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Aidan Merivale Crawley (10 April 1908 – 3 November 1993) was a British journalist, television executive and editor, and politician. He was a member of both of Britain's major political parties: the
Labour Party and
Conservative Party
The Conservative Party is a name used by many political parties around the world. These political parties are generally right-wing though their exact ideologies can range from center-right to far-right.
Political parties called The Conservative P ...
, and was elected to the
House of Commons
The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. ...
as a Labour MP from 1945 to 1951, and as a Conservative MP from 1962 to 1967.
Education
Crawley was educated at
Harrow School
(The Faithful Dispensation of the Gifts of God)
, established = (Royal Charter)
, closed =
, type = Public schoolIndependent schoolBoarding school
, religion = Church of E ...
and
Trinity College, Oxford
(That which you wish to be secret, tell to nobody)
, named_for = The Holy Trinity
, established =
, sister_college = Churchill College, Cambridge
, president = Dame Hilary Boulding
, location = Broad Street, Oxford OX1 3BH
, coordinates ...
.
[Aidan Crawley – player profile]
CricketArchive. Retrieved 2017-02-13. He played cricket for both Harrow and for
Oxford University Cricket Club
Oxford University Cricket Club (OUCC), which represents the University of Oxford, has always held first-class status since 1827 when it made its debut in the inaugural University Match between OUCC and Cambridge University Cricket Club (CUCC). ...
. He scored 87 in the 1926
Eton v Harrow
The Eton v Harrow cricket match is an annual match between public school rivals Eton College and Harrow School. It is one of the longest-running annual sporting fixtures in the world and is the last annual school cricket match still to be pla ...
match at
Lord's
Lord's Cricket Ground, commonly known as Lord's, is a cricket venue in St John's Wood, London. Named after its founder, Thomas Lord, it is owned by Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) and is the home of Middlesex County Cricket Club, the England and ...
, an innings which
Wisden
''Wisden Cricketers' Almanack'', or simply ''Wisden'', colloquially the Bible of Cricket, is a cricket reference book published annually in the United Kingdom. The description "bible of cricket" was first used in the 1930s by Alec Waugh in a ...
described as "widely regarded as the best innings in the match for many year", and he was described in the same publication as a "beautiful player".
[Crawley, Aiden Merivale – Obituary]
Wisden's Cricketers' Almanack, 1994. Retrieved 2017-02-13. In 1928 he set a new record for runs scored in a season for Oxford with 1,137 runs scored, and in 1929 scored 204 against
Northamptonshire
Northamptonshire (; abbreviated Northants.) is a county in the East Midlands of England. In 2015, it had a population of 723,000. The county is administered by
two unitary authorities: North Northamptonshire and West Northamptonshire. It is ...
.
Life and career
Crawley had a varied career, playing
first-class cricket
First-class cricket, along with List A cricket and Twenty20 cricket, is one of the highest-standard forms of cricket. A first-class match is one of three or more days' scheduled duration between two sides of eleven players each and is officiall ...
, serving in the armed forces, acting as a Member of Parliament for two political parties, making documentary films and serving as the first chairman of London Weekend Television.
Cricket career
Crawley made his
first-class cricket
First-class cricket, along with List A cricket and Twenty20 cricket, is one of the highest-standard forms of cricket. A first-class match is one of three or more days' scheduled duration between two sides of eleven players each and is officiall ...
debut in May 1927, playing for
Oxford University
Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...
against Harlequins.
[First-class matches played by Aidan Crawley]
CricketArchive. Retrieved 2017-02-13. Later the same year he made his
County Championship
The County Championship (referred to as the LV= Insurance County Championship for sponsorship reasons) is the domestic first-class cricket competition in England and Wales and is organised by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB). It bec ...
debut for
Kent County Cricket Club
Kent County Cricket Club is one of the eighteen first-class county clubs within the domestic cricket structure of England and Wales. It represents the historic county of Kent. A club representing the county was first founded in 1842 but Ke ...
against
Worcestershire
Worcestershire ( , ; written abbreviation: Worcs) is a county in the West Midlands of England. The area that is now Worcestershire was absorbed into the unified Kingdom of England in 927, at which time it was constituted as a county (see His ...
as an amateur cricketer.
