Wyndham Portal, 1st Viscount Portal
Member of the Royal Victorian Order | |
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Wyndham Raymond Portal, 1st Viscount Portal,
Early life
The eldest son of Sir William Wyndam Portal, 2nd Baronet, and Florence Elizabeth Mary Glyn, daughter of Hon. St Leger Glyn, 2nd son of George Glyn, 1st Baron Wolverton, he was educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford. In 1909 he married Lady Louise Rosemary Kathleen Virginia Cairns, only child of Arthur Cairns, 2nd Earl Cairns.
Military service
He was commissioned into the
He relinquished command of the battalion in 1918 and reverted to the rank of captain, but was soon promoted major and attached to the Machine Gun Corps as a battalion commander, again with the rank of lieutenant-colonel. He resigned his commission in 1919.[citation needed]
Later life
Returning to civilian life, he became chairman of the Portal family's banknote paper mill company in Laverstoke, Portals Limited, in 1919[1][2] which had manufactured banknote paper for the Bank of England since 1724.[3] and became the company's chairman when his father died in 1931.[1] In 1936, he was one of the main investors in
In 1935, he was made chairman of the Bacon Development Board, and, in April 1939, he was made was regional commissioner for Wales under the Civil Defence Scheme.
In 1940, he became the chairman of the Coal Production Council, and he served in government as Additional
In 1935, he accepted the chairmanship of the British Olympic Association and thus led the British team in the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin. That experience made him the perfect president of the 1948 Olympic Games in London.[1][2]
After the war, in 1945, he became the last chairman of the
Portal was Lord Lieutenant of Hampshire from 1947 until his death in 1949.[1]
Titles and honours
In 1917, he was awarded the Distinguished Service Order and appointed a Member of the Royal Victorian Order (MVO).[citation needed]
Portal succeeded to his father's baronetcy in 1931. In 1935 he was raised to the peerage as Baron Portal, of
On his death in 1949, Portal was succeeded to the baronetcy by his uncle, Sir Spencer Portal as the 4th Baronet.
References
- ^ a b c d e Oxford Dictionary of National Biography: Portal, Wyndham Raymond Retrieved 31 October 2012.
- ^ a b The Basingstoke Gazette, 12 August 2012: Portal family from Overton helped organise the 1948 Olympic Games Retrieved 31 October 2012.
- ^ DeLaRue: Industry Expertise – Banknote paper. Retrieved 31 October 2012.
- ^ An Economic History of Film (2000, page 334. Retrieved 31 October 2012.
- ^ Geoffrey Macnab: J. Arthur Rank and the British Film Industry (1994), pp. 21–23. Retrieved 31 October 2012.
- Who Was Who (UK)