He was conscripted in World War I but his poor eyesight limited the options for service so he was allocated to the Labour Corps.

During World War II, Radcliffe joined the Ministry of Information becoming its Director-General by 1941, where he worked closely with the Minister Brendan Bracken.

Radcliffe, a man who had never been east of Paris,[2] was given the chairmanship of the two boundary committees set up with the passing of the Indian Independence Act.

Speaking of his experience as the chairman of boundary committees, he later said-"I had no alternative, the time at my disposal was so short that I could not do a better job.

In the 1940s and 1950s he chaired a string of public enquiries in addition to his legal duties and continued to hold numerous trusteeships, governorships and chairmanships right up until his death.

He chaired the Committee of Enquiry into the Future of the British Film Institute (1948), whose recommendations led to the modernisation of the BFI in the post-war period.

While a Law Lord, he produced a report in 1956 making proposals for the constitution of Cyprus, then a British colony.

[10] Lord Radcliffe married Antonia Mary Roby, daughter of Godfrey Benson, 1st Baron Charnwood and former wife of John Tennant, in 1939.