Geoffrey Alexander Rowley-Conwy, 9th Baron Langford

Colonel Geoffrey Alexander Rowley-Conwy, 9th Baron Langford, OBE, DL (born 8 March 1912) is a British-Irish peer and British Army officer.

Biography

The only son of two children born to Major Geoffrey Seymour Rowley-Conwy (1877 – 10 August 1915), who was killed in action Gallipoli, and Bertha Gabrielle Cochran, JP (1880–1984), Langford was educated at Marlborough College and Royal Military Academy, Woolwich. He served as an army officer with the Royal Artillery in World War II, being captured at the Japanese taking of Singapore in 1942, but escaping, before seeing further active service in Burma. He reached the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel in 1945 and retired from the regular army in 1957. He was appointed an Honorary Colonel in 1967.^[1]

He married, firstly, Ruth St John Murphy (died 1991), on 24 January 1939. She was the daughter of Albert St John Murphy and Rose Davis, of The Island House, Little Island, County Cork, Ireland. They divorced in 1956. They had no children.

He married, secondly, Grete von Freiesleben (11 September 1922 – 16 January 1973), on 7 February 1957. She was the daughter of Colonel Erik Theodor Christian von Freiesleben, of Hjortekaer, Kongens Lyngby, Copenhagen, Ch Kings's Adj's Staff to His Majesty The King of Denmark. They had three children and seven grandchildren:

• Hon. Peter Alexander Rowley-Conwy (1951); he married Deborah Jane Stevens in 1979. They have two children:
  • Gabrielle Catrin Rowley-Conwy (1984)
  • Eleanor Rowley-Conwy (1986)
• Hon. John Seymour Rowley-Conwy (1955); he married Emma Brown in 1983. They have three children:
  • Katherine Grete Clare Rowley-Conwy (1985)
  • William Geoffrey Peter Rowley-Conwy (1988)
  • Huw Grenville Rowley-Conwy (1993)
• Hon. Owain Grenville Rowley-Conwy (27 December 1958); he married Joanna Featherstone on 3 May 1986. They have two children:
  • Thomas Alexander Rowley-Conwy (20 March 1987)
  • Magdalene Guinevere Rowley-Conwy (9 October 1988)

He married, thirdly, Susan Winifred Denham, daughter of Cyril Henry Charles Denham, of Wrexham, Denbighshire, Wales, on 3 February 1975. Lady Langford is a patron of St Kentigern Hospice, St Asaph. They have two children:

• Hon. Christopher Geoffrey Hugh Rowley-Conwy (19 March 1978); he married Robina Khan on 25 August 2007.
• Hon. Charlotte Susan Gabrielle Rowley-Conwy (9 October 1980).

His heir is his third son from his second marriage, Hon Owain Grenville Rowley-Conwy (born 1958).

He inherited the Bodrhyddan estate in Rhuddlan, on the death of his unmarried and childless paternal uncle Captain Rafe Grenville Rowley-Conwy RN CMG in April 1951 and succeeded to the Barony as the ninth holder of the title on the death of his childless second cousin once removed Arthur Sholto Langford Rowley, 8th Baron Langford CMG in August 1953. He is Constable of Rhuddlan Castle and Lord of the Manor of Rhuddlan. He turned 100 in March 2012.^[2] He is the patron of the North Wales Wildlife Trust.

See also

• Peter Rowley-Conwy
• List of centenarians (royalty and nobility)

References

Further reading

• Skidmore, Ian. Escape from Singapore, 1942; the story of an incredible voyage through enemy waters, New York: Scribner, 1974. ISBN 978-0-684-13638-7

External links

• Bodrhyddan Hall website
• Lord Langford visits Rhuddlan Nature Reserve
• Bodrhyddan Manuscripts
• The Viking Origins of the Viscounts Conway and Killultagh