In the lead-up to the Second World War, he was an editor of the influential conservative newsletter The Whitehall Letter.

His father was the youngest son of the 6th Duke of Richmond; his mother was the daughter of the Hon.

[4] In 1917, he served as aide-de-camp to Anthony Gustav de Rothschild of the Buckinghamshire Yeomanry[5] and later to Lieutenant-General Sir John Du Cane.

[1] After the war, he was military secretary to Lieutenant-General Sir Richard Haking at Dantzig.

[7] It was regularly read by future Prime Ministers Winston Churchill and Anthony Eden; King Gustaf V of Sweden was also a subscriber.

His distinguished appearance, the width of his contacts, his immense personal charm, made him stand out among journalists of his period.

They met in Ottawa that summer while he was reporting on the British Empire Economic Conference for The Telegraph.