Archibald Henry Macdonald Sinclair, 1st Viscount Thurso, (22 October 1890 – 15 June 1970), known as Sir Archibald Sinclair between 1912 and 1952, and often as Archie Sinclair, was a British politician and leader of the
Liberal Party
The Liberal Party is any of many political parties around the world.
The meaning of ''liberal'' varies around the world, ranging from liberal conservatism on the right to social liberalism on the left. For example, while the political systems ...
.
Background and education
Sinclair was born in 1890 in
Caithness, Scotland.
Sinclair was the son Clarence Granville Sinclair, and his American wife Mabel Sands, daughter of
Mahlon Day Sands, and half-sister of
Ethel Sands. His mother died shortly after his birth, and his father in 1895. He was brought up in families including those of his paternal grandfather
Sir Tollemache Sinclair, 3rd Baronet, his uncle
William Macdonald Sinclair, and
Owen Williams, married to his aunt Nina.
Educated at
Eton College
Eton College ( ) is a Public school (United Kingdom), public school providing boarding school, boarding education for boys aged 13–18, in the small town of Eton, Berkshire, Eton, in Berkshire, in the United Kingdom. It has educated Prime Mini ...
and the
Royal Military College, Sandhurst, Sinclair was commissioned into the
Life Guards in 1910. In 1912, he succeeded his grandfather as the fourth Baronet of
Ulbster.
He became one of the largest landowners in the United Kingdom, owning an estate of about in Caithness.
His recreations included
polo and flying: he was a keen aviator. At this period he made a friend of
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965) was a British statesman, military officer, and writer who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1945 (Winston Churchill in the Second World War, ...
.
Colin Coote in his memoirs wrote of Sinclair's "irresistible charm, allied to the face and figure of an Adonis". The handsome Sinclair was at this period thought of as a possible husband for Nellie Hozier, younger sister of
Clementine Churchill.
Military career

Sinclair served on the
Western Front during
World War I
World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
, in 1915 as aide de camp to
J. E. B. Seely who commanded the
Canadian Cavalry Brigade. He rose to the rank of
Major in the
Guards Machine Gun Regiment.
After Winston Churchill resigned as
First Lord of the Admiralty, Sinclair served as his
second-in-command when Churchill took up command at the beginning of 1916 of the 6th Battalion of the Royal Scots Fusiliers. Churchill arranged the transfer with
Douglas Haig
Field marshal (United Kingdom), Field Marshal Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig (; 19 June 1861 – 29 January 1928) was a senior Officer (armed forces), officer of the British Army. During the First World War he commanded the British Expeditionary F ...
, who turned down the request that Seely should be moved too, and also refused him
Edward Spears. They were stationed in the
Ploegsteert Wood sector of the Western Front.
Working with Churchill
From 1919 to 1921 Sinclair served as Personal Military Secretary to Churchill, when he returned to the Cabinet as
Secretary of State for War, and then accompanied him to the
Colonial Office as
Private Secretary.
Sinclair's duties included acting as liaison for Churchill with the
Secret Intelligence Service
The Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), commonly known as MI6 (MI numbers, Military Intelligence, Section 6), is the foreign intelligence service of the United Kingdom, tasked mainly with the covert overseas collection and analysis of Human i ...
. He had dealings with
George Alexander Hill and
Malcolm Wollcombe, agent in the
Soviet Union
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...
for
Mansfield Smith-Cumming.
Stewart Menzies who had the official liaison role at the
War Office was a personal friend. Sinclair collated
humint and
technical intelligence for Churchill, for example on
Leonid Krasin. He also assisted in the delicate handling of
Boris Savinkov, who was brought to London. It was Sinclair who introduced the prominent British agent
Sidney Reilly to Nikolai Alekseyev, intelligence chief of the
White Russian leader
Alexander Guchkov.
Political career 1922–1939
In 1922, Sinclair entered the
House of Commons
The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the Bicameralism, 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 ...
as a Liberal Member of Parliament (MP) for
Caithness and Sutherland, supporting
David Lloyd George and defeating the incumbent Liberal supporter of
H. H. Asquith. He rose through the Liberal ranks as the party shrank in Parliament, becoming
Chief Whip by 1930.