The bulk of Crawley's first-class cricket career was in the late 1920s and early 1930s. He made at least ten first-class appearances in each year between 1927 and 1932
[First-class batting and fielding by Aidan Crawley in each season]
CricketArchive. Retrieved 2017-02-13. and made a total of 87 first-class appearances, the majority during this period.
He played a total of 39 times for Oxford and 33 for Kent as well as eight times for
Marylebone Cricket Club
Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) is a cricket club founded in 1787 and based since 1814 at Lord's Cricket Ground, which it owns, in St John's Wood, London. The club was formerly the governing body of cricket retaining considerable global influence ...
(MCC) as well as making a few appearances for other teams such as the Free Foresters.
[First-class batting and fielding for each team by Aidan Crawley]
CricketArchive. Retrieved 2017-02-13.
He played only six more first-class matches after the end of the
1932 season, four of which took place after the Second World War whilst he was a sitting MP. He also made four
Minor Counties Championship
The NCCA 3 Day Championship (previously the Minor Counties Cricket Championship) is a season-long competition in England and Wales that is contested by the members of the National Counties Cricket Association (NCCA), the so-called national cou ...
appearances for
Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire (), abbreviated Bucks, is a ceremonial county in South East England that borders Greater London to the south-east, Berkshire to the south, Oxfordshire to the west, Northamptonshire to the north, Bedfordshire to the north-ea ...
in 1948
[Minor counties championship matches played by Aidan Crawley]
CricketArchive. Retrieved 2017-02-13. and was president of MCC in 1972-73 and the chairman of the
National Cricket Association for seven years, during which time he was one of the driving forces behind the establishment of the
National Village Cricket Championship.
Services career
He joined the
Auxiliary Air Force
The Royal Auxiliary Air Force (RAuxAF), formerly the Auxiliary Air Force (AAF), together with the Air Force Reserve, is a component of His Majesty's Reserve Air Forces (Reserve Forces Act 1996, Part 1, Para 1,(2),(c)). It provides a primary rein ...
in 1936, and was a trained fighter pilot at start of the
Second World War
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
. After serving on night patrols over the
English Channel
The English Channel, "The Sleeve"; nrf, la Maunche, "The Sleeve" (Cotentinais) or ( Jèrriais), (Guernésiais), "The Channel"; br, Mor Breizh, "Sea of Brittany"; cy, Môr Udd, "Lord's Sea"; kw, Mor Bretannek, "British Sea"; nl, Het Kana ...
he was sent ostensibly as an assistant air attaché to Turkey in April 1940, cover for intelligence work in the Balkans in
Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia (; sh-Latn-Cyrl, separator=" / ", Jugoslavija, Југославија ; sl, Jugoslavija ; mk, Југославија ;; rup, Iugoslavia; hu, Jugoszlávia; rue, label=Pannonian Rusyn, Югославия, translit=Juhoslavija ...
and
Bulgaria
Bulgaria (; bg, България, Bǎlgariya), officially the Republic of Bulgaria,, ) is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern flank of the Balkans, and is bordered by Romania to the north, Serbia and North Macedon ...
, being smuggled out of
Sofia
Sofia ( ; bg, София, Sofiya, ) is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria. It is situated in the Sofia Valley at the foot of the Vitosha mountain in the western parts of the country. The city is built west of the Iskar river, and ha ...
when the Germans invaded the latter country in March 1941. Subsequently, assigned to 73 Squadron in Egypt, he was shot down in July 1941 near besieged
Tobruk
Tobruk or Tobruck (; grc, Ἀντίπυργος, ''Antipyrgos''; la, Antipyrgus; it, Tobruch; ar, طبرق, Tubruq ''Ṭubruq''; also transliterated as ''Tobruch'' and ''Tubruk'') is a port city on Libya's eastern Mediterranean coast, near th ...
and was taken prisoner of war. He remained in Germany, despite escape attempts, latterly at
Stalag Luft III
, partof = ''Luftwaffe''
, location = Sagan, Lower Silesia, Nazi Germany (now Żagań, Poland)
, image =
, caption = Model of the set used to film the movie ''The Great Escape.'' It depicts a smaller version of a single compound in ''Stalag ...
.
