Claude Lowther
Geoffrey Howard | |
|---|---|
| Personal details | |
| Born | Claude William Henry Lowther c. 1870 |
| Died | 16 June 1929 (aged 58–59) |
| Relations | William Lowther, 2nd Earl of Lonsdale (grandfather) Toupie Lowther (sister) |
| Parent(s) | Francis William Lowther Louise Beatrice de Fonblanque |
| Residence | Herstmonceux Castle |
| Education | Rugby School |
Colonel Claude William Henry Lowther (c. 1870 – 16 June 1929) was an English Conservative politician.
Early life
Lowther was the only son of Capt. Francis William Lowther and Louise Beatrice de Fonblanque;[1] Francis William was the illegitimate son of the Earl of Lonsdale and Emilia Cressotti, an Italian opera singer, and received £125,000 on the Earl's death.[2] His sister was the tennis player Toupie Lowther, whom he encouraged to form an all-female unit supporting the French Army during the First World War.[3]
He was educated at Rugby School and had a brief diplomatic career as honorary attaché at Madrid from 1894.[1]
Career
He was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Westmorland and Cumberland Yeomanry of the British Army on 17 May 1899. Following the outbreak of the Second Boer War later that year, he signed up for service with the Imperial Yeomanry, where on 3 February 1900 he was appointed a Lieutenant in the 8th Battalion.[4] During a skirmish at Faber's Put on 30 March 1900, he and two troopers rescued two wounded men while under heavy Boer Fire, an act for which he was unsuccessfully recommended for the Victoria Cross (VC) by Sir Charles Warren.[2]
In September 1914, a month after the outbreak of the
Political career
In October 1900, at the "Khaki Election", he was elected Unionist member of parliament for Eskdale. During the last months of the Boer War on 10 July 1901, Lowther made a speech advocating extracting reparations from the Transvaal, using mineral deposits to compensate for high British taxes needed to pay for the war.[5]
He was defeated in 1906 by the
In Parliament, he called for both military and industrial conscription, and for the creation of a volunteer army of veterans past the age of service. Lowther followed the philosophy of Milner in admiring the patriotic dedication of the working class.[2]
Having announced that he would not stand again in North Cumberland, which was won unopposed in 1918 by the distantly related Christopher Lowther, he became MP for Lonsdale. He favoured large indemnity payments from Germany, and supported the Anti-Waste League, and, less fortunately, Horatio Bottomley. He was among the MPs who voted to end the coalition with David Lloyd George at the Carlton Club meeting brought on by the Chanak Crisis.
In the 1922 General Election he did not stand for re-election in Lonsdale on health grounds, but was a last minute nominee for Carlisle. In 1918 the Conservatives had not contested this traditionally Liberal seat, to ensure Labour did not win. The local party proposed to do the same again, but an internal coup led to Lowther's selection. In a brief but vigorous campaign he pushed the sitting Liberal into third place, and the Labour candidate took the seat. This proved to be the end of Claude Lowther's political career.[6]
Personal life
Aside from his political career, Lowther was also a connoisseur and a student of the theatre, and a friend of
His health gradually failed, and Lowther died at his London home in 1929. After his death, the collection he had assembled at Herstmonceux was sold off, and the castle itself sold to Reginald Lawson.[2]
References
- ^ a b School, Rugby (1904). Rugby School Register: From May 1874 to May 1904. Rugby School. p. 118. Retrieved 17 June 2022.
- ^ a b c d e f g Grieves, Keith (2004). "Lowther, Claude William Henry (1870–1929)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 14 January 2007.
- ^ "Englishwomen with the French Army – Miss Toupie Lowther's Unit". The Times. 5 August 1919. p. 13.
- ^ "No. 27160". The London Gazette. 2 February 1900. p. 692.
- ^ R. B. McCallum, Public Opinion and the Last Peace (Oxford University Press, 1945), p. 45.
- ISBN 978-1-349-15762-4. Retrieved 17 June 2022.
- ^ "Herstmonceux Castle". Retrieved 14 January 2007.