At this period he worked on land policy with Lloyd George, including the "Tartan Book" that addressed
Scottish devolution.
In July 1931, a meeting took place at Sinclair's house, where
Oswald Mosley and
Harold Nicolson met Churchill, Lloyd George and
Brendan Bracken, to discuss a political alliance. About a month later, the Liberal Party joined the
National Government of
Ramsay MacDonald, with Sinclair appointed
Secretary of State for Scotland. He was sworn of the
Privy Council at the same time. In 1932, he, together with other Liberal ministers led by
Herbert Samuel, resigned from the government in protest at the
Ottawa Conference introducing
Imperial Preference.
In the
1935 general election, Herbert Samuel lost his seat, and Sinclair became the Liberal Party's leader at the head of 20 MPs. During the
Abdication Crisis
In early December 1936, a constitutional crisis in the British Empire arose when King Edward VIII proposed to marry Wallis Simpson, an American socialite who was divorced from her first husband and was in the process of divorcing her second.
T ...
of 1936, his name was put forward as a possible leader of a government that might be formed if
Edward VIII held onto the throne against the wishes of the
Baldwin administration. Churchill came to support the King's position, and
Lord Beaverbrook entertained the idea of Sinclair as Prime Minister. Both
Clement Attlee
Clement Richard Attlee, 1st Earl Attlee (3 January 18838 October 1967) was a British statesman who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1945 to 1951 and Leader of the Labour Party (UK), Leader of the Labour Party from 1935 to 1955. At ...
for Labour and Sinclair for the Liberals, however, in late November ruled out forming a government under those circumstances.
Sinclair consistently opposed the
continental dictatorships and kept the
National Liberals at arms length. He supported the
League of Nations
The League of Nations (LN or LoN; , SdN) was the first worldwide intergovernmental organisation whose principal mission was to maintain world peace. It was founded on 10 January 1920 by the Paris Peace Conference (1919–1920), Paris Peace ...
and
collective security
Collective security is arrangement between states in which the institution accepts that an attack on one state is the concern of all and merits a collective response to threats by all. Collective security was a key principle underpinning the Lea ...
. He backed, as did Attlee, Churchill's book ''
Arms and the Covenant''.
He joined the
Anti-Nazi Council of Eugen Spier, with Churchill and
Violet Bonham Carter,
Margaret Bondfield and
Hugh Dalton. Public opinion at this point of the later 1930s by no means agreed, and
John Alfred Spender attacked Sinclair in ''
The Times
''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...
'' on foreign policy, claiming that he, like the
League of Nations Union, wished for war with the
Axis Powers
The Axis powers, originally called the Rome–Berlin Axis and also Rome–Berlin–Tokyo Axis, was the military coalition which initiated World War II and fought against the Allies of World War II, Allies. Its principal members were Nazi Ge ...
.
At the time of the
Munich Crisis in September 1938, Sinclair was one of the anti-appeasement group who gathered around Churchill, with
Leo Amery,
Robert Boothby,
Robert Cecil,
Harold Macmillan
Maurice Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton (10 February 1894 – 29 December 1986), was a British statesman and Conservative Party (UK), Conservative politician who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1957 to 1963. Nickn ...
and Harold Nicolson. During parliamentary debate over the
Munich Agreement
The Munich Agreement was reached in Munich on 30 September 1938, by Nazi Germany, the United Kingdom, the French Third Republic, French Republic, and the Kingdom of Italy. The agreement provided for the Occupation of Czechoslovakia (1938–194 ...
he attacked Prime Minister
Neville Chamberlain
Arthur Neville Chamberlain (; 18 March 18699 November 1940) was a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from May 1937 to May 1940 and Leader of the Conservative Party (UK), Leader of the Conservative Party from ...
for "wilting" to
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German Reich, German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a Totalit ...
and tossing "justice and respect for treaties... to the winds." On a personal level, Violet Bonham Carter was a frequent guest of the Sinclairs at Dalnawillan Lodge in the
Flow Country, as were
Harcourt Johnstone and Lady Gwendoline Churchill, wife of
Jack Churchill and Winston's sister-in-law. Bonham Carter was a Liberal activist, close follower of Churchill, anti-appeaser and
League of Nations Union member.
