David Patrick Maxwell Fyfe, 1st Earl of Kilmuir, (29 May 1900 – 27 January 1967), known as Sir David Maxwell Fyfe from 1942 to 1954 and as Viscount Kilmuir from 1954 to 1962, was a British
Conservative politician, lawyer and judge who combined an industrious and precocious legal career with political ambitions that took him to the offices of
Solicitor General,
Attorney General
In most common law jurisdictions, the attorney general or attorney-general (sometimes abbreviated AG or Atty.-Gen) is the main legal advisor to the government. The plural is attorneys general.
In some jurisdictions, attorneys general also have exec ...
,
Home Secretary and
Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain
The lord chancellor, formally the lord high chancellor of Great Britain, is the highest-ranking traditional minister among the Great Officers of State in Scotland and England in the United Kingdom, nominally outranking the prime minister. The ...
.
One of the
prosecuting counsels at the
Nuremberg Trials, he subsequently played a role in drafting the
European Convention on Human Rights. As Home Secretary he led a crackdown against homosexuals in the UK in the 1950s, and declined to commute
Derek Bentley's death sentence for the murder of a police officer. His political ambitions were ultimately dashed in
Harold Macmillan
Maurice Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, (10 February 1894 – 29 December 1986) was a British Conservative statesman and politician who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1957 to 1963. Caricatured as "Supermac", he ...
's
cabinet reshuffle
A cabinet reshuffle or shuffle occurs when a head of government rotates or changes the composition of ministers in their cabinet, or when the Head of State changes the head of government and a number of ministers. They are more common in parlia ...
of July 1962.
Early life
Born in
Edinburgh, the only son of William Thomson Fyfe, Headmaster of Aberdeen Grammar School, by his second wife Isabella Campbell, daughter of David Campbell, of Dornoch, co. Sutherland, he was educated at
George Watson's College and
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 ...
, where, perhaps owing to his interest in politics, he achieved a third-class degree in
Greats. Whilst at Oxford, he was a member of the
Stubbs Society. His academic education was paused during his service in the
Scots Guards in 1918–19, at the end of the
World War I.
[ Also stated in ''Burke's Peerage'' and ''Who Was Who'' but omitted from sketches in both the ''Dictionary of National Biography'' (1961–1970 Supplement) and the ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography''.] After graduation, he worked for the
British Commonwealth Union
The British Commonwealth Union (BCU) was a protectionist organisation formed in the United Kingdom in 1916 to "found a solid business group in parliament" and to "press for the protective tariffs and restrictions on imports discussed at the Pari ...
as political secretary to Sir
Patrick Hannon
Sir Patrick Joseph Henry Hannon FRGS FRSA (1874 - 10 January 1963) was an Irish-born Conservative and Unionist Party politician, industrialist and agriculturalist. “one of parliaments most colourful characters”. He served as Member of Parliam ...
MP, studying
law in his spare time. He entered
Gray's Inn and was
called to the bar
The call to the bar is a legal term of art in most common law jurisdictions where persons must be qualified to be allowed to argue in court on behalf of another party and are then said to have been "called to the bar" or to have received "call to ...
in 1922. He became a
pupil of
George Lynskey
Sir George Justin Lynskey (5 February 1888 – 21 December 1957) was an English judge, particularly remembered for his role in investigating the political scandal that led to the eponymous Lynskey tribunal.
Early life and legal career
Lynskey was ...
in
Liverpool then joined his chambers to practise.
[Dutton (2004).]
Not pausing before beginning his political career in earnest, he stood as a Conservative for
Wigan in
1924
Events
January
* January 12 – Gopinath Saha shoots Ernest Day, whom he has mistaken for Sir Charles Tegart, the police commissioner of Calcutta, and is arrested soon after.
* January 20– 30 – Kuomintang in China hol ...
, an unwinnable parliamentary seat. He cultivated the more winnable
Spen Valley until
1929
This year marked the end of a period known in American history as the Roaring Twenties after the Wall Street Crash of 1929 ushered in a worldwide Great Depression. In the Americas, an agreement was brokered to end the Cristero War, a Catholic ...
when the party resolved not to oppose sitting
Liberal Member of Parliament (MP) Sir
John Simon while he was absent on the
Simon Commission
The Indian Statutory Commission also known as Simon Commission, was a group of seven Members of Parliament under the chairmanship of Sir John Simon. The commission arrived in India in 1928 to study constitutional reform in Britain's largest a ...
in
India. Maxwell Fyfe was eventually elected to
Parliament in
Liverpool West Derby
Liverpool, West Derby is a List of United Kingdom Parliament constituencies, constituency represented in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, UK Parliament since 2019 by Ian Byrne ...
in a
by-election in July 1935.
