[4] Having joined the charity's founder, Lawrence Hills' band of enthusiasts in July 1958, as member number 171, Henry Kitchener became its president in 1973, a position he was to occupy for the next thirty-five years.
However Earl Kitchener remained interested in the organic movement and regularly wrote and updated the organisation whenever a subject arose that he felt passionately about.
Kitchener was associated with the charity for over 20 years serving under two chairmen, the late Bishop Hugh Montefiore and the succeeding chairman, Mrs Frances Jackson.
His niece Emma Joy Kitchener, LVO (2000) (born 1963), a Lady-in-Waiting to Princess Michael of Kent, married Julian Fellowes on 28 April 1990.
[14] Lord Fellowes publicly expressed his dissatisfaction that the proposals to change the rules of royal succession were not extended to hereditary peerages, which had they been would have allowed his wife to succeed her uncle as The Countess Kitchener in her own right.
On 9 May 2012, Queen Elizabeth II issued a Royal Warrant of Precedence granting Lady Emma Fellowes the same rank and style as the daughter of an earl, as would have been due to her if her late father had survived his brother and therefore succeeded to the earldom.