His Lordship sits in the precedency given by the Patent of 9 Aug. 1603 ;
hence it must be inferred that the only Barony which is recognised to be vested in
him is that created by that Patent ; but his Lordship is heir general of the body of
Sir James Fienes, who was sum. to Parl. 3 Mar. ( 1446/7 ) 25 Hen . VI. , and who it
would appear from the note on a former page [ p . 64, note " d " ] was sitting in Parl . on
the 5th Mar. by virtue of the Writ issued on the 3rd . If it could be established that Sir
James Fienes was never created by Patent to the dignity in question , with remainder
to his heirs male, which is altogether a gratuitous supposition , and of which, according
to Mr. Cruise, there does not appear to be any evidence, his Lordship must, it is
presumed, be deemed to have inherited a Barony in fee under the Writ of Summons
to Sir James Fienes in 1447 , but the earliest proof on the Rolls of Parliament of a
Lord Say and Sele having been present in Parliament is in 1449. It is also to be
observed that the Patent of 9 Aug. 1603 recited the fact that James Fienes was
summoned by Writ 3 Mar. 1447 , and that on the 5th of the same month he was created
in full Parliament a Baron of England by the style , title, and honour of Baron Say
and Sele, but mentions no limitation whatever ; the only evidence against the Patent
of 1603 being a confirmation of the original Barony, to which Sir Richard Fienes was
undoubtedly entitled , was the circumstance of his always sitting as junior Baron , but
this was by special proviso " [ Courthope. ]
Nicolas [p. 35 of his " Corrigenda " ] observes hereon that " the only claim which
appears feasible to the Barony cr. [by writ ] in 1447, consists in establishing that no
patent limiting the dignity to the heirs male of Sir James Fienes ever passed, and
consequently that it originated in a writ of summons, " as, for instance, if it could
be proved that Lord Saye and Sele sat in the house " between the day on which the
writ was tested and that on which he is said to have been cr. to that dignity in full
parl. with rem . to his heirs male. " It should be remembered that the person confirmed
in the Barony of 1603 was ( unlike the person confirmed therein in 1781 ) heir
male of the body, as well as heir general, of the Baron of 1313."

[S. S.]

This footnote perhaps indicates to me that someone made an error as to the actual nature of their sitting in Parliament of the Lords Saye and Sele, and later on others had to deal with the headache of trying to constitute the supposed errors with fact. It is not the first time contemporaries in peerage law attempted to reconcile the past and its very different notions/errors with that of the present. 

S.S.

[dpth...@gmail.com]

"...my question has been why summon by writ with the odd designation of "Lord Saye and Sele" at such an early point in history? Putting aside the indications of the double names chosen in the title..."


About the double names: I don't know why "Lord Fiennes" wouldn't have been sufficient for the 1447 Baron, but if they wanted to use the name "Saye [or Say]" in honor of his grandmother's family, the fact was that he had an older brother [or if the brother was dead, the brother had a son] who was co-heir to the old Barony of Saye [Say], so there might have been a problem using that title alone.

On Monday, January 22, 2024 at 12:29:49 PM UTC-6 S. S. wrote:

[S. S.]

I meant the double designation in terms of the mode of creation. I think this may be the first time that a double designation have been used if we go down the route of barony by writ rather than by letters patent. I will have to investigate. It would make more sense the designation was in the letters patent creating the dignity than by a writ of summons alone. 

S.S.

[colinp]

At 103 years and 120 days he was the second oldest peer ever after the 9th Baron Langford (105 years 249 days)

[malcolm davies]

There are now 8 peers over the age of 95:

The Earl of Elgin(100 on 17 February),Lord Walsingham,the Marquess of Ailesbury,Viscount Knutsford,Lord Gisborough,the Earl of Donoughmore,Lord Brain and the Earl of Westmeath.Soon to join them is the Earl of Rosebery on February 11.