Second World War
When Churchill formed an
all-party coalition government in 1940, Sinclair entered the cabinet as
Secretary of State for Air. During the
May 1940 British war cabinet crisis after the
fall of France he sided with Churchill against
Lord Halifax's plan to seek a negotiated settlement with Nazi Germany mediated by
Fascist Italy
Fascist Italy () is a term which is used in historiography to describe the Kingdom of Italy between 1922 and 1943, when Benito Mussolini and the National Fascist Party controlled the country, transforming it into a totalitarian dictatorship. Th ...
.
Sinclair's first task was to work with the
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the Air force, air and space force of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. It was formed towards the end of the World War I, First World War on 1 April 1918, on the merger of t ...
in planning the
Battle of Britain. Towards the end of the war, he found himself at odds with Churchill, arguing against
Bomber Harris' strategy for the
Bombing of Dresden and other German cities. He was not a strong political personality:
Max Hastings reports that he was often regarded as the "
Head of School's
fag" to Churchill, and as the political mouthpiece rather than the master of
Air Chief Marshals Portal and
Harris. However, in 1942 he did convince Churchill and his cabinet not to carry out reprisals on German villages for
war atrocities such as the
Lidice massacre.
Sinclair remained a minister until May 1945, when the coalition ended. In the
1945 general election, he lost his seat. His margin of defeat was narrow: he came in third place, with the victor
Eric Gandar Dower having 61 votes more.
Last years
At the
1950 general election, Sinclair again stood for his old seat, coming second. In 1952, the year of his first stroke, he accepted elevation to the
House of Lords
The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the lower house, the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster in London, England. One of the oldest ext ...
as Viscount Thurso of Ulbster in the
County of Caithness. A more serious stroke in 1959 left him largely bedridden and in a state of precarious health, until he died at his home in
Twickenham in 1970.
[
]
Family
In 1918 Sinclair married Marigold Forbes (1897–1975), daughter of Lieutenant-Colonel James Stewart Forbes and Lady Angela Forbes. They had four children:
# Catherine (1919–2007), married 1957 Kazimierz Zielenkiewicz.
# Elizabeth (1921–1994), married in 1942 Archibald Michael Lyle, son of Sir Archibald Lyle, 2nd Baronet, and was mother of Veronica Linklater.
# Robin (1922–1995), married 1952 Margaret Beaumont Robertson, and was father of John Sinclair, 3rd Viscount Thurso
# Angus John (1925–2003), married firstly in 1955 Pamela Karen Bower, daughter of Dallas Bower (dissolved 1967), secondly in 1968 Judith Anne Percy (dissolved 1992), thirdly in 1992 Kate Fry.
Legacy
The Southern Railway named a Battle of Britain Class Light Pacific steam locomotive "Sir Archibald Sinclair". The ceremonial naming of the locomotive was performed by Sir Archibald himself at Waterloo station on 24 February 1948. The SR number of the locomotive was 21C159 and its British Railways number was 34059.
References
Bibliography
*
* Violet Bonham Carter, ed. Mark Pottle, ''Champion Redoubtable: The Diaries of Violet Bonham Carter 1914–1945'' (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1998).
*Gerard DeGroot, ''Liberal Crusader: The Life of Sir Archibald Sinclair'' (New York University Press, 1993).
*
*ed. Ian Hunter, ''Winston and Archie: The collected correspondence of Winston Churchill and Sir Archibald Sinclair'' (Politico's, 2005).
* Torrance, David, ''The Scottish Secretaries'' (Birlinn 2006).
External links
*
Sir Archibald Sinclair (Viscount Thurso) 1890–1970
biography from the Liberal Democrat History Group
*
The Papers of Archibald Sinclair, 1st Viscount Thurso
held at Churchill Archives Centre
{{DEFAULTSORT:Thurso, Archibald Sinclair, 1st Viscount
1890 births
1970 deaths
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