Herbrand Sackville, 9th Earl De La Warr facts for kids

Quick facts for kids The Right Honourable The Earl De La Warr GBE PC JP DL
Postmaster General
In office 5 November 1951 – 5 April 1955
Monarch	George VI Elizabeth II
Prime Minister	Winston Churchill
Preceded by	Ness Edwards
Succeeded by	Charles Hill
First Commissioner of Works
In office 3 April 1940 – 10 May 1940
Monarch	George VI
Prime Minister	Neville Chamberlain
Preceded by	Herwald Ramsbotham
Succeeded by	The Lord Tryon
President of the Board of Education
In office 27 October 1938 – 3 April 1940
Monarch	George VI
Prime Minister	Neville Chamberlain
Preceded by	The Earl Stanhope
Succeeded by	Herwald Ramsbotham
Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal
In office 28 May 1937 – 27 October 1938
Monarch	George VI
Prime Minister	Neville Chamberlain
Preceded by	The Viscount Halifax
Succeeded by	Sir John Anderson
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies
In office 30 July 1936 – 28 May 1937
Monarch	Edward VIII George VI
Prime Minister	Stanley Baldwin
Preceded by	The Earl of Plymouth
Succeeded by	The Marquess of Dufferin and Ava
Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Education
In office 28 November 1935 – 30 July 1936
Monarch	George V Edward VIII
Prime Minister	Stanley Baldwin
Preceded by	Herwald Ramsbotham
Succeeded by	Geoffrey Shakespeare
Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries
In office 5 June 1930 – 28 November 1935
Monarch	George V
Prime Minister	Ramsay MacDonald Stanley Baldwin
Preceded by	Christopher Addison
Succeeded by	Herwald Ramsbotham
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for War
In office 11 June 1929 – 5 June 1930
Monarch	George V
Prime Minister	Ramsay MacDonald
Preceded by	The Duke of Sutherland
Succeeded by	The Lord Marley
Lord-in-waiting Government Whip
In office 18 July 1929 – 24 August 1931
Monarch	George V
Prime Minister	Ramsay MacDonald
Preceded by	The Earl of Airlie
Succeeded by	The Viscount Gage
In office 8 February 1924 – 4 November 1924
Monarch	George V
Prime Minister	Ramsay MacDonald
Preceded by	The Earl of Lucan
Succeeded by	The Earl of Lucan
Member of the House of Lords Lord Temporal
In office 21 June 1921 – 28 January 1976 Hereditary Peerage
Preceded by	The 8th Earl De La Warr
Succeeded by	The 10th Earl De La Warr
Personal details
Born	20 June 1900 (1900-06-20)
Died	28 January 1976 (1976-01-29) (aged 75)
Nationality	British
Political party	Labour National Labour Conservative
Spouses	Diana Leigh ​ ​ (m. 1920; died 1966)​ Sylvia Harrison ​ (m. 1967)​
Children	3
Parents	Gilbert Sackville, 8th Earl De La Warr Muriel Brassey
Alma mater	Magdalen College, Oxford

Herbrand Edward Dundonald Brassey Sackville, 9th Earl De La Warr, GBE, PC, JP, DL (20 June 1900 – 28 January 1976), styled Lord Buckhurst until 1915 (and sometimes nicknamed "Buck De La Warr" after that), was a British politician. He was the first hereditary peer to join the Labour Party and became a government minister at the age of 23.

He was later one of the few Labour politicians to follow Ramsay MacDonald in the formation of the National Government and the National Labour Organisation. However, he ended his political career by serving as Postmaster General in the last Conservative administration of Winston Churchill.

Background and education

De La Warr was the son of Gilbert Sackville, 8th Earl De La Warr, and Muriel Agnes, daughter of Thomas Brassey, 1st Earl Brassey, eldest son of the railway engineer Thomas Brassey. He was educated at Eton and Magdalen College, Oxford. The son of a Conservative father and Liberal mother, he developed trends towards socialism at university. In 1915 his father was killed in the First World War, and he succeeded to the title as a minor. On reaching 18, he refused as a conscientious objector to take part in active combat, but joined the Royal Naval Reserve (trawler section).

Political career

De La Warr became the first hereditary peer to join the Labour Party, and in February 1924, then aged 23, was one of the youngest ever ministers when he was appointed Lord in Waiting in the first Labour government of Ramsay MacDonald. He made his maiden speech in the House of Lords the same month.

In the second Labour government of 1929 to 1931 he served as Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (government chief whip in the House of Lords) and Under-Secretary of State for War between 1929 and 1930, as Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries between 1930 and 1931 and as a Lord-in-waiting between 1929 and 1931.

In 1931, the Labour government fell and MacDonald formed a National Government. De La Warr was one of only a tiny handful of Labour ministers to join it, and before the 1931 general election was instrumental in the formation of the National Labour Organisation to provide a vehicle of support for MacDonald and other ex-Labour members of the National Government. He resumed office as Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, a post he held until 1935, and then served under Stanley Baldwin as Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Education between 1935 and 1936 and as Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies between 1936 and 1937. In 1936, he was sworn of the Privy Council.

In 1937, new Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain gave De La Warr his first cabinet post as Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal. Like several other younger members of the cabinet, De La Warr found himself disagreeing over the government's foreign policy, and contemplated resigning over the Munich Agreement, but decided not to. In the aftermath of the agreement he was transferred in 1938 to be President of the Board of Education. During his time in this post, it was expected that he would oversee legislation for raising of the school leaving age to 15, but the outbreak of World War II deferred all such plans until the end of hostilities.

In April 1940 De La Warr became First Commissioner of Works in a series of ministerial changes by Chamberlain, but was demoted from the cabinet. The following month Chamberlain was replaced by Winston Churchill, who formed an all-party coalition government, and the objections of the Labour Party to National Labour ministers meant that De La Warr was dropped, and he did not return to government for eleven years.

In 1951, in Churchill's peacetime Conservative government, De La Warr was appointed Postmaster General, and as such, was in charge at the time of the Eastcastle Street robbery, before leaving office for the final time in 1955. He continued to contribute regularly to the House of Lords until 1966, but from then on until his death ten years later only spoke twice, both times in 1972.

Apart from his career in national politics, De La Warr was Mayor of Bexhill-on-Sea between 1932 and 1934 and a Justice of the Peace and Deputy Lieutenant for Sussex. In 1956 he was made a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire. The De La Warr Pavilion was built in 1935 in Bexhill-on-Sea and was named after Lord De La Warr. The "De La Warr" in both the pavilion's name and the Earl's name is pronounced "Delaware" (as in the American state named for his ancestor Thomas West, 3rd Baron De La Warr).

Family

Lord De La Warr was twice married. He married firstly Diana Helena, daughter of Henry Gerard Leigh, in 1920. They had two sons and a daughter. Their younger son Thomas Sackville (1922–1943) was killed in action during the Second World War.

After Diana's death in March 1966, he married secondly Sylvia, Countess of Kilmuir, in 1968. She was the daughter of Edith and cotton broker William Reginald Harrison, widow of David Maxwell Fyfe, 1st Earl of Kilmuir, and the sister of actor Sir Rex Harrison, famously star of the film, My Fair Lady.

One of his sisters was Lady Avice Ela Muriel Sackville (d. 1985). He attended her marriage to Stewart Menzies, (leader of British wartime intelligence or 'C'), dressed in a lower-deck seaman's bell-bottomed uniform.

Death

Lord De La Warr died in January 1976, aged 75, and was succeeded in the earldom by his elder and only surviving son, William. The Countess De La Warr died in June 1992.

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