Basil Sheridan Hamilton-Temple-Blackwood, 4th Marquess of Dufferin and Ava (6 April 1909 – 25 March 1945), styled Earl of Ava from 1918 until 1930, was a

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 ...

politician and soldier of the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

Early life

Dufferin was the eldest child, and only son, of the 3rd Marquess of Dufferin and Ava and the former Brenda Woodhouse. Following his father's succession to the

marquessate A marquess (; french: marquis ), es, marqués, pt, marquês. is a nobleman of high hereditary rank in various European peerages and in those of some of their former colonies. The German language equivalent is Markgraf (margrave). A woman wi ...

in 1918, he was known as the Earl of Ava. His grandfather, a descendant of the 18th-century playwright

Richard Brinsley Sheridan Richard Brinsley Butler Sheridan (30 October 17517 July 1816) was an Irish satirist, a politician, a playwright, poet, and long-term owner of the London Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. He is known for his plays such as ''The Rivals'', ''The Sc ...

, "was the cultured and worldly 1st Marquess of Dufferin and Ava", who served as the

Viceroy and Governor-General of India The Governor-General of India (1773–1950, from 1858 to 1947 the Viceroy and Governor-General of India, commonly shortened to Viceroy of India) was the representative of the monarch of the United Kingdom and after Indian independence in 19 ...

. He was educated at

Lockers Park School Lockers Park School is a day and boarding preparatory and pre-preparatory school for boys, situated in 23 acres of countryside in Boxmoor, Hertfordshire. Its headmaster is Gavin Taylor. History Lockers Park was founded in 1874 by Henry Montagu ...

and

Eton College Eton College () is a public school in Eton, Berkshire, England. It was founded in 1440 by Henry VI under the name ''Kynge's College of Our Ladye of Eton besyde Windesore'',Nevill, p. 3 ff. intended as a sister institution to King's College, C ...

, and then at

Balliol College, Oxford Balliol College () is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. One of Oxford's oldest colleges, it was founded around 1263 by John I de Balliol, a landowner from Barnard Castle in County Durham, who provided the f ...

. At Eton, when aged sixteen, he won the coveted Rosebery Prize, the highest possible distinction for a history pupil. At

Oxford 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 ...

, he was friends with among others

Frank Pakenham, 7th Earl of Longford Francis Aungier Pakenham, 7th Earl of Longford, 1st Baron Pakenham, Baron Pakenham of Cowley, (5 December 1905 – 3 August 2001), known to his family as Frank Longford and styled Lord Pakenham from 1945 to 1961, was a British politician and ...

. He was also a contemporary and close friend of the poet

John Betjeman Sir John Betjeman (; 28 August 190619 May 1984) was an English poet, writer, and broadcaster. He was Poet Laureate from 1972 until his death. He was a founding member of The Victorian Society and a passionate defender of Victorian architecture, ...

. Betjeman wrote of his friend as "the dark, heavy-lidded companion" in his poem ''Brackenbury Scholar of Balliol''.

Career

After university Lord Dufferin pursued a career in politics. He made his maiden speech in the

House of Lords The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the Bicameralism, upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is by Life peer, appointment, Hereditary peer, heredity or Lords Spiritual, official function. Like the ...

in December 1931, aged just 22, during a debate on

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. Only a few days later he was appointed to the Indian Franchise Committee which was to tour the country during its research. After his return from India he was appointed

Parliamentary Private Secretary A Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) is a Member of Parliament (MP) in the United Kingdom who acts as an unpaid assistant to a minister or shadow minister. They are selected from backbench MPs as the 'eyes and ears' of the minister in the H ...

to the 11th Marquess of Lothian, who was

Under-Secretary of State for India This is a list of Parliamentary Under-Secretaries of State and Permanent Under-Secretaries of State at the India Office during the period of British rule between 1858 and 1937 for India(and Burma by extension), and for India and Burma from 193 ...