Parliamentary career
He was Labour Member of Parliament for
Buckingham
Buckingham ( ) is a market town in north Buckinghamshire, England, close to the borders of Northamptonshire and Oxfordshire, which had a population of 12,890 at the 2011 Census. The town lies approximately west of Central Milton Keynes, sou ...
from 1945 to 1951, when he lost to the
Conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...
candidate
Frank Markham
Sir Sydney Frank Markham (19 October 1897 – 13 October 1975) was a British politician who represented three constituencies, each on behalf of a different party, in Parliament.
Born in Stony Stratford, he left school at the age of fourteen. ...
, himself an ex-Labour MP. He was
Under-Secretary of State for Air
The Under-Secretary of State for Air was a junior ministerial post in the United Kingdom Government, supporting the Secretary of State for Air in his role of managing the Royal Air Force. It was established on 10 January 1919, replacing the previou ...
in Clement Attlee's Labour Government. Having left the Labour Party in 1957,
in 1962, he was elected to
Parliament
In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...
as a Conservative, winning
the by-election in
West Derbyshire. He held the seat through two general elections, before resigning in 1967 to become Chairman of
London Weekend Television
London Weekend Television (LWT) (now part of the non-franchised ITV London region) was the ITV network franchise holder for Greater London and the Home Counties at weekends, broadcasting from Fridays at 5.15 pm (7:00 pm from 1968 unt ...
where he remained until 1973.
Media career
In 1955, he was the first editor-in-chief of
Independent Television News
Independent Television News (ITN) is a UK-based television production company. It is made up of two divisions: Broadcast News and ITN Productions. ITN is based in London, with bureaux and offices in Beijing, Brussels, Jerusalem, Johannesburg, ...
and was responsible for introducing American-style newscasters to British media and pledged to transform television's attitudes to politicians. He left ITN after a row when the company tried to trim down the news operations and rejoined the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
.
Crawley authored several books, including biographies of
Konrad Adenauer
Konrad Hermann Joseph Adenauer (; 5 January 1876 – 19 April 1967) was a Germany, German statesman who served as the first Chancellor of Germany, chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany from 1949 to 1963. From 1946 to 1966, he was the fir ...
and
Charles De Gaulle
Charles André Joseph Marie de Gaulle (; ; (commonly abbreviated as CDG) 22 November 18909 November 1970) was a French army officer and statesman who led Free France against Nazi Germany in World War II and chaired the Provisional Government ...
.
* ''De Gaulle: A Biography'' (London: Collins, 1969)
* ''Escape from Germany 1939-1945''
* ''Spoils of the War: The Rise of Western Germany 1945-1972''
* ''Patterns of Government in Africa''
* ''Leap before you look: a memoir'', 1988.
Family
Crawley was the second son of the Rev.
(Arthur) Stafford Crawley, Canon of Windsor, and the former Anstice Katherine Gibbs (usually known as Nancy), sixth of the ten children of Antony and Janet Gibbs of
Tyntesfield
Tyntesfield is a Victorian Gothic Revival house and estate near Wraxall, North Somerset, England. The house is a Grade I listed building named after the Tynte baronets, who had owned estates in the area since about 1500. The location was form ...
, Somerset. His paternal grandfather was
George Baden Crawley (1833–1879), a successful railway contractor and his wife Inez.
Stafford Crawley was the brother-in-law of the
Earl of Cavan
Earl of Cavan is a title in the Peerage of Ireland. It was created in 1647 for Charles Lambart, 2nd Baron Lambart. He was made Viscount Kilcoursie, in the King's County, at the same time, also in the Peerage of Ireland. Lord Cavan was the son o ...
and Crawley's mother was related to the
Lords Wraxall, of Tyntesfield and the
Lords Aldenham and
Hunsdon
Hunsdon is a village and civil parish in Hertfordshire, England. It is around east of Ware and north-west of Harlow. The population of the village taken at the 2011 Census was 1,080.
See also
*Baron Hunsdon
*Hunsdon Airfield
*The Hundred Pa ...
