2nd Baron Denham PC, KBE
Brian Coleman
sven_me...@web.de
colinp
The 2nd Lord Denham, who has died aged 94, was an urbane and effective Chief Whip in the Lords throughout Margaret Thatcher’s premiership, personifying the case for hereditary peers at Westminster.
When they were limited to 92 seats in 1999, Denham, universally known as Bertie, was the Tory peers’ fourth most popular choice to stay on and represent them. By the time he retired in April this year, he was the longest-serving member of the House, having taken his seat in 1950....
Denham sold his father’s manor house at Weston Underwood, Buckinghamshire, soon after inheriting it. Apart from a period at Spencers, the former Essex home of Rab Butler, he always lived on the Bucks/Beds border. He divided his time between a cottage in his home village and an 18th-century house at Kilmore, near Oban; many heirlooms were lost when the latter was burgled in 1994.
Bertram Stanley Mitford Bowyer was born on October 3 1927, the younger son of the first Lord Denham, a whip in both Houses, and the former Daphne Freeman-Mitford, daughter of the 1st Lord Redesdale.
His elder brother was killed on active service with the RAF when Bertie was at Eton, so in 1948, on the death of his father, he succeeded to the barony of Denham, two years later also succeeding as 10th Baronet when a distant kinsman died....
Denham’s marriage to Jean McCorquodale in 1956 was punctuated by the moment every couple dreads: when Canon Charles Smyth asked if anyone knew of an impediment to their being wed, a voice from the back of St Margaret’s, Westminster, boomed out: “I do”.
Neither Denham nor his bride batted an eyelid; they knew the culprit was Lord Rayleigh, a friend of the McCorquodales who had recently proclaimed himself King. He was led away declaring: “Well, I’ve had my say.”
It later transpired that Rayleigh – who never gave his reasons – had alerted the celebrant in advance. Lady Denham declared the moment “the most horrible of my life”....
Denham opposed any tinkering with the hereditary principle. When New Labour sought to strip hereditaries of their voting rights, his tactical skills, and his senses of caution and parliamentary propriety, were of immense value to a party uncertain whether to die in the last ditch, lie low, or trump Labour with an even bolder reform.
He is survived by Lady Denham, three sons and a daughter. His eldest son, Richard Grenville George Bowyer, born in 1959, succeeds to the peerage and in the baronetcy.
Lord Denham, born October 3 1927, died December 1 2021
www.maltagenealogy.com
Richard R
Obit in the Times of 9 Dec 2021:
Lord Denham obituary
Popular and mildly eccentric Lords chief whip who liked to quote his cousin Nancy Mitford and stand his ground with Mrs Thatcher
Until his retirement this year at the age of 93, Lord Denham was the longest-serving peer, having sat in the upper house since 1949. Such was his longevity, that he was also the last man alive to have served in Harold Macmillan’s government. He was not one for hogging the debates, though. The last time he spoke in parliament was six years ago, and that was to tell off another peer for droning on too long....
...The agreeable vein of eccentricity in his personality might have made him seem like a character from PG Wodehouse, especially as he was universally known as Bertie and had a penchant for snuff, but the mischievous Nancy Mitford would have been closer to the mark, not least because she was his first cousin and he was much given to quoting her.
Unlike many peers, Denham had no country estate or business to manage, only a small village shop. This meant he was able to spend a great deal of time in the House of Lords, relishing all aspects of its traditions and procedures, of which he was a staunch guardian. Changes that seriously affronted constitutional practice caused him considerable anguish. In particular, he deplored the removal of the vast majority of the hereditary peers by Tony Blair in 1999...
...Sir Bertram Stanley Mitford Bowyer Bt, was born in 1927 in Weston Underwood, Buckinghamshire. He succeeded as 2nd Baron Denham in 1948 on the death of his father, a long-serving Conservative MP and junior minister whose peerage had been preceded by a baronetcy to which Bertie Denham added a second, inherited from a kinsman. His mother was the Hon Daphne Freeman-Mitford, daughter of the first Baron Redesdale.
He was educated at Eton where he was a King’s Scholar, and at King’s College, Cambridge, where he read English literature. After the end of the Second World War, in 1945, he served briefly in the Grenadier Guards and subsequently as a lieutenant in the Oxford and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry between 1946 and 1948 as part of his National Service.
In 1956 he married Jean, daughter of Major Kenneth McCorquodale and sister of Alastair McCorquodale, who represented Britain at the 1948 Olympic Games. They had four children: Jocelyn, a physiotherapist; Richard, a teacher, who becomes the 3rd Baron Denham; Harry, a barrister; and George, a chartered surveyor.
Lord Denham, KBE, Conservative politician and author, was born on October 3, 1927. He died at home on December 1, 2021, aged 94
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/lord-denham-obituary-b2n92p77g
dpth...@gmail.com
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Sir William, 2nd Bt. (ca 1639-13 Feb 1722); m.1679 Hon. Frances Cecil (d.15 Jun 1723)
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Cecil, d.5 Dec 1720; m.22 Jul 1707 Juliana Parker
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Sir William, 3rd Bt. (ca 1710-12 Jul 1767); m.21 Aug 1733 Anne (d.22 May1785), dau of Sir John Stonhouse, 3rd Bt.
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Richard, took surname ATKINS-BOWYER, d.21 Nov 1820; m.3 Feb 1773 Elizabeth Brady; he inherited property from Sir Richard Atkins, his maternal cousin
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William ATKINS-BOWYER, of Braywick Grove and of Clapham (11 Jan 1779-9 Feb 1844); m.13 Apr 1803 Frances Wentworth (d.24 Jan 1856)
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Rev. William Henry Wentworth (1807-25 Feb 1872); m.1st 12 May 1831 Emily Harpford (d.3 Jun 1840); m.2nd 18 Apr 1844 Charlotte Wells (d.3 May 1864), gdau of Earl of Carysfort
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Wentworth Grenville BOWYER (10 Nov 1850-31 Mar 1929); m.29 Oct 1883 Eva Mary Lane (d.22 May 1954)
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George Edward Wentworth, cr Baronet 1933, cr 1937 Baron Denham, of Weston Underwood (16 Jan 1886-30 Nov 1948); m.27 Feb 1919 Hon. Daphne Freeman-Mitford (3 Sep 1895-Apr 1996), granddaughter of the 5th Earl of Airlie
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Bertram Stanley Mitford, 2nd Lord Denham, suc 1950 as 10th Bt. of the 1660 creation (3 Oct 1927-1 Dec 2021); m.14 Feb 1956 Jean McCorquodale (b.4 May 1931)