Evan Morgan, 2nd Viscount Tredegar

Evan Frederic Morgan, 2nd Viscount Tredegar of the second creation of the title (July 13, 1893 – April 27, 1949) was a Welsh poet and author. The only son of Courtenay Morgan, 1st Viscount Tredegar, of Tredegar Park, Monmouthshire, and Lady Katharine Carnegie, he was a chamberlain to Popes Benedict XV and Pius XI yet, as an accomplished occultist, was hailed by Aleister Crowley as "Adept of Adepts".

Morgan came from what the Duke of Bedford described as "the oddest family I have ever met"; his mother is rumoured to have built bird nests big enough to sit in; in 1925 his sister, Gwyneth Ericka Morgan, was found dead aged 29 in the River Thames, while his father owned one of the largest yachts in the world.

A noted eccentric, he kept at his seat of Tredegar House in Newport a menagerie of animals including a boxing kangaroo, honey bear, baboon and macaw. His weekend house parties, which attracted such figures as Aldous Huxley, H. G. Wells, Augustus John and Aleister Crowley, gained local notoriety, as did the host's extravagant lifestyle.

Morgan succeeded as 2nd Viscount and 4th Baron Tredegar in May 1934 on the death of his father.

Despite his known homosexuality and reputation for dissipation, he married twice.^[1] His wives were:

• Hon. Lois Ina Sturt (1900–1937), an actress and daughter of Napier Sturt, 2nd Baron Alington; they married in 1928.
• Princess Olga Sergievna Dolgorouky (1915–1998); they married in 1939 in Singapore and the marriage was annulled in 1943.

A review of Evan Morgan's life and times, with a transcript of his court-martial for offences against the Official Secrets Acts in 1943 appears in the book Aspects of Evan: The Last Viscount Tredegar by Monty Dart and William Cross, the authors of A Beautiful Nuisance: The Life and Death of the Hon. Gwyneth Ericka Morgan, a book which has many references to Morgan as well as revealing the full story of his only sibling, Gwyneth.

Evan Morgan is also the subject of the book Not Behind Lace Curtains: The Hidden World of Evan, Viscount Tredegar, by William Cross and FSA Scot.^[2] This book explores Evan's homosexuality, his dabbles in the occult and with the Black Masses. In 2014, Cross published a sequel, Evan Frederic Morgan, Viscount Tredegar: The Final Affairs: Financial and Carnal, which examines the efforts of Morgan's executors and the 10 years spent winding up his estate, as well as including a further collection of anecdotes about Evan and his lovers.

Cross has also published a short tribute to Lois Ina Sturt, Evan's first wife, who died in 1937, aged 37.

Works

• Fragments
• At Dawn
• The Eel
• The City of Canals

See also

• Tredegar House
• Ruperra Castle
• Godfrey Morgan, 1st Viscount Tredegar

External links

• Evan Frederic Morgan

References

1. ↑ D. J. Taylor, "Bright Young People", Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007, page 232
2. ↑ ISBN 9781905914210

Information taken from:

• Tredegar House guide book (1985) published by Newport County Borough Council
• Tredegar House Blog
• Only Evan: The eccentric life of Lord Tredegar by Paul Busby (Awaiting Publication)
• Aspects of Evan : The Last Viscount Tredegar by Monty Dart and William Cross. ISBN 9781905914159 ( publication due 10 December 2012)
• A Beautiful Nuisance : The Life and Death of the Hon. Gwyneth Ericka Morgan by Monty Dart and William Cross. ISBN 9781905914104
• Not Behind Lace Curtains : The Hidden World of Evan, Viscount Tredegar by William Cross. ISBN 978-1-905914-21-0 (2013)
• Evan Frederic Morgan: Viscount Tredegar The Final Affairs: Financial and Carnal by William Cross. ISBN 978-1-905914-24-1 (2014)
• Lois Sturt, Wild Child. A Glance at Hon. Lois Ina Sturt, Viscountess Tredegar. ISBN 9781905914319. (2014)