. Stafford Crawley was chaplain to the Archbishop of York at
Bishopthorpe
Bishopthorpe is a village and civil parish three miles south of York in the City of York unitary authority area and ceremonial county of North Yorkshire, England. Bishopthorpe is close to the River Ouse, and has a population of 3,174, in ...
and later Canon of
St George's Chapel,
Windsor
Windsor may refer to:
Places Australia
* Windsor, New South Wales
** Municipality of Windsor, a former local government area
* Windsor, Queensland, a suburb of Brisbane, Queensland
**Shire of Windsor, a former local government authority around Wi ...
. The Crawleys had three sons and two daughters, of whom Aidan was the middle son. A daughter Anstice, Lady Goodman (see below), was also prominent in public life.
Marriage and issue
In 1945, he married the sometime war correspondent
Virginia Cowles
(Harriet) Virginia Spencer Cowles OBE (August 24, 1910 – September 17, 1983) was an American journalist, biographer, and travel writer. During her long career, Cowles went from covering fashion, to covering the Spanish Civil War, the turbule ...
(24 August 1910 – 6 September 1983), daughter of the controversial society doctor
Edward Spencer Cowles MD, with whom he had 3 children.
Crawley suffered several tragedies. His wife died in 1983 in a road accident near
Biarritz
Biarritz ( , , , ; Basque also ; oc, Biàrritz ) is a city on the Bay of Biscay, on the Atlantic coast in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department in the French Basque Country in southwestern France. It is located from the border with Spain. ...
in France. Five years later, he lost both his sons in a plane crash whilst they were travelling together to their sister's 40th birthday party, leaving young children and widows who were seven months pregnant. He then lost heavily in the
Lloyd's
Lloyd's of London, generally known simply as Lloyd's, is an insurance and reinsurance market located in London, England. Unlike most of its competitors in the industry, it is not an insurance company; rather, Lloyd's is a corporate body gov ...
crash and at the time of his death, Crawley was virtually penniless.
He was survived by his daughter Harriet, his two widowed daughters-in-law and six grandchildren:
* Andrew Hayward Crawley (1947−1988), married Sarah Lawrence in 1986 and had one son and a posthumous daughter.
* Randall Stafford Crawley (1950–1988), who married
Marita Georgina Phillips in 1982. Their two sons (the younger Galen born after his death) and a daughter. His widow Marita remarried
Andrew Knight in 2006.
* Harriet Spencer Crawley (b. 1948), a successful author and former television presenter of "Collecting Now", married Gleb Shestakov in 1993 and then Julian Ayer in around 2001. Ayer, whom she met in 1999, was the adoptive son of the philosopher Sir
Alfred Jules Ayer. They had no children although Harriet had one son in 1987: Harriet unsuccessfully fought the
Brent East Constituency in the
1987 general election, she lost to
Labour
Labour or labor may refer to:
* Childbirth, the delivery of a baby
* Labour (human activity), or work
** Manual labour, physical work
** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer
** Organized labour and the labour ...
veteran
Ken Livingstone
Kenneth Robert Livingstone (born 17 June 1945) is an English politician who served as the Leader of the Greater London Council (GLC) from 1981 until the council was abolished in 1986, and as Mayor of London from the creation of the office i ...
.
**
Spencer Henry Crawley (b.1987) who played one
first-class cricket
First-class cricket, along with List A cricket and Twenty20 cricket, is one of the highest-standard forms of cricket. A first-class match is one of three or more days' scheduled duration between two sides of eleven players each and is officiall ...
match for
Oxford University
Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...
.
Notable relatives
* Crawley's sister was Anstice, Lady Goodman (7 December 1911 – 4 January 2001), whose marriage to Sir
Victor Goodman
Sir Victor Martin Reeves Goodman KCB OBE MC (14 February 1899 – 29 September 1967) was a British public servant and Clerk of the Parliaments from 1959 to 1963.''Who Was Who'', A & C Black, 1920–2008; online edn, Oxford University Pr ...
was childless.
* Crawley's niece Penelope Anstice Crawley (b. 1950) married 1971
Lord Guernsey, now
12th Earl of Aylesford (b. 1947), the heir to the
11th Earl of Aylesford and has issue, including one son. Her husband succeeded to the earldom on 12 February 2008, and her son is now styled Lord Guernsey. This is not the first notable marriage for a Crawley female; her great-aunt Caroline Inez Crawley (d. 1920, without issue) was first wife of
Field Marshal the 10th Earl of Cavan.