Meanwhile, Maxwell Fyfe's legal career had prospered. In 1934 he became
King's Counsel
In the United Kingdom and in some Commonwealth countries, a King's Counsel ( post-nominal initials KC) during the reign of a king, or Queen's Counsel (post-nominal initials QC) during the reign of a queen, is a lawyer (usually a barrister or ...
. He was
Recorder
Recorder or The Recorder may refer to:
Newspapers
* ''Indianapolis Recorder'', a weekly newspaper
* ''The Recorder'' (Massachusetts newspaper), a daily newspaper published in Greenfield, Massachusetts, US
* ''The Recorder'' (Port Pirie), a news ...
of
Oldham from 1936 to 1942.
Early political career
Maxwell Fyfe, along with
Patrick Spens,
Derrick Gunston
Sir Derrick Wellesley Gunston, 1st Baronet MC, (26 February 1891 – 13 July 1985) was a Unionist politician in the United Kingdom.
Gunston served with the Irish Guards in World War I and was awarded the Military Cross in 1918.
He was elected a ...
and others, backed the
National Government A national government is the government of a nation.
National government or
National Government may also refer to:
* Central government in a unitary state, or a country that does not give significant power to regional divisions
* Federal governme ...
over the
Hoare–Laval Pact
The Hoare–Laval Pact was an initially secret December 1935 proposal by British Foreign Secretary Samuel Hoare and French Prime Minister Pierre Laval for ending the Second Italo-Ethiopian War. Italy had wanted to seize the independent nation of ...
, and he supported
Neville Chamberlain
Arthur Neville Chamberlain (; 18 March 18699 November 1940) was a British politician of the Conservative Party who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from May 1937 to May 1940. He is best known for his foreign policy of appeasemen ...
over the
Munich Agreement. However, after the
German occupation of Czechoslovakia
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
** Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ge ...
in March 1939, Maxwell Fyfe joined the
Territorial Army and, at the outbreak of
World War II in September, he was deployed to the
Judge Advocate-General's department with rank of
major
Major (commandant in certain jurisdictions) is a military rank of commissioned officer status, with corresponding ranks existing in many military forces throughout the world. When used unhyphenated and in conjunction with no other indicators ...
. He was badly injured in an
air raid
Air raid may refer to:
Attacks
* Airstrike
* Strategic bombing
Other uses
* ''Air Raid'' (album), by the improvisational collective Air
* Air Raid ''(Transformers)'', the name of three characters in the Transformers universes
* ''Air Raid'' ...
in September 1940. In May 1941 Maxwell Fyfe became deputy to
Rab Butler's chairmanship of a Conservative Party committee to analyse forthcoming post-war problems, taking over from Butler in July 1943.
Into government and on to Nuremberg
In March 1942, Sir
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 ...
, on the advice of
Brendan Bracken, appointed Maxwell Fyfe
Solicitor-General. At the same time he was
knighted and sworn of the
Privy Council
A privy council is a body that advises the head of state of a state, typically, but not always, in the context of a monarchic government. The word "privy" means "private" or "secret"; thus, a privy council was originally a committee of the mon ...
. He applied himself to his work in the wartime coalition government with enormous industry and began some of the thinking and planning about how the leaders of the
Nazi regime in Germany might be brought to account after the war. As part of his duties, on 8 April 1945, he attended an Anglo-American discussion over the war crimes trial, at which, says the historian
Richard Overy
Richard James Overy (born 23 December 1947) is a British historian who has published on the history of World War II and Nazi Germany. In 2007, as ''The Times'' editor of ''Complete History of the World'', he chose the 50 key dates of world his ...
, "he presented the standard British argument for
summary execution
A summary execution is an execution in which a person is accused of a crime and immediately killed without the benefit of a full and fair trial. Executions as the result of summary justice (such as a drumhead court-martial) are sometimes include ...
