William Wedgwood Benn, 1st Viscount Stansgate
William Wedgwood Benn, 1st Viscount Stansgate, DSO, DFC, PC (10 May 1877 – 17 November 1960) was a British Liberal politician who later joined the Labour Party. A decorated Royal Air Force officer, he was Secretary of State for India between 1929 and 1931 and Secretary of State for Air between 1945 and 1946. He was the father of Tony Benn and the paternal grandfather of Hilary Benn.
The Viscount Stansgate
Constituency established
Constituency abolished
17 November 1960 (aged 83)
Westminster, London, England
4, including Tony Benn
Sir John Benn, 1st Baronet
Elizabeth Pickstone
DSO (1917)
DFC (1918)
Bronze Medal of Military Valor (Italy; 1918)
1914–1918, 1940–1945
Background and education[edit]
Born in Hackney, Benn was the second son of Sir John Benn, 1st Baronet. He was given the name Wedgwood because his mother, Elizabeth (Lily) Pickstone, was distantly linked to Josiah Wedgwood of the pottery family.[1] Benn was educated at the Lycée Condorcet in Paris and at University College, London.
Family[edit]
Lord Stansgate married Margaret Holmes, daughter of Daniel Holmes, in 1920. His eldest son Michael Wedgwood Benn was killed in the Second World War in 1944. Stansgate died at Westminster, London, in November 1960, aged 83, and was succeeded in the viscountcy by his second son, then known as Anthony Wedgwood Benn (1925–2014), who was successful in 1963 in changing the law to allow him to disclaim the peerage for life. His youngest son, David Wedgwood Benn (1928–2017), a specialist in Russia and Eastern Europe, worked for the BBC's External Services for many years.[24] A fourth son, Jeremy, was stillborn.