, and then to the 3rd Viscount Halifax (later 1st Earl of Halifax) who was successively

President of the Board of Education The secretary of state for education, also referred to as the education secretary, is a Secretary of State (United Kingdom), secretary of state in the Government of the United Kingdom, responsible for the work of the Department for Education. ...

from 1932 to 1935,

Secretary of State for War The Secretary of State for War, commonly called War Secretary, was a secretary of state in the Government of the United Kingdom, which existed from 1794 to 1801 and from 1854 to 1964. The Secretary of State for War headed the War Office and ...

in 1935, and

Lord Privy Seal The Lord Privy Seal (or, more formally, the Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal) is the fifth of the Great Officers of State (United Kingdom), Great Officers of State in the United Kingdom, ranking beneath the Lord President of the Council and abov ...

from 1935 to 1937. Lord Dufferin was chairman of the

Primrose League The Primrose League was an organisation for spreading Conservative principles in Great Britain. It was founded in 1883. At a late point in its existence, its declared aims (published in the ''Primrose League Gazette'', vol. 83, no. 2, March/April ...

from 1932 to 1934, a

Lord-in-waiting Lords-in-waiting (male) or baronesses-in-waiting (female) are peers who hold office in the Royal Household of the sovereign of the United Kingdom. In the official Court Circular they are styled "Lord in Waiting" or "Baroness in Waiting" (without ...

King George VI George VI (Albert Frederick Arthur George; 14 December 1895 – 6 February 1952) was King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Commonwealth from 11 December 1936 until his death in 1952. He was also the last Emperor of Ind ...

from 1936 to 1937 and was himself appointed

Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies The Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies was a junior Ministerial post in the United Kingdom government, subordinate to the Secretary of State for the Colonies and, from 1948, also to a Minister of State. Under-Secretaries of State for the Col ...

in 1937, serving until his resignation in 1940.

War service

In 1940, he resigned from the government to join the

British Army The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurk ...

, refusing a post in the

World War II 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 ...

coalition government of

Winston Churchill Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 Winston Churchill in the Second World War, dur ...

. He received a commission as a captain in the

Royal Horse Guards The Royal Regiment of Horse Guards (The Blues) (RHG) was a cavalry regiment of the British Army, part of the Household Cavalry. Raised in August 1650 at Newcastle upon Tyne and County Durham by Sir Arthur Haselrigge on the orders of Oliver Cr ...

in July 1940 but was released from the Army in 1941 to become Director of the Empire Division of the Ministry of Information. The following year he undertook a special mission abroad for the ministry, and rejoined the Army in 1944. Lord Dufferin was serving with the Indian Field Broadcasting Unit on 25 March 1945 when he was filmed demanding the surrender of Japanese troops who were sheltered in a tunnel; the film then captured Lord Dufferin's death when a Japanese mortar shell landed on the unit, just a few weeks short of his 36th birthday.

Personal life

Maureen Constance Hamilton-Temple-Blackwood (née Guinness), Marchioness of Dufferin and Ava

On 3 July 1930, Lord Dufferin and Ava was married to brewery heiress

Maureen Constance Guinness Maureen Constance Hamilton-Temple-Blackwood, Marchioness of Dufferin and Ava (née Guinness; 31 January 1907 – 3 May 1998) was an Anglo-Irish socialite, known as one of the "Guinness Golden Girls". Early life and family Maureen Constance Guin ...

, the second daughter of Hon. Arthur Ernest Guinness, himself the second son of

Edward Guinness, 1st Earl of Iveagh Edward Cecil Guinness, 1st Earl of Iveagh, (10 November 1847 – 7 October 1927) was an Irish businessman and philanthropist. A member of the prominent Anglo-Irish Guinness family, he was the head of the family's eponymous brewing business, ma ...

, at

St. Margaret's, Westminster The Church of St Margaret, Westminster Abbey, is in the grounds of Westminster Abbey on Parliament Square, London, England. It is dedicated to Margaret of Antioch, and forms part of a single World Heritage Site with the Palace of Westminster ...

. They had three children: * Lady Caroline Maureen Hamilton-Temple-Blackwood (1931–1996), who married three times; first to

Lucian Freud Lucian Michael Freud (; 8 December 1922 – 20 July 2011) was a British painter and draughtsman, specialising in figurative art, and is known as one of the foremost 20th-century English portraitists. He was born in Berlin, the son of Jewis ...