[Henry W]

Colin stated above:

It is (possibly) unusual in recent years for there to be no centenarian peer or baronet living

Agreed.  Is the most recent period without a centenarian peer/baronet from the death of Sir Hereward WAKE, 14th Baronet on 11 Dec 2017 until the centenary of (Sir) Humphrey Moon, 7th Baronet on 9 Oct 2019?  A period of nearly two years.  

Before Sir Hereward's death I think you would have to go back to the period between the death of Dame Anne MAXWELL MACDONALD, 11th Baronetess on 21 April 2011 to the centenary of 9th Baron LONGFORD on 8 March 2012. About 10.5 months.

Assuming the Earl of ELGIN lives, we are looking at a period of just under a month with no centenarian.

[https:/www.maltagenealogy.com/LeighRayment/]

There was an older son Richard Ingel Fiennes, born 1959. No marriage or descendants ?

Second, the new titleholder only carries the surname of Fiennes or TWISLETON-WYKEHAM-FIENNES ?

Thank you in advance.

[Paul Theroff]

Whatever their legal surnames may be, many of the current generation use only "Fiennes" in daily practice....  such as the actors Joseph and Ralph Fiennes.

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D. P. Theroff

[https:/www.maltagenealogy.com/LeighRayment/]

I ve just read, the late Baron shorten his surname to Fiennes.  Thanks anyhow.

[Richard R]

From the Telegraph of 23 Jan 2024: SAYE AND SELE Nathaniel Thomas Allen Fiennes, 21st Baron Saye and Sele, on 20th January 2024, aged 103. Beloved husband of Mariette. Devoted father and grandfather. Funeral at St Mary's Church, Broughton… on Monday 12th February at 2 p.m.

[bx...@yahoo.com]

maltagenealogy,

The eldest son, Richard Ingel Fiennes, b. 1959, died in 2001, unmarried.  (This is according to DPB Online.)

There is also a baronetcy, Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes,  cr.  1916, for a son of the 17th Lord Saye and Sele.  That baronetcy is currently held by by Ranulph Twisleston-Wykeham-Fiennes, 3rd Bt, a grandson of the 1st Bt.  He was born in 1944, and there are no heirs to this baronetcy.

Brooke

[dpth...@gmail.com]

As to the death of the 7th Lord Saye and Sele on 1 July 1788, I notice that Complete Peerage says only : "He died suddenly in Harley street..."

However, it seems that it was a suicide. Horace Walpole, writing to Hannah More on 4 July 1788, complains that the private affairs of families are being spread by the press: "I mean self-murder in particular. Mr. ___'s was detailed at length; and today that of Lord ___ and ___."

The editors of the Yale edition of the Correspondence supply this in a footnote: "Thomas Twistleton (ca 1735-88), 7th Lord Saye and Sele (de jure 1763, de facto 1781), committed suicide 1 July 1788, using both a razor and a sword. The account in "The World" for 4 July, filling nearly two-thirds of a column, gives lurid details of his mental derangement, an unsuccessful attempt to drown himself, and the final catastrophe."

[BREMENMURRAY]

His eldest son lived with a disability was in residential care

[dpth...@gmail.com]

Likewise, Gentleman's Magazine did not mention suicide in its lengthy account of the 7th Lord, but gives a quaint account of how he became a Baron:

"He owed his peerage to the follwing inscription, which he met with in Bunhill-fields, while on duty there during the late riots, 1780: "Here lieth the body of Elizabeth Twisleton, the eldest daughter of ... Viscount James Fenys, Say and Sele, wife to John Twisleton, Esq...." and proving himself collaterally related to the late Richard Fiennes, Viscount and Baron Say and Sele, who died July 29, 1781, substantiated his claim to the barony, and was called up to the House of Lords June 20, 1781.

See pages 660-1 of Gentelman's Magazine for 1788.

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hw2911&seq=103

The dates are confirmed by Complete Peerage, showing that he actually made his claim and it was confirmed BEFORE the death of the last Viscount Saye and Sele. I wonder whether it was true that he did not even realize until 1780 that he had a claim to the Barony.

