George Villiers, 6th Earl of Clarendon

The Right Honourable The Earl of Clarendon KG, PC
5th Governor-General of the Union of South Africa
In office 26 January 1931 – 5 April 1937
Monarch	George V
Prime Minister	James Barry Munnik Hertzog
Preceded by	The Earl Athlone
Succeeded by	The Rt Hon. Sir Patrick Duncan

George Herbert Hyde Villiers, 6th Earl of Clarendon KG, PC (7 June 1877 – 13 December 1955), known as Lord Hyde from 1877 to 1914, was a British Conservative politician. He served as Governor-General of the Union of South Africa from 1931 to 1937.

Clarendon was the only son of Edward Hyde Villiers, 5th Earl of Clarendon and his wife Lady Caroline Elizabeth Agar, daughter of James Agar, 3rd Earl of Normanton. George William Frederick Villiers, 4th Earl of Clarendon, three times Foreign Secretary, was his grandfather. Clarendon took his seat on the Conservative benches in the House of Lords on his father's death in 1914. When Andrew Bonar Law became Prime Minister in 1922 he appointed Clarendon Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (government chief whip in the House of Lords), a position he also held under Stanley Baldwin until January 1924, and again from December 1924 to 1925. He then served as the first Under-Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs until 1927. In 1931 Clarendon was appointed Governor-General of South Africa, in which position he remained until 1937. He later held the court position of Lord Chamberlain of the Household between 1938 to 1952. He was admitted to the Privy Council in 1931 and made a Knight of the Garter in 1937.

Lord Clarendon married Adeline Verena Ishbel Cocks, daughter of Herbert Haldane Somers Cocks, in 1905. He died in December 1955, aged 78. His eldest son George Villiers, Lord Hyde, had been killed in a shooting accident in 1935 and he was succeeded in the earldom by his grandson George Frederick Laurence Hyde Villiers.

During his tenure as Governor-General of South Africa, he also served as Chief Scout of South Africa.

Commemorations

Clarendon High School for Girls and its associated schools, Clarendon Primary School and Clarendon Preparatory School in East London, South Africa are named after him.

References

• Scouting Round the World, John S. Wilson, first edition, Blandford Press 1959 p. 94