." Whether Maxwell Fyfe believed such executions were the best method of dealing with the Nazis may be doubted, in view of his later work at the
Nuremberg Trials; at the time, however, as a member of the government he had little choice but to follow the lead of the Prime Minister, Churchill, who repeatedly urged that summary justice be visited upon the Nazi leaders. When the war in Europe ended and the coalition was dissolved in May 1945, Maxwell Fyfe was briefly
Attorney-General in Churchill's caretaker government.
The
Labour Party won a landslide victory in the
United Kingdom general election of 1945 and Sir
Hartley Shawcross became Attorney General and took responsibility as Britain's chief prosecutor in the Nuremberg Trials. Shawcross, to emphasise the non-partisan nature of the trials, appointed Maxwell Fyfe his deputy. Shawcross was largely committed to his political duties in
Westminster and played little part other than delivering the opening and closing speeches. Maxwell Fyfe took on most of the day-to-day responsibilities as "capable lawyer, efficient administrator and concerned housemaster". There were misgivings in some quarters as to how Fyfe would perform,
cross-examination not being regarded as one of his strengths. However, his cross-examination of
Hermann Göring was one of the most noted cross-examinations in history.
Opposition
After Nuremberg, Maxwell Fyfe returned to Parliament to
shadow the
Minister of Labour while simultaneously pursuing a full, busy and prominent career at the
Bar
Bar or BAR may refer to:
Food and drink
* Bar (establishment), selling alcoholic beverages
* Candy bar
* Chocolate bar
Science and technology
* Bar (river morphology), a deposit of sediment
* Bar (tropical cyclone), a layer of cloud
* Bar (u ...
, for example defending serial murderer
John George Haigh
John George Haigh (; 24 July 1909 – 10 August 1949), commonly known as the Acid Bath Murderer, was an English serial killer convicted for the murder of six people, although he claimed to have killed nine. Haigh battered to death or shot his ...
in 1949. Reputedly, he would arrive at the
House of Commons at around 5.00 pm, often stay throughout debates that lasted all night then, after a quick shave and breakfast, leave for
court. He was assisted in his punishing schedule by his wife
Sylvia, herself a Conservative Party worker.
Maxwell Fyfe played a leading role in drafting the party's
Industrial Charter
''The Industrial Charter: A Statement of Conservative Industrial Policy'' was a 1947 pamphlet and policy statement by the United Kingdom Conservative Party. The ''Charter'' is widely regarded as representing a seminal moment in the history of post ...
of 1947 and chaired the committee into Conservative Party organisation that resulted in the
Maxwell Fyfe Report
Maxwell may refer to:
People
* Maxwell (surname), including a list of people and fictional characters with the name
** James Clerk Maxwell, mathematician and physicist
* Justice Maxwell (disambiguation)
* Maxwell baronets, in the Baronetage of ...
(1948–49). The report shifted the balance of electoral funding from the candidate to the party, with the intention of broadening the
diversity of MPs. In practice, it may have had the effect of lending more power to
constituency
An electoral district, also known as an election district, legislative district, voting district, constituency, riding, ward, division, or (election) precinct is a subdivision of a larger State (polity), state (a country, administrative region, ...
parties and making candidates more uniform.
Maxwell Fyfe was a champion of
European integration
European integration is the process of industrial, economic integration, economic, political, legal, social integration, social, and cultural Regional integration, integration of states wholly or partially in Europe or nearby. European integrat ...
and a member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the
Council of Europe
The Council of Europe (CoE; french: Conseil de l'Europe, ) is an international organisation founded in the wake of World War II to uphold European Convention on Human Rights, human rights, democracy and the Law in Europe, rule of law in Europe. ...
from August 1949 to May 1952, becoming the Chair of the Assembly's Committee on Legal and Administrative Questions, and
rapporteur on the committee drafting the
European Convention on Human Rights. In his memoirs he criticised Sir
Anthony Eden
Robert Anthony Eden, 1st Earl of Avon, (12 June 1897 – 14 January 1977) was a British Conservative Party politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1955 until his resignation in 1957.
Achieving rapid promo ...
for a negative stance that derailed the UK's opportunity to become a leader in Europe. Eden always rejected this and considered a
libel
Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime. The legal defini ...
action against Maxwell Fyfe.