[S. S.]

Paul, you can find a similar instance of a person's suicide being not mentioned explicitly in the case of the 5th Duke of Bolton. I have included it in a footnote in my re-write: 

The death was merely reported in the London Evening News with the following: “Yesterday.. suddenly after a short illness, his Grace, the Duke of Bolton” died at his house. It is only after reading Walpole’s letter to his friend Mann that the truth of his death is revealed: “The Duke of Bolton [died] t’other [the other] morning, nobody knows why or wherefore… except that there is a good deal of madness in the blood, sat himself down upon the floor in his dressing room, and shot himself through the head… What is more remarkable is, that it is the same house and the same room in which Lord Scarborough [Richard Lumley, 2nd Earl of Scarbrough] performed the same exploit. I do not believe that shooting one’s self through the head is catching, or that any contagion [i.e. blood] lies in a wainscot [an area of wood panelling near a part of a wall] that makes one pull a suicide-trigger, but very possibly the idea might revert and operate on the brain of a splenic man. I am glad he had not a blue garter [i.e. Order of the Garter] but a red one [i.e. the Order of the Bath], as the more plenty the sooner one gets to Florence” (Letters of Horace Walpole (1844), i, 133). If any ambiguity be left in the London Evening News’s report of his death as “sudden”, Walpole continued elsewhere with the following comment: “Suddenly, in this country, is always at first construed to mean, [death or suicide] by a pistol”.  

S.S.

[dpth...@gmail.com]

Yes.. there are frequent accounts of suicide in the Walpole Correspondence... see multiple mentions of suicide in the Index here:

https://libsvcs-1.its.yale.edu/hwcorrespondence/page.asp?vol=48&seq=240&type=b

In 1755 he wrote to Bentley: "I only begin to be afraid that it should grow as necessary to shoot one's self here, as it is to go into the army in France."

And in 1783, writing about the suicide of John Powell, he told Mann: "This happened as if to convince the newly-arrived French, that self-murder is a weekly event in this country."

[Dapifer de Truchsess]

I would note that (despite my own inadequate knowledge on the subject), that the heir to the new Lord Saye and Sele, Guy Fiennes appears to be half Singaporean-half British; with the current lord, Martin, being married to Kang Chai Lian and having three sons. 

Would this be one of the first future Asian hereditary peers? 

[Paul Theroff]

Depending on the definition of "Asian"....    If I recall correctly there were persons from India created Barons and Baronets.

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D. P. Theroff

[BREMENMURRAY]

Lord Sinha is descended from the first Asian peer

[bx...@yahoo.com]

I think there might be a couple of  ha's and hp's who might fall into this category.

The one that comes to mind is the only son of Lord Oxmantown, the heir to the 7th Earl of Rosse.  Lord Oxmantown's wife is Anna, dau of Qicai Lin of China.  Their son, the Hon. William Yufan Charles, b. 2008,  is second in line to the earldom behind his father.

Brooke

[sven_me...@web.de]

Is it right that he never took his seat in the Lords?

[bx...@yahoo.com]

DPB Online has now updated this page.

After the new (22nd) Baron, the order of succession is as follows:

1. Hon. GUY WINSTON YE, b. 1997, eldest son of the new Baron;

2. Hon. Ned Richard Ling. b. 1999, middle son of the new Baron;

3. Hon. Ivo Nathaniel Lei, b. 2000, youngest son of the new Baron;

4. Hon. William John, b.. 1970, brother of the new Baron  (His son is not in remainder, as he was never married.)

Brooke

[bx...@yahoo.com]

The 4th Earl of Cromer's 2nd wife is Shelly Hu, dau of Hu Guo-qin of Shanghai.

Their son, Viscount Errington, b. 1994, is the heir apparent.

Brooke

[marquess]

Isn't Viscount Rochdale or his immediate heir married to Chinese woman, with issue? Lord Dowding is married to a Japanese woman. There is even a French duc who is half Japanese, though I can't remember the name of the dukedom. 

