John Conrad Russell, 4th Earl Russell (16 November 1921 – 16 December 1987), styled Viscount Amberley from 1931 to 1970, was the eldest son of the philosopher and mathematician

Bertrand Russell Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, (18 May 1872 – 2 February 1970) was a British philosopher, logician, mathematician, and public intellectual. He had influence on mathematics, logic, set theory, and various areas of analytic ...

(the 3rd Earl) and his second wife,

Dora Black Dora Winifred Russell, Countess Russell ( Black; 3 April 1894 – 31 May 1986) was a British author, a feminist and socialist campaigner, and the second wife of the philosopher Bertrand Russell. She was a campaigner for contraception and pea ...

. His middle name was a tribute to the writer

Joseph Conrad Joseph Conrad (born Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski, ; 3 December 1857 – 3 August 1924) was a Poles in the United Kingdom#19th century, Polish-British novelist and story writer. He is regarded as one of the greatest writers in the Eng ...

, whom his father had long admired. He was the great-grandson of the 19th-century British Whig

Prime Minister A prime minister or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. A prime minister is not the head of state, but r ...

Lord John Russell John Russell, 1st Earl Russell (18 August 1792 – 28 May 1878), known as Lord John Russell before 1861, was a British Whig and Liberal statesman who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1846 to 1852 and again from 1865 to 186 ...

. He succeeded to the earldom on the death of his father on 2 February 1970.

Education

John Russell was educated at the progressive

Dartington Hall School Dartington Hall in Dartington, near Totnes, Devon, England, is an historic house and country estate of dating from medieval times. The group of late 14th century buildings are Grade I listed; described in Pevsner's Buildings of England as ...

, the

University of California, Los Angeles The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school the ...

and

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

. Upon leaving Harvard in 1943 he returned to Britain and enlisted in the

Royal Naval Reserve The Royal Naval Reserve (RNR) is one of the two volunteer reserve forces of the Royal Navy in the United Kingdom. Together with the Royal Marines Reserve, they form the Maritime Reserve. The present RNR was formed by merging the original ...

. In the Reserve, he learned the

Japanese language is the principal language of the Japonic languages, Japonic language family spoken by the Japanese people. It has around 123 million speakers, primarily in Japan, the only country where it is the national language, and within the Japanese dia ...

Career

Russell had a distinguished early career, working for the

FAO The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations; . (FAO) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations that leads international efforts to defeat hunger and improve nutrition ...

among other organisations, but in later life he was diagnosed as

schizophrenic Schizophrenia () is a mental disorder characterized variously by hallucinations (typically, Auditory hallucination#Schizophrenia, hearing voices), delusions, thought disorder, disorganized thinking and behavior, and Reduced affect display, f ...

. This made him the only person in the United Kingdom to be denied the vote on two counts, first, for being a peer and, second, for being insane. He delivered a speech in the House of Lords on 18 July 1978 that was considered so outlandish that it was claimed to be the only speech unrecorded by ''

Hansard ''Hansard'' is the transcripts of parliamentary debates in Britain and many Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth countries. It is named after Thomas Curson Hansard (1776–1833), a London printer and publisher, who was the first official printe ...

'', although it is included in the online version while lacking the final section that he had written but failed to read aloud after being interrupted.

Personal life

He was married on 28 August 1946 to Susan Doniphan Lindsay, daughter of the poet

Vachel Lindsay Nicholas Vachel Lindsay (; November 10, 1879 – December 5, 1931) was an American poet. He is considered a founder of modern ''singing poetry,'' as he referred to it, in which verses are meant to be sung or chanted. Early years Lindsay was born ...

. They were divorced in 1955. They had three daughters: , Lady Sarah Elizabeth Russell , and Lady Lucy Catherine Russell (21 July 1948 – 11 April 1975). Neither Sarah nor Lucy married or bore children; Felicity had one daughter, Rowan. Like their father and mother, the three daughters had mental illnesses. Lucy, who was Bertrand Russell's favourite grandchild, died from

self-immolation Self-immolation is the act of setting oneself on fire. It is mostly done for political or religious reasons, often as a form of protest or in acts of martyrdom, and known for its disturbing and violent nature. Etymology The English word ' ...

, at the age of 26, in the forecourt of a church near

Penzance Penzance ( ; ) is a town, civil parish and port in the Penwith district of Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It is the westernmost major town in Cornwall and is about west-southwest of Plymouth and west-southwest of London. Situated in the ...

, ostensibly protesting in the cause of world peace.

Héctor Abad Hector () is an English, French, Scottish, and Spanish given name. The name is derived from the name of Hektor, a legendary Trojan champion who was killed by the Greek Achilles. The name ''Hektor'' is probably derived from the Greek ''ékhein'', m ...

The Reasoning Heart
'' Brick Magazine'', No. 88 (Winter, 2012). Retrieved 2016-07-05. Like her father, Lucy was diagnosed with schizophrenia. Russell was succeeded as Earl by his half-brother, the historian

Conrad Russell, 5th Earl Russell Conrad Sebastian Robert Russell, 5th Earl Russell, (15 April 1937 – 14 October 2004), was a British historian and politician. As an academic historian, he worked primarily on 17th-century English history, having extensively written and l ...

References

Bibliography

External links

* 1921 births 1987 deaths 20th-century British military personnel Earls Russell Harvard University alumni People with schizophrenia History of mental health in the United Kingdom Royal Naval Reserve personnel J Bertrand Russell University of California alumni People educated at Dartington Hall School {{UK-earl-stub