Return to government
Home Secretary
Shortly before the
United Kingdom general election of 1951, Maxwell Fyfe caused a stir when he appeared to hint in a radio interview that a Conservative government might legislate to curb the power of
trade unions. When the Conservative Party was returned to power in the election, Churchill thought it unwise to appoint him Minister of Labour, and Maxwell Fyfe became both
Home Secretary and cabinet minister for Welsh affairs. He was responsible for guiding several complicated pieces of legislation through the Commons, in particular those that established
commercial television. He gained a reputation as a hard-working, thorough and reliable cabinet member.
In 1952, the
Director General of MI5 (DG) was made directly answerable to the Home Secretary rather than the Prime Minister. Given this novel responsibility, Maxwell Fyfe issued the
Maxwell Fyfe Directive
Maxwell may refer to:
People
* Maxwell (surname), including a list of people and fictional characters with the name
** James Clerk Maxwell, mathematician and physicist
* Justice Maxwell (disambiguation)
* Maxwell baronets, in the Baronetage of ...
which became the ''
de facto'' constitution of the Security Service until the
Security Service Act 1989 set it on a statutory basis. When
Sir Percy Sillitoe resigned as DG in 1953, Maxwell Fyfe delegated the shortlisting of a successor to a committee of
civil servant
The civil service is a collective term for a sector of government composed mainly of career civil servants hired on professional merit rather than appointed or elected, whose institutional tenure typically survives transitions of political leaders ...
s chaired by
Sir Edward Bridges. The committee put forward
Dick White and
Sir Kenneth Strong. Maxwell Fyfe endorsed the committee's preference for White, observing to Churchill that an internal appointment would be good for the morale of the service.
Fyfe's assumption of office as Home Secretary heralded a reign of fear for male homosexuals. A stern advocate of existing legislation criminalising homosexual acts, he started a campaign to “rid England of this male vice … this plague” by dramatically increased arrests of male homosexuals through police surveillance and entrapment via the use of ''agents provocateurs'', tapped telephones, forged documents and the absence of warrants.
[Stewart, Graham "The Accidental Legacy of a Homophobic Humanitarian", The Times (London), 2 October 2000.] From 1,276 in prosecutions in 1939 for actual or attempted sodomy or gross indecency, a year after he had assumed the office of Home Secretary prosecutions had soared to 5,443.
Fyfe subsequently sanctioned the establishment of the
Wolfenden Report into homosexuality, but had he known its findings would recommend decriminalisation, it is unlikely he would have done so.
A conservative on the death penalty, Kilmuir was likewise conservative on the issue of homosexual rights, and led the opposition in the House of Lords to the implementation of the
Wolfenden Committee
The Report of the Departmental Committee on Homosexual Offences and Prostitution (better known as the Wolfenden report, after Sir John Wolfenden, the chairman of the committee) was published in the United Kingdom on 4 September 1957 after a suc ...
report, which had recommended the decriminalisation of homosexual acts between
consenting adults.
This was ironic, says
Geraldine Bedell, since it was he, while Home Secretary, who had set up the committee to consider whether the law should be changed.
[Geraldine Bedell]
"Coming out of the dark ages"
, ''The Observer'', London, 24 June 2007. As Bedell also notes: "Perhaps he thought, by handing over to a committee, to shelve the issue. Perhaps he assumed
Wolfenden would find against, in which case, he chose a curious chairman, because Wolfenden had a gay son,
Jeremy." Kilmuir still opposed liberalisation when a bill was introduced in the Lords (by
Lord Arran) in 1965. Says Bedell: "For the opposition, Lord Kilmuir warned against licensing the 'buggers' clubs' which he claimed were operating behind innocent-looking doors all over London."
Maxwell Fyfe told the Conservative backbencher
Sir Robert Boothby, who was known in parliamentary circles to be bisexual, that it was not his intention to legalise homosexuality: "I am not going down in history", he told Boothby, "as the man who made
sodomy legal."
During his tenure as Home Secretary, he was embroiled in the controversy surrounding the
hanging of
Derek Bentley.
Maxwell Fyfe had controversially refused to grant a reprieve to Bentley despite the written petitions of 200 MPs and the claim that Bentley was mentally retarded allegedly having a mental age of only 11. However, on most issues he was on the progressive wing of the Conservative Party, opposing the proposals in 1953 for the re-introduction of
corporal punishment.