[dpth...@gmail.com]

Well, if we want to extend this to the Continent, there have been many instances of German nobles having married Japanese, Chinese and Persians. And of course two of Queen Margrethe's grandsons have a part-Chinese ancestry.

[bx...@yahoo.com]

marquess,

You are correct that both of those Lords are married to women of Asian ancestry.

However, neither one of them has sons to inherit the titles.  The hp to Viscount Rochdale  is his nephew, while Lord Dowding's hp is his brother.

Brooke

[colinp]

malcolm davies wrote above (22 Jan 2024)

There are now 8 peers over the age of 95:

The Earl of Elgin (100 on 17 February), Lord Walsingham, the Marquess of Ailesbury, Viscount Knutsford, Lord Gisborough, the Earl of Donoughmore, Lord Brain and the Earl of Westmeath. Soon to join them is the Earl of Rosebery on February 11.

Life Peers over the age of 95:

Lord Christopher 25 Apr 1925

Lord Mackay of Clashfern 2 July 1927

Baroness Gardner of Parkes 17 July 1927

Lord Higgins 18 Jan 1928

Lord Taverne 18 Oct 1928

Lord Rodgers of Quarry Bank 28 Oct 1928

[colinp]

On 23 Jan sven_me wrote above:

Is it right that he never took his seat in the Lords?

According to the House of Lords "Find a Member" webpage he was a member of the Lords from 21 October 1968 to 11 November 1999

[BREMENMURRAY]

The number of peers aged over 95 is going to increase because we have now reached peers too"young" to have fought in World War Two"

[Jonathan]

Lord Bethell is married to Melissa Wong, who is probably American-born Chinese. Their son Jacob is ha.

On Wednesday 24 January 2024 at 20:31:46 UTC bx...@yahoo.com wrote:

[BREMENMURRAY]

With the centenary of the first Labour Government {22 January 1924} it is worth noting that Lord Saye and Sele was the last peer to be born in a pre Labour Government Britain.Also the last alive during the premierships of Lloyd George and Bonar Law

[Henry W]

BBC Radio 4's Last Word memorialised Lord Saye & Sele on Friday 26/01.

In the programme it is mentioned he never took his seat in the House of Lords due to his personal belief that hereditary peers should not have automatic seats in the legislature.

[Richard R]

Obit in the Times of 29 Jan 2024:

E X T R A C T

Lord Saye and Sele obituary

Self-effacing custodian of Broughton Castle and former Army officer whose forebears could be traced back to the Norman Conquest

When Nathaniel Fiennes succeeded to the ancient barony of Saye and Sele in 1968 as the 21st incumbent, he also inherited the moated Broughton Castle, set in an 1,800-acre estate, near Banbury in Oxfordshire.

Described by Sir Nikolaus Pevsner, a historian, as “the finest and most complete medieval house in the county”, the actual building, which had been in his family for about 600 years, had deteriorated badly. After his father had restored the roof in 1957, the new lord and his wife Mariette overhauled the stonework and windows, and carried out extensive redecoration. He was helped by his training as a chartered surveyor and land agent.

In the early Eighties he and his wife embarked on the main structure, with a £1 million, 12-year programme, supported by English Heritage and completed in 1994. Crumbling stonework, rotting window lead and timbers riddled with deathwatch beetles were all replaced…

… Broughton provided the backdrop to scenes in [Shakespeare in Love,] Wolf Hall and The Crown, and the discovery on the estate of one of the largest Roman villas in Britain prompted a visit by Channel 4’s Time Team in 2021.

… He was born Nathaniel Thomas Allen Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes in 1920 in a grace and favour apartment in the House of Lords. He discarded his triple-barrelled surname (encapsulating various family cognomens), shortening it to Fiennes by deed poll in 1965. In the same spirit as his parliamentarian forebear, the 8th Baron Saye and Sele, who railed against episcopal pomp and privilege under Charles I, he never sat in the House of Lords, and opposed voting rights for hereditary peers in the constitutional reforms of 1999.

