Peter Carington, 6th Baron Carrington
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| The Right Honourable The Lord Carrington KG GCMG CH MC PC DL |
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 Lord Carrington, as Chancellor of the Order of the Garter, in procession to St George's Chapel at Windsor Castle in 2006 |
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| In office 25 June 1984 – 1 July 1988 |
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| Preceded by | Joseph Luns |
| Succeeded by | Manfred Wörner |
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| In office 4 May 1979 – 5 April 1982 |
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| Prime Minister | Margaret Thatcher |
| Preceded by | David Owen |
| Succeeded by | Francis Pym |
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| In office 8 January – 4 March 1974 |
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| Prime Minister | Edward Heath |
| Preceded by | Position created |
| Succeeded by | Eric Varley |
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| In office 20 June 1970 – 8 January 1974 |
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| Prime Minister | Edward Heath |
| Preceded by | Denis Healey |
| Succeeded by | Sir Ian Gilmour, Bt. |
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| In office 20 October 1963 – 16 October 1964 |
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| Prime Minister | Sir Alec Douglas-Home |
| Preceded by | The Viscount Hailsham |
| Succeeded by | The Earl of Longford |
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| In office 20 October 1963 – 16 October 1964 |
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| Prime Minister | Sir Alec Douglas-Home |
| Preceded by | W.F. Deedes |
| Succeeded by | Vacant Position was next held by George Morgan Thomson in 1968 |
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| In office 14 October 1959 – 20 October 1963 |
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| Preceded by | The Earl of Selkirk |
| Succeeded by | The Earl Jellicoe |
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| Born | 6 June 1919 Buckinghamshire, England |
| Nationality | British |
| Political party | Conservative |
| Spouse(s) | Iona Maclean |
| Alma mater | Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst |
Peter Alexander Rupert Carington, 6th Baron Carrington and Baron Carington of Upton, KG, GCMG, CH, MC, PC, DL (born 6 June 1919) is a British Conservative politician. He served as British Foreign Secretary between 1979 and 1982 and as Secretary-General of NATO from 1984 to 1988. He is the last person to have held one of the four Great Offices of State while a peer. He is also the last surviving member of the Cabinet of Alec Douglas Home.
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[edit] Career
Carrington was educated at Eton, and RMA Sandhurst.
In 1938, Carrington succeeded his father as 6th Baron Carrington and took his seat in the House of Lords on his 21st birthday in 1940. Following Sandhurst, he was commissioned into the Grenadier Guards as a second lieutenant on 26 January 1939.[1] He served with the regiment during the Second World War, he was promoted lieutenant on 1 January 1941,[2] and later rose to the rank of temporary captain and acting major, and was awarded the Military Cross (MC) on 1 March 1945.[3] The MC was awarded for his part in the capture and holding of a vital bridge in Nijmegen.[4]
After the war Lord Carrington remained in the army until 1949, though he was on the unemployed list from October 1945,[5] he became involved in politics and served in the Conservative governments of Winston Churchill and Anthony Eden as Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry for Agriculture and Food from November 1951 to October 1954 and to the Ministry of Defence from October 1954 to October 1956. The latter year Carrington was appointed High Commissioner to Australia, a post he held until October 1959. He was also appointed a Deputy Lieutenant of Buckinghamshire on 2 July 1951.[6]
After his return to Britain he served under Harold Macmillan as First Lord of the Admiralty until October 1963,[7] and was then Minister without Portfolio and Leader of the House of Lords under Sir Alec Douglas-Home until October 1964, when the Conservatives fell from power. From 1964 to 1970 he was Leader of the Opposition in the House of Lords. When the Conservatives returned to power in 1970 under Edward Heath, Carrington became Defence Secretary, where he remained until 1974. He also served as Chairman of the Conservative Party from 1972 to 1974, and was briefly Secretary of State for Energy from January to March 1974.
