In 1931 he joined the The Round Table, the journal established by former members of Milner's Kindergarten a group of very able young men including the politician and novelist John Buchan (later Lord Tweedsmuir Governor-General of Canada), the constitutional scholar Lionel Curtis, the banker Robert Brand, Lionel Hichens and others who were determined to create a liberal regime in South Africa to advance the imperial cause [2] but later coined and supported an independent Commonwealth.

[5] The Round Table Harry Hodson Prize was established as an annual Award after his death to mark the nearly seventy years involvement of its late editor with the journal.

[6] Owing to his intimate knowledge of all the Commonwealth countries that he had gained through his frequent visits to them with his eight years of editorial experience on The Round Table quarterly, Hodson was the official Rapporteur of the Second Commonwealth Conference from 3–17 September 1938,[7] organised by the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House) and held at Lapstone near Sydney, Australia.

The rest of the delegation from Britain included the General Secretary of the Transport and General Workers' Union Ernest Bevin, (he subsequently served as Minister of Labour and National Service in the wartime coalition government and British Foreign Minister in the post-WWII Attlee Labour government so as Foreign Secretary from 1945 to 1951 he held office at the outset of the Cold War, the independence of India and the formation of NATO in 1949), James Walker M.P., General John Burnett-Stuart, Admiral John Kelly, Geoffrey Vickers V.C., Lionel Curtis and Ivison Macadam (Conference Secretary).

[11] The significance of this conference was that it exposed the then five active Commonwealth countries, (Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and the United Kingdom) to the possibility that war with Germany lay ahead and it gave each of them a full year to prepare and decide whether each of these independent Commonwealth nations would voluntarily commit their armed forces should war break out.

[14] This was achieved despite formidable competition from the other quality Sunday "heavy", The Observer edited by David Astor during what many consider was that paper's golden years.

When Kemsley phoned him one time after dinner during the Korean War to demand the Americans drop an Atomic bomb, Hodson threatened to resign.

Hodson wrote what was considered a significant and transformational leading editorial (leader) advocating the liberalisation of the law relating to homosexuality.

[17] As editor, although appreciating good writing he was ready to kill a music critics copy for being too highbrow and he dispensed of the services of Sacheverell Sitwell as Atticus for lacking incisiveness.

He thereafter was a regular presence at the Friday leader (editorial) conferences and was a steadying voice of Conservatism amongst the more radical of those present.

[22] Hodson, then still the editor of The Sunday Times, had been invited in 1950, after the conference had finished, to give an address at Chatham House on Race Relations in the Commonwealth .

It began as a fledgling part of the Race Relations Unit of The Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House) in 1952 under the Chairmanship of Lord Hailey.

[26] The Mercers, that is, merchants, dealers in high-valued products like cloth-of-gold, had lost even by Tudor times most or all of their functions as regulators of trade in the City of London.

[28] Whilst its connection to its original trade has diminished over time, it maintains centuries-old links with Associated Schools & Colleges, the British Armed Forces, Church Livings, the City of London Corporation and other livery companies.

Hodson led the enormous initiative over some years (with David Vermont and Rt Rev Richard Chartres) that was responsible for the reestablishment of Gresham College as an independent entity.

Ditchley was founded as a privately funded charity in 1958 by the philanthropist Sir David Wills in order to support the Transatlantic Alliance between the United States and Europe by bringing decision makers and experts together in a unique and inspiring setting.

He considered, or found out, who was the top person in any category he was looking for, civil servant, diplomat, politician, business leader, academic expert or whatever and went all out for him or her.

More pragmatically he wrote a letter that guides Ditchley in framing meetings today, advising that it was important to include “all kinds of apparently irrelevant persons,” dreading otherwise “a lot of dull-faced men probably saying it had all been very interesting...”.

They included ambassadors and foreign service officers not only from Britain and the United States, but from many other countries as well, government ministers, senior civil servants, Peers and MPs, Senators and Congressmen, leading figures from the United Nations, the World Bank and other international agencies, leading business men, trade union leaders, economists and experts of all kinds.

They ranged from young American students attending courses, to Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, who presided over a conference, 'inspired by that life-changer' his former headmaster Kurt Hahn, on rescue, relief and service.

Prince Philip worked hard when he took on a job like that, keeping long-winded speakers in order, directing the discussion to a purposeful end, and summarising the previous debate at the start of each session.

)[35] Hodson initiated American Legislators' conferences, to which were invited hand-picked United States Senators and Congressmen to discuss with their parliamentary counterparts, MPs and Peers, and a few British experts, some subject of major common concern.

It is a living memorial to his and his wife's genius and remains an important institution carrying on in the manner he originally envisioned and further fashioned over its first decade.

When Hodson took on his last job, as editor of the Annual Register he was conscious that it was not as well known as The Sunday Times and was a delighted when former prime minister Harold Macmillan responded "Never heard of it?

When Winston Churchill was a young subaltern in India he asked his mother to send him as many past volumes of The Annual Register from previous years that she could find.

[38] The Telegraph described Hodson's fifteen years at the Annual Register's helm as having introduced new sections on statistics, defence, environment and fashion.