Julian Asquith, 2nd Earl of Oxford and Asquith

Julian Edward George Asquith, 2nd Earl of Oxford and Asquith, KCMG (22 April 1916 – 16 January 2011) was a British colonial administrator and hereditary peer.

Background and education

Asquith was the only son of Raymond Asquith, a barrister, by his wife the former Katherine Horner. He was the grandson of H. H. Asquith, 1st Earl of Oxford and Asquith, British Prime Minister from 1908 until 1916. Lord Oxford's two older sisters both predeceased him; the younger of these was Lady Perdita Rose Mary Asquith, later Lady Hylton (1910–1996),[1] who was married to William Jolliffe, 4th Baron Hylton and became the grandmother of the actress Anna Chancellor.

He inherited the earldom in 1928 on the death of his grandfather, since his father had been killed in the First World War. He was raised as a Roman Catholic after his mother's conversion to Roman Catholicism in 1923 and was educated at St Ronan's School and Ampleforth College. He then became a scholar at Balliol College, Oxford, where he graduated BA and MA. In 1941, Asquith was commissioned as a lieutenant in the Royal Engineers and from 1942 to 1948 he was an Assistant District Commissioner in Palestine.

Career

Lord Oxford was Deputy Chairman Secretary of the British Administration Tripolitania from 1949 to 1950, Director of Interior Tripolitania in 1951 and Advisor to the Prime Minister of Libya in 1952. In 1955 he was Administrative Secretary of Zanzibar and from 1958 to 1962 was the Administrator of Saint Lucia. He was appointed Companion of Order of St. Michael and St. George in 1961. Oxford was the Governor and Commander-in-Chief of the Seychelles from 1962 to 1967, and the Commander of the British Indian Ocean Territory from 1965 to 1967. In 1964, he was advanced as Knight Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George. He also held the posts of Constitutional Commander of the Cayman Islands in 1971, and Turks and Caicos Islands from 1973 to 1974.

Family

Lord Oxford married Anne Mary Celestine Palairet (14 November 1916 Paris – 19 August 1998[2] at Frome, Somerset), daughter of Sir Michael Palairet KCMG (1882–1956)[3][4] by his wife Mary de Vere Studd,[5] on 28 August 1947 at the Brompton Oratory. Anne Oxford was also a Roman Catholic via her parents' conversions. The Countess of Oxford and Asquith died in 1998, leaving five children: two sons, both diplomats, and three daughters (the middle married to another diplomat).

Lord Oxford inherited the estate of Mells from his mother Katherine Asquith, younger daughter of Sir John Horner, of Mells and his wife Frances Graham.

Lord Oxford died, aged 94, on 16 January 2011.[6] He was succeeded in his peerage titles, which he had held for over eighty years, by his elder son, Raymond (b. 1952), a former British diplomat and elected hereditary member of the House of Lords. His younger son The Hon. Sir Dominic Asquith is a former British Ambassador to Iraq and to Egypt.

References

  1. ↑ Lady Perdita Asquith
  2. ↑ Lundy, Darryl. "p. 1149 § 11483 : Anne Mary Celestine Palairet". The Peerage.
  3. ↑ His parents were Charles Harvey Palairet and Emily Henry, not Nora Hamilton Martin as listed by Paul Theroff. Nora Hamilton Martin married Palairet only in 1888. See Descendants of King Henry VII of England: Part Two for details.
  4. ↑ ru:Паларет, Чарльз Майкл
  5. ↑ Lady Palairet (1895–1977) was a remarkable beauty painted by Augustus John. See Lundy, Darryl. "The Peerage: Mary de Vere Studd". The Peerage. for her dates.
  6. ↑ "Obituaries — The Earl of Oxford and Asquith". The Daily Telegraph. 17 January 2011.

Sources

References

Government offices
Preceded by
Sir John Thorp
as Commissioner of Saint Lucia		 Administrator of Saint Lucia
1958–1962 		Succeeded by
Gerald Jackson Bryan
Preceded by
Sir John Thorp		 Governor of the Seychelles
1962–1967 		Succeeded by
Sir Hugh Norman-Walker
Peerage of the United Kingdom
Preceded by
Herbert Henry Asquith		 Earl of Oxford and Asquith
1928–2011 		Succeeded by
Raymond Asquith