Lord Carrington was again Leader of the Opposition in the House of Lords from 1974 to 1979. In 1979 he was made Foreign Secretary and Minister for Overseas Development as part of the first Cabinet of Margaret Thatcher. He chaired the Lancaster House conference in 1979, a wrapup of Zimbabwe's revolutionary war attended by Ian Smith, Abel Muzorewa, Robert Mugabe, Joshua Nkomo, Josiah Tongogara that paved the way for second elections in February, 1980. He was Foreign Secretary in 1982 when the Falkland Islands were invaded by Argentina. He took full responsibility for the complacency and failures in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to foresee this development and resigned. Lord Carrington then served as Secretary-General of NATO from 1984 to 1988. He was also appointed Chancellor of the Order of St Michael and St George on 1 August 1984.[8]
In 1991, Lord Carrington presided over diplomatic talks about the breakup of the Former Yugoslavia and attempted to pass a plan that would end the wars and result in each republic becoming an independent nation.
Apart from his political posts he was the Chancellor of the University of Reading and has served as chairman of several companies, including Christie's, and as a director of many others, including Barclays Bank, Schweppes and the Daily Telegraph. He also chaired the Bilderberg conferences for several years in the late 1990s, being succeeded in 1999 by Étienne Davignon.[9] In 1983 he became president of the Pilgrims Society.[10] He relinquished the Chancellorship of the Order of St Michael and St George on 7 June 1994,[11] and was appointed Chancellor of the Order of the Garter on 8 November 1994.[12]
After the House of Lords Act 1999 removed the automatic right of hereditary peers to sit in the House of Lords, Carrington (along with all former Leaders of the House of Lords) was given a life peerage on 17 November 1999 as Baron Carington of Upton, of Upton in the County of Nottinghamshire,[13] and therefore still sits in the House of Lords. He is currently the longest serving member of the House of Lords and is the second longest serving member of the Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council after the HRH The Duke of Edinburgh.
His surname (which the family assumed in 1839 in lieu of Smith) and life peerage are both spelt Carington (single "r"), and the hereditary peerages are spelt Baron Carrington (double "r").[13]
[edit] Honours
- Military Cross, 1945.
- Knight Commander of the Most Distinguished Order of Saint Michael and Saint George (KCMG), 1958.[14]
- Lord of Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, 1959.
- Member of the Order of the Companions of Honour (CH), 1983.[15]
- Knight Companion of the Most Noble Order of the Garter (KG), 1985;[16] Chancellor of the Order from 1994.[12]
- Knight Grand Cross of the Most Distinguished Order of Saint Michael and Saint George (GCMG), 1988;[17] Chancellor of the Order 1984–94.[8][11]
- Life peerage, as Baron Carington of Upton, 1999.[13]
- Medal of Honour, for his contribution regarding Serbian war crimes committed against civilians in Croatia (especially in the Vukovar massacre and rough displacement of citizens), 1999.
- Presidential Medal of Freedom, 1988
[edit] Honorary degrees
- University of Essex (DUniv) in 1983[18]
- University of Reading (DLitt) in December 1989[19][20]
- Harvard University (LLD) in 1986[21]
- University of Nottingham (LLD) in 1993[22]
- Newcastle University (DCL) 14 December 1998[23]
- University of Oxford (DCL) 21 November 2003[24]
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This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it.
[edit] Styles
- Master Peter Carington (1919-1929)
- The Hon. Peter Carington (1929-1938)
- The Lord Carrington (1938-1945)
- The Lord Carrington MC (1945-1951)
- The Lord Carrington MC DL (1951-1958)
- The Lord Carrington KCMG MC DL (1958-1959)
- The Lord Carrington KCMG MC PC DL (1959-1983)
- The Lord Carrington KCMG CH MC PC DL (1983-1985)
- The Lord Carrington KG KCMG CH MC PC DL (1985-1988)
- The Lord Carrington KG GCMG CH MC PC DL (1988-
[edit] Family
Lord Carrington married Iona McClean, daughter of Lt.-Colonel Sir Francis Kennedy McClean, on 25 April 1942. They have three children:
- The Hon. Alexandra Carington DL (Norfolk) (1943-); married Major Peter de Bunsen in 1965, becoming The Hon. Mrs de Bunsen. They have three children:
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- Victoria de Bunsen (1968-)
- Charles Rupert de Bunsen (1970-)
- James Peter de Bunsen (1973-)
- The Hon. Virginia Carington (1946-); married Henry Cubitt, 4th Baron Ashcombe in 1973, becoming Lady Ashcombe. The couple divorced in 1979
- The Hon. Rupert Francis John Carington DL (Buckinghamshire) (1948-) - heir apparent; married Daniela Diotallevi in 1989. She became The Hon. Mrs Rupert Carington. They have three children:
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- Robert Carington (1990-)
- Francesca Carington (1993-)
- Isabella Iona Carington (1995-)
Lord Carrington's wife, Lady Carrington, died on 7 June 2009.[25]
[edit] In popular culture
Carington was portrayed by Rowan Atkinson on Not the Nine O'Clock News in a parody of Question Time, in which Lord Carington was portrayed as pedantically discussing an imminent nuclear holocaust.
