John Lyttelton, 11th Viscount Cobham

He married Penelope Ann Cooper in 1974, and inherited the family's titles and 200-year-old Worcestershire mansion, Hagley Hall, on his father's death in 1977.

Facing inheritance taxes and high maintenance costs [1] as well as the unstable state of finances left by his predecessors, he auctioned his family's 700-year archive for £164,000, and sold Necker Island to Richard Branson for $120,000.

He was a member of the Conservative Party, but shyness prevented him from taking the seat in the House of Lords that his hereditary peerage entitled him to.

[4] He later confessed to having contemplated suicide over the break-up of his marriage, and admitted sitting in his drawing room holding a loaded shotgun.

[5] Lord Cobham remarried on 1 August 1997 to Lisa Clayton, the first British woman to have sailed single-handed and non-stop around the world.