Michael Adeane, Baron Adeane

Michael Edward Adeane, Baron Adeane, GCB, GCVO, PC (30 September 1910 – 30 April 1984) was Private Secretary to Elizabeth II for 19 years, between 1953 and 1972.

Lieutenant Colonel The Right Honourable
The Lord Adeane
GCB GCVO PC
Adeane in 1953
Private Secretary to the Sovereign
In office
1 January 1954 – 1 April 1972
MonarchElizabeth II
Preceded bySir Alan Lascelles
Succeeded bySir Martin Charteris
Assistant Private Secretary to the Sovereign
In office
1945–1953
MonarchsGeorge VI
Elizabeth II
Member of the House of Lords
Lord Temporal
In office
20 April 1972 – 30 April 1984
Life Peerage
Personal details
Born
Michael Edward Adeane

(1910-09-30)30 September 1910
London, England
Died30 April 1984(1984-04-30) (aged 73)
Aberdeen, Scotland
Spouse
Helen Chetwynd-Stapleton
​
​
(m. 1939)​
Children2, including Edward Adeane
Alma materMagdalene College, Cambridge

Early life and education

Adeane was the son of Captain Henry Robert Augustus Adeane (1882–1914), by his wife Hon. Victoria Eugenie Bigge (d.1969). His paternal grandfather was Admiral Edward Stanley Adeane, from a family of landed gentry tracing their ancestry to a Simon Adeane who died in 1686;[1] his maternal grandfather was Arthur Bigge, 1st Baron Stamfordham, Private Secretary to Queen Victoria and King George V. Adeane was educated at Eton College and graduated from Magdalene College, Cambridge in 1934 with a Master of Arts degree.

Career

After graduating, Adeane travelled to Canada. He was aide-de-camp to Lord Bessborough, Governor General of Canada from 1934 to 1935, and then to his successor, Lord Tweedsmuir, until 1936.

Adeane then returned to Britain and became George VI's Assistant Private Secretary from 1945 after five-and-a-half years on active military duty,[2] a post he held until the latter's death in 1952. He continued in that post for Queen Elizabeth until 1953 when he was promoted to Private Secretary and admitted to the Privy Council.[3]

In 1961, during a Royal visit to Nepal, Adeane was credited with a share of a tiger kill with Sir Christopher Bonham-Carter in a royal tiger hunt.[4] The tiger-shooting role had fallen to him after the Queen had declined, the Duke of Edinburgh had been unable to shoot due to having his trigger finger in a splint, and the then Foreign Secretary Alec Douglas-Home had missed twice.[4]

Personal life

On 10 January 1939 Adeane married Helen Chetwynd-Stapleton (1916 – 1994),[5] and they had a daughter and a son.[6] Their son, Edward Adeane, a barrister, was Private Secretary to the Prince of Wales from 1979 to 1984.

On 30 April 1984 Adeane died of heart failure in Aberdeen, Scotland. He was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium.[6]

Honours

Adeane was appointed a Member of the Royal Victorian Order (MVO) in 1946,[7] a Companion of the Order of the Bath (CB) in 1947,[8] he was promoted to Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order (KCVO) in 1951,[9] and Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath (KCB) in 1955.[10] In 1962 he was promoted to Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order (GCVO)[11] and in 1968 to Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath (GCB).[12] He also received the Royal Household Long and Faithful Service Medal.

In 1959, Adeane received the Grand Decoration in Gold with Sash for Services to the Republic of Austria[13] and on 20 April 1972, he was created a life peer as Baron Adeane, of Stamfordham in the County of Northumberland.[14]

References
  1. Burke's Landed Gentry, 18th edition, vol. 1, Peter Townend, Burke's Peerage Ltd, 1965, "Adeane of Babraham" pedigree
  2. "King's Counsellor: Abdication and War: the Diaries of Tommy Lascelles" (Phoenix, London. 2007) edited by Duff Hart-Davis., p. 319
  3. "New Secretary for Her Majesty". The Examiner. Tasmania. 1 January 1954. p. 5.
  4. Lynam, Ruth (1961). "Tiger hunt and ring around a rhino". Life. Vol. 50, no. 12. pp. 51–54. ISSN 0024-3019.
  5. Helen Adeane. 13 August 1994. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)
  6. "Adeane, Michael Edward, Baron Adeane (1910–1984), courtier | Oxford Dictionary of National Biography". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. 2004. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/30752. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  7. "No. 37598". The London Gazette (Supplement). 13 June 1946. p. 2764.
  8. "No. 37977". The London Gazette (Supplement). 12 June 1947. p. 2574.
  9. "No. 39243". The London Gazette (Supplement). 7 June 1951. p. 3065.
  10. "No. 40366". The London Gazette (Supplement). 1 January 1955. p. 3.
  11. "No. 42617". The London Gazette. 9 March 1962. p. 1941.
  12. "No. 44484". The London Gazette (Supplement). 1 January 1968. p. 3.
  13. "Reply to a parliamentary question" (PDF) (in German). p. 213. Retrieved 18 October 2012.
  14. "No. 45656". The London Gazette. 25 April 1972. p. 4911.
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