Lord Chancellor
Maxwell Fyfe remained ambitious and a ''
Daily Mirror''
opinion poll in 1954, on the popular favourite to succeed Churchill as Party leader and
prime minister, had him behind Eden and Butler but well ahead of Macmillan. However, once it was clear that Eden was to be Churchill's successor, he sought the office of
Lord Chancellor.
On 19 October 1954 he was raised to the peerage as Viscount Kilmuir, of
Creich in the
County of Sutherland
Sutherland ( gd, Cataibh) is a historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area in the Highlands of Scotland. Its county town is Dornoch. Sutherland borders Caithness and Moray Firth to the east, Ross-shire and Cromartyshire (later ...
, and moved to the
House of Lords and the "
woolsack". Lord Kilmuir was a political Lord Chancellor, not restricting himself to his judicial role. He worked on many government issues including the
constitution of
Malta, which he wanted to become part of the UK, and the creation of the
Restrictive Practices Court
The Restrictive Trade Practices Act 1956 was an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom intended to enforce competition, and provide an appropriate check on restrictive combines and practices. It required that any agreement between companies ...
. In his eight years in the post he only sat as a judge on 24
appeal
In law, an appeal is the process in which cases are reviewed by a higher authority, where parties request a formal change to an official decision. Appeals function both as a process for error correction as well as a process of clarifying and ...
s to the
House of Lords. Lord Kilmuir opposed
Sydney Silverman
Samuel Sydney Silverman (8 October 1895 – 9 February 1968) was a British Labour politician and vocal opponent of capital punishment.
Early life
Silverman was born in poverty to a migrant Jewish parents from Jassy, Romania. His father was a d ...
's 1956
private member's bill
A private member's bill is a bill (proposed law) introduced into a legislature by a legislator who is not acting on behalf of the executive branch. The designation "private member's bill" is used in most Westminster system jurisdictions, in whi ...
to abolish
capital punishment. He described it as "an unwise and dangerous measure, the presence of which on the statute book would be a disaster for the country and a menace to the people". However, Kilmuir chaired the cabinet committee that recommended limiting the death penalty's scope and which led to the
Homicide Act 1957. He feared the consequences of
immigration to the United Kingdom and presented a report to the cabinet in 1956. Lord Kilmuir contended that the military intervention in the 1956
Suez Crisis
The Suez Crisis, or the Second Arab–Israeli war, also called the Tripartite Aggression ( ar, العدوان الثلاثي, Al-ʿUdwān aṯ-Ṯulāṯiyy) in the Arab world and the Sinai War in Israel,Also known as the Suez War or 1956 Wa ...
was justified under the
self-defence provisions of
Article 51
Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter sets out the UN Security Council's powers to maintain peace. It allows the Council to "determine the existence of any threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression" and to take military an ...
of the
United Nations Charter.
He continued in this office in the governments of
Anthony Eden
Robert Anthony Eden, 1st Earl of Avon, (12 June 1897 – 14 January 1977) was a British Conservative Party politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1955 until his resignation in 1957.
Achieving rapid promo ...
and
Harold Macmillan
Maurice Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, (10 February 1894 – 29 December 1986) was a British Conservative statesman and politician who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1957 to 1963. Caricatured as "Supermac", he ...
until Macmillan's 1962 "
Night of the Long Knives", when he was abruptly replaced by
Sir Reginald Manningham-Buller, the Attorney-General. Kilmuir was made Baron Fyfe of Dornoch, of
Dornoch
Dornoch (; gd, Dòrnach ; sco, Dornach) is a town, seaside resort, parish and former royal burgh in the county of Sutherland in the Highlands of Scotland. It lies on the north shore of the Dornoch Firth, near to where it opens into the Moray ...
in the County of Sutherland, and Earl of Kilmuir on 20 July 1962 to cushion the blow of retirement.
He is said to have complained to Macmillan that he was being sacked with less notice than would be given to a cook, to which Macmillan replied that it was easier to get Lord Chancellors than good cooks.