(son of architect

Ernst L. Freud Ernst L. Freud (6 April 1892 – 7 April 1970) was an Austrian architect and the fourth child of Austrian psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud and his German-born wife Martha Bernays. In honour of his wife, Ernst Freud added the initial L. to his name wh ...

and grandson of

Sigmund Freud Sigmund Freud ( , ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating psychopathology, pathologies explained as originatin ...

), secondly to Israel Citkowitz, and lastly to American poet

Robert Lowell Robert Traill Spence Lowell IV (; March 1, 1917 – September 12, 1977) was an American poet. He was born into a Boston Brahmin family that could trace its origins back to the ''Mayflower''. His family, past and present, were important subjects i ...

. * Lady Perdita Maureen Hamilton-Temple-Blackwood (b. 1934) * Sheridan Frederick Terence Hamilton-Temple-Blackwood, 5th and last Marquess of Dufferin and Ava (1938–1988), who married his fourth cousin Serena Belinda "Lindy" Rosemary Guinness in 1964. Because he has no known grave in Burma, Lord Dufferin is commemorated by the

Commonwealth War Graves Commission The Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) is an intergovernmental organisation of six independent member states whose principal function is to mark, record and maintain the graves and places of commemoration of Commonwealth of Nations mil ...

, his name listed on Face 1 of the Rangoon Memorial in

Taukkyan War Cemetery The Taukkyan War Cemetery ( my, ထောက်ကြံ့ စစ်သင်္ချိုင်း) is a cemetery for Allied soldiers from the British Commonwealth who died in battle in Burma during the Second World War. The cemetery is in th ...

.
CWGC Casualty Record. In the family burial ground of Campo Santo at

Clandeboye Clandeboye or Clannaboy (from Irish language, Irish ''Clann Aodha Buí'', "family of Hugh the Blond") was a kingdom of Gaelic Ireland, comprising what is now south County Antrim, north County Down, and the barony of Loughinsholin, Northern Irelan ...

County Down County Down () is one of the six counties of Northern Ireland, one of the nine counties of Ulster and one of the traditional thirty-two counties of Ireland. It covers an area of and has a population of 531,665. It borders County Antrim to the ...

a Celtic cross stands to mark his loss and the earlier losses of the Dufferin family to war. His friend

wrote the poem ''In Memory of Basil, Marquess of Dufferin and Ava'' in his memory. His widow married twice after his death, first to Major Harry Alexander Desmond ('Kelpie') Buchanan MC in 1948 (divorced 1954) and second in 1955 to judge

John Maude John Cyril Maude KC (3 April 1901 – 16 August 1986) was a British barrister and Conservative Party politician. He sat in the House of Commons from 1945 to 1951, and then became a judge. Early life Maude was the son of the actors Cyril Maude ...

QC (1901–1986), but against precedent always used the title she acquired from her first marriage. Maureen, Lady Dufferin, died on 3 May 1998 and is buried at Clandeboye.

Arms

References

External links

*
Hamilton-Temple-Blackwood, Basil Sheridan (1909-1945) 4th Marquess of Dufferin and Ava, colonial administrator
at

The National Archives National archives are central archives maintained by countries. This article contains a list of national archives. Among its more important tasks are to ensure the accessibility and preservation of the information produced by governments, both ...

. {{DEFAULTSORT:Dufferin and Ava, Basil Hamilton-Temple-Blackwood, 4th Marquess of 1909 births 1945 deaths Alumni of Balliol College, Oxford

Basil Basil (, ; ''Ocimum basilicum'' , also called great basil, is a culinary herb of the family Lamiaceae (mints). It is a tender plant, and is used in cuisines worldwide. In Western cuisine, the generic term "basil" refers to the variety also kno ...

British Army personnel killed in World War II Conservative Party (UK) Baronesses- and Lords-in-Waiting Foreign Office personnel of World War II 4 Ministers in the Chamberlain peacetime government, 1937–1939 Ministers in the Chamberlain wartime government, 1939–1940 People educated at Eton College People educated at Lockers Park School Royal Horse Guards officers Filmed killings Burials at Taukkyan War Cemetery Marquesses in the Peerage of the United Kingdom