* An ancestress Matilda Crawley-Boevey (1817–1877), of the
Crawley-Boevey baronets
The Barrow, later Crawley-Boevey Baronetcy (pronounced "Boovey"), of Highgrove (Hygrove House, Minsterworth) in the County of Gloucester, is a title in the Baronetage of Great Britain. It was created on 22 January 1784 for Charles Barrow, Member ...
married
William Gibbs of
Tyntesfield
Tyntesfield is a Victorian Gothic Revival house and estate near Wraxall, North Somerset, England. The house is a Grade I listed building named after the Tynte baronets, who had owned estates in the area since about 1500. The location was form ...
and Clyst St. George, and had issue, seven children, of whom four are listed in the
Plantagenet Roll.
[Marquis de Ruvigny de Raineval et a]
''Plantagenet Roll: Clarence Volume
p. 150. Originally published: London : T.C. & E.C. Jack, 1905. Reprinted by Genealogical Publishing Com, 1994. Retrieved 10 December 2008 Her granddaughter Anstice Katharine Gibbs married a Crawley cousin (Arthur Stafford Crawley) in 1903, and was mother of Aidan Merivale Crawley. Anstice's brother was
1st Baron Wraxall, while close relatives patrilineally were the
Lords Aldenham and
Hunsdon
Hunsdon is a village and civil parish in Hertfordshire, England. It is around east of Ware and north-west of Harlow. The population of the village taken at the 2011 Census was 1,080.
See also
*Baron Hunsdon
*Hunsdon Airfield
*The Hundred Pa ...
(now united as of 1939).
Notes
References
Daily Telegraph, 14/06/67*
*
*
Virginia Cowles
(Harriet) Virginia Spencer Cowles OBE (August 24, 1910 – September 17, 1983) was an American journalist, biographer, and travel writer. During her long career, Cowles went from covering fashion, to covering the Spanish Civil War, the turbule ...
, German Wikipedia (in German).
*
Aidan Crawleyfrom CricketArchive
''The Independent'', 18 December 2007. Describes Harriet Ayer's efforts to build a memorial to her husband, and relates some of the family tragedies.
External links
*
* Crawley ancestry can be found at the following sources:
** th
''Plantagenet Roll: Clarence Volume''** the 1895 issue of ''
Debrett's Peerage
Debrett's () is a British professional coaching company, publisher and authority on etiquette and behaviour, founded in 1769 with the publication of the first edition of ''The New Peerage''. The company takes its name from its founder, John Deb ...
''
archived online.
*
This shows all the descendants of the
Crawley-Boevey baronets
The Barrow, later Crawley-Boevey Baronetcy (pronounced "Boovey"), of Highgrove (Hygrove House, Minsterworth) in the County of Gloucester, is a title in the Baronetage of Great Britain. It was created on 22 January 1784 for Charles Barrow, Member ...
, starting with the 2nd Baronet and his brothers. Retrieved 10 December 2008.
Rev. Arthur Stafford Crawley (1876-1948) Canon of Windsor, information in the National Archives.
Further reading
Aidan Crawley. ''Leap before you look: a memoir'', (HarperCollins Publishers Ltd, 7 April 1988)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Crawley, Aidan Merivale
1908 births
1993 deaths
20th-century biographers
20th-century English historians
20th-century British male writers
Alumni of Trinity College, Oxford
British World War II fighter pilots
British World War II prisoners of war
British reporters and correspondents
British sportsperson-politicians
Buckinghamshire cricketers
Conservative Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies
English biographers
English cricketers
English television executives
Free Foresters cricketers
Gentlemen cricketers
ITN
Kent cricketers
Labour Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies
Marylebone Cricket Club cricketers
Members of the Order of the British Empire
Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for constituencies in Derbyshire
Ministers in the Attlee governments, 1945–1951
Oxford University cricketers
People educated at Harrow School
Presidents of the Marylebone Cricket Club
UK MPs 1945–1950
UK MPs 1950–1951
UK MPs 1959–1964
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UK MPs 1966–1970
Military personnel from Kent
World War II prisoners of war held by Germany
People from Benenden
Royal Air Force pilots of World War II
Shot-down aviators
20th-century English businesspeople
American male non-fiction writers