Carington was portrayed by James Fox in the 2002 BBC production of Ian Curteis's The Falklands Play.
Carington was referenced on the 6th series of Peep Show (2009) in a list of imagined dog names by Mark.
[edit] Notes
- ^ London Gazette: no. 34593, p. 608, 27 January 1939. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
- ^ London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 35077, p. 954, 14 February 1941. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
- ^ London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 36961, pp. 1173–1175, 14 February 1941. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
- ^ "Recommendations for Honours and Awards (Army)—Image details—Carrington, Lord, Peter Alexander Rupert" (fee may be required to view full pdf of original recommendation). DocumentsOnline. The National Archives. http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documentsonline/details-result.asp?Edoc_Id=7667641. Retrieved 2008-12-03.
- ^ London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 37815, p. 2877, 10 December 1946. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 38636, p. 2877, 10 June 1949. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 38654, p. 3231, 1 July 1949. Retrieved on 2008-12-03. - ^ London Gazette: no. 39278, p. 3687, 6 July 1951. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
- ^ London Gazette: no. 41860, p. 6942, 3 November 1959. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
London Gazette: no. 41891, p. 7851, 11 December 1959. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
London Gazette: no. 41966, p. 1451, 26 February 1960. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
London Gazette: no. 42044, p. 3736, 27 May 1960. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
London Gazette: no. 42249, p. 263, 13 January 1961. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
London Gazette: no. 42321, p. 2546, 7 April 1961. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
London Gazette: no. 42476, p. 7055, 29 September 1961. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
London Gazette: no. 42504, p. 7931, 3 November 1961. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
London Gazette: no. 42564, p. 145, 5 January 1962. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
London Gazette: no. 42909, p. 980, 1 February 1963. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
London Gazette: no. 42925, p. 1619, 19 February 1963. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
London Gazette: no. 42995, p. 4217, 17 May 1963. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
London Gazette: no. 43077, p. 6683, 9 August 1963. Retrieved on 2008-12-03. - ^ a b London Gazette: no. 49826, p. 10601, 3 August 1984. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
- ^ Rockefeller, David (2002). Memoirs. Random House. pp. 412. ISBN 0-679-40588-7.
- ^ Who's Who. 1999.
- ^ a b London Gazette: no. 53691, p. 8301, 7 June 1994. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
- ^ a b London Gazette: no. 53843, p. 15625, 8 November 1994. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
- ^ a b c London Gazette: no. 55676, p. 12466, 23 November 1999. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
- ^ London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 41404, p. 3514, 3 June 1958. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
- ^ London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 49375, p. 19, 10 June 1983. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
- ^ London Gazette: no. 50104, p. 5844, 26 April 1985. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
- ^ London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 51365, p. 3, 10 June 1988. Retrieved on 2008-12-03.
- ^ http://www.essex.ac.uk/academic/docs/cal/former.shtm#grad
- ^ http://www.rdg.ac.uk/about/people/about-carrington.asp
- ^ http://www.rdg.ac.uk/about/about-honorary.asp
- ^ http://www.commencement.harvard.edu/background/hon_deg.html
- ^ http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/registrar/honorary-degrees/hon-deg-list-july08.pdf
- ^ http://www.ncl.ac.uk/alumni/involved/strategic/convocation/archive/minutes99.html
- ^ http://www.admin.ox.ac.uk/po/news/2003-04/nov/21.shtml
- ^ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/politics-obituaries/5626228/Lady-Carrington.html
[edit] Bibliography
- Reflect on Things Past - The Memoirs of Lord Carrington. Published by William Collins, 1988.
[edit] External links
- Announcement of his taking the oath under his new title at the House of Lords House of Lords minutes of proceedings, 17 November 1999
- Lord Carrington's views on the EU from the Daily Telegraph
- Burke's Peerage entry.
- Thatcher's First Cabinet
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