… While skiing in Switzerland in 1958, he met Mariette Salisbury-Jones, the daughter of a major general, on the Gornergrat railway in Zermatt. They were married at St Margaret’s Church, Westminster. With her creativity and warmth, she proved a perfect partner in running and restoring Broughton in what became a new golden age in its history.

Respected in his local community, Lord Saye devoted himself to the stewardship of owning a great house. Even in later years he pitched in, often unobtrusively performing tasks such as helping in the car park, wearing a hi-vis jacket. He loved taking people around the house and took pride in the garden (designed with advice from the American landscape architect Lanning Roper), pointing out favourite roses with his walking stick…

… Family was particularly important. He and Mariette had five children, including four sons — Martin, who inherits the title, is a partner in the university-linked company Oxford Science Enterprises, while William is an author — and a daughter Susannah, Martin’s twin, an artist who has worked closely with the King. Their eldest son, Richard, had epilepsy, which led to his premature death in 2001, aged 41. Another son, Thomas, died in an accident aged two. The ups and downs of Richard’s illness are lovingly depicted in his brother William’s book The Music Room.

Lord Saye’s forebears could be traced back to the Norman Conquest. An ancestor, Geoffrey de Say, was one of 25 barons who signed the Magna Carta and was charged with its implementation. Another ancestor, James Fiennes, fought at Agincourt and befriended the young Henry VI, serving as chamberlain of his household; he was elevated to the peerage as the 1st Baron Saye and Sele in 1447, but his wealth and influence made him a target of the Kentish rebels under Jack Cade in 1450 when he was imprisoned and beheaded.

The 2nd Lord Saye and Sele married a descendant of William of Wykeham, Bishop of Winchester. As a result the family inherited a fortified manor house in Oxfordshire, for which in 1406 Sir Thomas Wykeham, William’s great nephew, had obtained a licence to “crenellate and embattle”. So emerged Broughton Castle, which Richard Fiennes, the 6th Lord Saye and Sele embellished into what is still essentially the Elizabethan mansion that stands today.

The family played a significant role in the English Civil War. The 8th baron became a leader of the Parliamentarian opposition to Charles I, alongside John Pym. In 1642 his four sons all fought against the royalists at Edgehill, the first major battle of the war, just seven miles from Broughton Castle. His second son, Nathaniel Fiennes, MP for Banbury, was notable for his calls for the abolition of the episcopacy. As an officer in the parliamentary army he led the defence of Bristol against Prince Rupert in 1643. When the city surrendered he was arrested, sentenced to death and later pardoned. Nathaniel remained close to Oliver Cromwell and attended his death bed. At the Restoration he and his father were pardoned for their parliamentary sympathies.

In the 19th century, agricultural depression diminished the family fortunes. For a while the house was rented out, but it retained its essential charm…

Lord Saye and Sele, land agent and Army officer, was born on September 22, 1920. He died on January 20, 2024, aged 103

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/lord-saye-and-sele-obituary-nl65dswm0 

[colinp]

Perhaps the House of Lords "Find a member" webpage indicates that the the late Lord Saye and Sele received a writ (or writs) of summons but never took his seat or was introduced?

[David Beamish]

Lord Saye and Sele took his seat in the House of Lords on 15 October 1969: https://hansard.parliament.uk/lords/1969-10-15/debates/4175c1b6-fd13-4e62-ac55-56685b6213e5/HouseOfLords

It appears from the online Hansard index that he never made a maiden speech.

[sven_me...@web.de]

how can that be? It contradicts the article

[BREMENMURRAY]

He took his seat but never spoke.His great uncle Eustace Fiennes was Liberal MP for Banbury in the last century at a time when it was a marginal not the safe Conservative seat it is today. Perhaps Lord Saye and Sele was a liberal with a small L