Elliot Crawshay-Williams 1879 – 1962

Description

The Colonel Author dies at 82 (11/05/1962)
Lieut-Col. Elliot Crawshay-Williams, the Welsh author, soldier, politician and sportsman, formerly of Plas Coed-y-Mwstwr, Bridgend, died yesterday at Deal Hospital. He was 82. He lived in Kent for the last 28 years.
Col. Crawshay-Williams was commissioned in the artillery in 1900, and after two years’ service in England he went to India for two years, and was awarded a medal for special service in the Grand Durbar of 1903.
He resigned his commission to enter politics and shortly afterwards accompanied Lord Curzon in the Viceroy’s expedition up the Persian Gulf, which provided the basis for his first book. “Across Persia.”
A Liberal
He was a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, an international lawn tennis player, M.P. for Leicester, private secretary to Sir Winston Churchill, when he was Under-Secretary for the Colonies, and Parliamentary Private Secretary to Lloyd George, when Chancellor of the Exchequer.
He was educated at Eton and Trinity College, Oxford.
He was a member of the National Liberal Club, founded by his father, who was a Liberal M.P. for South Glamorgan. The family mansion, Coed-y-Mwstwr, was until a short time ago, an approved school of which Col. Crawshay-Williams was chairman
He was also a magistrate.
Shocked
He wrote more than 40 books and 13 plays. His novels were sometimes considered shocking and two of his plays were refused a license by the Lord Chamberlain.
“But it has never been my intention to shock,” he once said “My works are, I hope, entertaining, but I should be sorry to be classed only as an amusing writer.”
Col. Crawshay-Williams who had been blind since 1959 married three times, his first two marriages ended in divorce.

• http://cynonculture.co.uk/wordpress/eminent-people/elliot-crawshay-williams-1879-1962/ (link opens in new window)