After government
After government, Kilmuir joined the
board of directors
A board of directors (commonly referred simply as the board) is an executive committee that jointly supervises the activities of an organization, which can be either a for-profit or a nonprofit organization such as a business, nonprofit organiz ...
of
Plessey
The Plessey Company plc was a British electronics, defence and telecommunications company. It originated in 1917, growing and diversifying into electronics. It expanded after World War II by acquisition of companies and formed overseas compani ...
but his health soon declined. He died at
Withyham,
Sussex
Sussex (), from the Old English (), is a historic county in South East England that was formerly an independent medieval Anglo-Saxon kingdom. It is bounded to the west by Hampshire, north by Surrey, northeast by Kent, south by the English ...
, on 27 January 1967 and was
cremated
Cremation is a method of final disposition of a dead body through burning.
Cremation may serve as a funeral or post-funeral rite and as an alternative to burial. In some countries, including India and Nepal, cremation on an open-air pyre i ...
. His ashes were buried at the church of St Michael and All Angels at Withyham. His wealth at death was £22,202. His titles, which could pass only to sons, became extinct, as he had fathered only daughters.
Family and personality
He married
Sylvia Harrison in 1925 and they had three daughters, one of whom pre-deceased him. Lalage Fyfe (b. 1926, d. 1944) and Pamela Maxwell Fyfe (b. 1928) later Wigram in 1950, then 26 October 1957 Blackmore. His
brother-in-law was the actor
Sir Rex Harrison
Sir Reginald Carey "Rex" Harrison (5 March 1908 – 2 June 1990) was an English actor. Harrison began his career on the stage in 1924. He made his West End theatre, West End debut in 1936 appearing in the Terence Rattigan play ''French Without ...
.
Kilmuir was a formidable parliamentary presence on behalf of his party, and his remarkable memory compensated for a dull speaking style, though he was capable of passion when the circumstances were right. In appearance, "His body was pear-shaped, and beneath a large square bald head there were dark heavy eyebrows and a face of middle-eastern pallor and swarthiness".
As Home Secretary, he often travelled to
Wales, and in the valleys of
South Wales
South Wales ( cy, De Cymru) is a loosely defined region of Wales bordered by England to the east and mid Wales to the north. Generally considered to include the historic counties of Glamorgan and Monmouthshire, south Wales extends westwards ...
he was nicknamed ''Dai Bananas'',
Fyffes being, then as now, one of Britain's major importers of the fruit.
Honours
Among his honours were:
*
King's Counsel
In the United Kingdom and in some Commonwealth countries, a King's Counsel ( post-nominal initials KC) during the reign of a king, or Queen's Counsel (post-nominal initials QC) during the reign of a queen, is a lawyer (usually a barrister or ...
(KC) (1934)
*
Knighthood (Kt) (1942)
*
Privy Councillor
A privy council is a body that advises the head of state of a state, typically, but not always, in the context of a monarchic government. The word "privy" means "private" or "secret"; thus, a privy council was originally a committee of the mon ...
(PC) (1945)
*
Viscount Kilmuir
A viscount ( , for male) or viscountess (, for female) is a title used in certain European countries for a noble of varying status.
In many countries a viscount, and its historical equivalents, was a non-hereditary, administrative or judicial ...
(1954)
*
Earl of Kilmuir
Earl () is a rank of the nobility in the United Kingdom. The title originates in the Old English word ''eorl'', meaning "a man of noble birth or rank". The word is cognate with the Scandinavian form ''jarl'', and meant " chieftain", particula ...
(1962)
* Knight Grand Cross in the
Royal Victorian Order (GCVO) (1953);
*
Honorary degrees including:
**
University of Oxford;
**
University of Manitoba (
LL.D
Legum Doctor (Latin: “teacher of the laws”) (LL.D.) or, in English, Doctor of Laws, is a doctorate-level academic degree in law or an honorary degree, depending on the jurisdiction. The double “L” in the abbreviation refers to the earl ...
) 1954.
**
University of Edinburgh (
LL.D
Legum Doctor (Latin: “teacher of the laws”) (LL.D.) or, in English, Doctor of Laws, is a doctorate-level academic degree in law or an honorary degree, depending on the jurisdiction. The double “L” in the abbreviation refers to the earl ...
) 1955.
**
University of Wales;
**
University of Ottawa (
LL.D
Legum Doctor (Latin: “teacher of the laws”) (LL.D.) or, in English, Doctor of Laws, is a doctorate-level academic degree in law or an honorary degree, depending on the jurisdiction. The double “L” in the abbreviation refers to the earl ...
) 16 September 1960.
