HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS THE DUKE OF GLOUCESTER

HL Deb 10 June 1974 vol 352 cc223-6

THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (LORD SHEPHERD)

My Lords, I know that the House will have learnt with deep regret of the death earlier this morning of His Royal Highness the Duke of Gloucester. I am sure your Lordships would wish to join with me in expressing our deep sympathy with Her Majesty the Queen on the death of her uncle, and also with other members of the Royal Family, especially of course his widow the Duchess of Gloucester and his son and daughter-in-law Prince and Princess Richard of Gloucester. And in mentioning Her Royal Highness we would recognise her own contribution to public service, supporting her husband, and, in recent years, alone—a service I have no doubt she will wish to continue.

The Duke had not been well for some years and had therefore not been very much in the public eye. Some therefore tend to forget what great public service His Royal Highness rendered this country, especially during the war years. The Duke was born in 1900 and, as the last surviving child of King George V, lived through the reigns of five Monarchs. He saw two of his elder brothers succeed to the Throne, and his younger brother the late Duke of Kent killed in an air crash during the last war. His sister the late Princess Royal died in 1965, and in 1972 he suffered the grievous loss of his elder son Prince William, who was also killed, as the House will recall, in an air crash.

The Duke's great interest throughout his life was of course the Army, which he joined in 1921, rising progressively through the ranks until lie became a Lieutenant-General in 1941 and a full General in 1944. I have no doubt that there are many other noble Lords more qualified than I to speak of his career in the Army and of his very great concern and interest for those with whom he served. His war service was as Chief Liaison Officer in France to the British Expeditionary Forces, when he was mentioned in dispatches. He was of course especially proud of the Gloucestershire Regiment, of which he became Colonelin-Chief. He was able in 1952 to present the Regiment with new Colours, not long after their heroic efforts during the Korean war where they won such honour and fame.

There is one further aspect of his public service to which I would make particular reference. Shortly before the end of the war, in 1944, he became Governor-General of Australia, a post which he held with great distinction for three years. I know with what great affection and good will he was regarded by Australians, who greatly welcomed the King's brother being appointed as his Representative in Australia. It was a very fitting gesture that the Duke should have accepted this appointment at the time when the Commonwealth was sending its young men to join us and our allies in the battles of the Pacific.

My Lords, like all members of the Royal Family, the Duke fulfilled many public engagements and he did so with a warmth and a kindness and an interest which was much appreciated. Illness had prevented him from discharging these public duties for some time, but I know your Lordships would not wish this opportunity to pass without our paying tribute to what he did for the nation. He was a very great man.

2.41 p.m.

LORD WINDLESHAM

My Lords, from this side of the House I should like to echo what the noble Lord the Leader of the House has said about His Royal Highness the Duke of Gloucester. Although the Duke of Gloucester, as the noble Lord has reminded us, was prevented by illness over the last six years from playing an active part in public life, he had a very long record of service to the public, and that is something we should remember to-day. The Duke of Gloucester gave up his early career as a soldier, and as a soldier who was highly regarded, I understand, by his contemporaries, in order to support his elder brother the Duke of York when he took the Throne as King George VI.

As one of the evening papers reminds us to-day in a happy phrase, the Duke became known as "the Duke of Work" because of the conscientious and thorough way in which he took on so many of the less glamorous and unpublicised engagements. It cannot have been easy for a man who was rather shy in character and who preferred to avoid the limelight. But in this work he was, as the noble Lord the Leader of the House has just said, very much helped by his wife, Her Royal Highness the Duchess of Gloucester, who, like so many members of the Royal Family, has continued to perform a wide range of public engagements with dignity and presence right up to the present time. The noble Lord the Leader of the House, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Gardiner, and others in the House were present only last week at a service in Westminster Abbey in support of "Help the Aged" at which the Duchess of Gloucester was present.

I hope the Leader of the House will inform the Duchess of Gloucester, and also Prince Richard of Gloucester, of these tributes in the House to-day. We should like them to know the affection in which the Duke of Gloucester was held by all Members of this House, some of whom knew him personally. Others of us did not have that privilege, but we all recognise the enduring quality of the work which he performed so unsparingly for many good causes. My Lords, the public as a whole has good reason to be deeply grateful for his life and work.

LORD BYERS

My Lords, from these Benches I should like to endorse the sentiments which have been expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, and the noble Lord, Lord Windlesham, concerning the death of His Royal Highness the Duke of Gloucester, which occurred to-day. We wish to express particular sympathy for the Duchess of Gloucester who in the past few years has suffered so much and so bravely, and for whom we have a great deal of affection. The Duke will be remembered by many serving soldiers as an officer who concerned himself in some depth with the wellbeing of the Army and those who belonged to it, and I believe from what I saw of him in those days that many of his happiest hours were spent with the troops both in the United Kingdom and overseas. My Lords, we wish also to express our condolences to Her Majesty the Queen and the Royal Family on this very sad bereavement.

THE LORD ARCHBISHOP or CANTERBURY

My Lords, we on these Benches join in the grief and in the tributes which have been expressed. Each of us who knew the late Duke will have his own special memories. I have one very vivid memory. It was when, a few years ago, the Duke fulfilled his duty as the Lord High Commissioner to the National Assembly of the Church of Scotland, residing at Holyrood at the time. Although at the time he was in failing health, he threw himself into the religious and the national significance of that occasion with great courage and outgoing kindness. That was typical of his width of sympathies and courage and care for what he believed to be good and right. We think of him as a man of faith who bore with courage both his own sickness and many sorrows. It is as such that we salute his memory and grieve with his brave widow and all his family.