*
Visitor
A visitor, in English and Welsh law and history, is an overseer of an autonomous ecclesiastical or eleemosynary institution, often a charitable institution set up for the perpetual distribution of the founder's alms and bounty, who can interve ...
of
St Antony's College, Oxford
St Antony's College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. Founded in 1950 as the result of the gift of French merchant Sir Antonin Besse of Aden, St Antony's specialises in international relations, economic ...
(1953); and
*
Rector
Rector (Latin for the member of a vessel's crew who steers) may refer to:
Style or title
*Rector (ecclesiastical), a cleric who functions as an administrative leader in some Christian denominations
*Rector (academia), a senior official in an edu ...
of the
University of St Andrews (1956).
Portrayal in drama
David Maxwell Fyfe has been portrayed by the following actors in film, television and theatre productions;
*
Iain Cuthbertson in the 1991 British/French film ''
Let Him Have It
''Let Him Have It'' is a 1991 British drama film directed by Peter Medak and starring Christopher Eccleston, Paul Reynolds, Tom Courtenay and Tom Bell. The film is based on the true story of Derek Bentley, who was convicted of the murder of a p ...
''
*
Christopher Plummer in the 2000 Canadian/U.S. TV production ''
Nuremberg''
*
Julian Wadham
Julian Neil Rohan Wadham (born 7 August 1958) is an English actor of stage, film and television. He was educated at Ampleforth College and the Central School of Speech and Drama, third son of Rohan Nicholas Wadham DFC and Juliana Wadham, née ...
in the 2006 British television docudrama ''
Nuremberg: Nazis on Trial''
*
Mel Smith in the 2007 British television drama ''
Consenting Adults''
*
John Warnaby
John Warnaby is a British actor who has appeared extensively in film and television.
Career
In 1996, Warnaby appeared at the Royal National Theatre, National Theatre in Helen Edmundson, Helen Edmundson's adaptation of Leo Tolstoy, Leo Tolstoy's ...
in
Nicholas de Jongh's stage play, ''
Plague Over England
''Plague Over England'' is a play written by Nicholas de Jongh, based on a real-life incident when actor John Gielgud was arrested for lewd behavior in 1953; it provides an insight into the changes in the lives of gay people over the last fifty ye ...
'' (London, 2009)
*There is also a film being made about him called ''Under an English Heaven'' by his grandson Tom Blackmore.
*
Zdzisław Mrożewski
Zdzisław Mrożewski (21 May 1909 – 5 July 2002) was a Polish actor. He appeared in 30 films between 1932 and 1981. He starred in the 1977 film '' Death of a President'', which was entered into the 28th Berlin International Film Festival, ...
in polish film ''Epilog norymberski''
References
Bibliography
*Obituaries:
**''
The Times'', 28 January 1967
**''
The Guardian'', 28 January 1967
*
*
*Dutton, D. J. (2004
Fyfe, David Patrick Maxwell, Earl of Kilmuir (1900–1967), ''
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, accessed 4 Aug 2007
*
*Lord Kilmuir (1964) ''Political Adventure''
*
*
Tusa, A. &
Tusa, J. (1983) ''The Nuremberg Trial''
External links
*
*
The Papers of Lord Kilmuirheld at
Churchill Archives Centre
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Kilmuir, David Maxwell Fyfe, 1st Earl of
1900 births
1967 deaths
Alumni of Balliol College, Oxford
Maxwell Fyfe, David
British Anglicans
Maxwell Fyfe, David
Earls in the Peerage of the United Kingdom
English King's Counsel
English barristers
Knights Bachelor
Knights Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order
Lord chancellors of Great Britain
Members of Gray's Inn
Maxwell Fyfe, David
Members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom
Ministers in the Churchill caretaker government, 1945
Ministers in the Churchill wartime government, 1940–1945
Ministers in the Eden government, 1955–1957
Ministers in the Macmillan and Douglas-Home governments, 1957–1964
Ministers in the third Churchill government, 1951–1955
Earls created by Elizabeth II
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Maxwell Fyfe, David
20th-century King's Counsel
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Maxwell Fyfe, David
Maxwell Fyfe, David
Maxwell Fyfe, David
Maxwell Fyfe, David
Maxwell Fyfe, David
Maxwell Fyfe, David
UK MPs who were granted peerages
Lawyers from Edinburgh