John Grigg (writer)

John Edward Poynder Grigg (April 15, 1924 – December 31, 2001) was a British writer, historian and politician. He was the 2nd Baron Altrincham from 1955 until he disclaimed that title under the Peerage Act on the day it received the Royal Assent in 1963.

He was the son of Edward Grigg, a Times journalist associated with the imperialist circle of Joseph Chamberlain, Conservative MP, governor of Kenya, and member of Churchill's wartime government, who was created first Baron Altrincham in 1945. After Eton, John Grigg attended New College, Oxford. He edited the "National and English Review" (1954-60) as his father had done. He was a liberal Tory but was defeated at the 1951 and 1955 general elections.

In an article for the "National and English Review" in August 1957, Grigg argued that the Queen's court was too upper-class and British, and instead advocated a more "classless" and Commonwealth court. More personally, he attacked the Queen's style of speaking as "a pain in the neck": "Like her mother, she appears to be unable to string even a few sentences together without a written text...The personality conveyed by the utterances which are put into her mouth is that of a priggish schoolgirl, captain of the hockey team, a prefect, and a recent candidate for Confirmation". [Ben Pimlott, "The Queen", p. 280.] His article caused a furore and was attacked by the majority of the press, with a minority, including the "New Statesman" and Ian Gilmour's "The Spectator", agreeing with some of Grigg's ideas. Henry Fairlie of the "Daily Mail", attacked Grigg for "daring to pit his infinitely tiny and temporary mind against the accumulated experience of centuries". [Pimlott, p. 281.] The Archbishop of Canterbury, Geoffrey Fisher, also attacked Grigg. [Pimlott, p. 281.] When Grigg was leaving Television House, after giving an interview defending his article, a member of the League of Empire Loyalists came up to him and slapped his face, saying: "Take that from the League of Empire Loyalists". ['Ld. Altrincham Slapped', "The Times" (7 August, 1957), p. 8.] The man, Philip Kinghorn Burbidge, was fined 20 shillings and said: "Due to the scurrilous attack by Lord Altrincham I felt it was up to a decent Briton to show resentment". ['Lord Altrinicham's Assailant Fined', "The Times" (8 August, 1957), p. 3.]

He was a columnist for the Guardian (1960-70), the Times (1986-93) and occasionally for the Spectator. He left the Conservative party for the SDP in 1982.

As historian Grigg argued that Wilhelmine Germany had been aggressive, militaristic, anti-democratic and bent on the domination of Europe, and had indeed been responsible for the war that began in 1914. His masterpiece was a four-volume biography, "The Young Lloyd George" (1973), "Lloyd George: The People's Champion" (1978, winner of the Whitbread Award for biography), "Lloyd George, From Peace To War 1912-1916" (1983, winner of the Wolfson prize), and the posthumous "Lloyd George: War Leader, 1916-1918" (2002) - the final chapter of which was finished by Margaret MacMillan. Grigg showed a remarkable sympathy, and even affinity, for the Welsh wizard, despite the fact that their domestic personalities were very different.

Grigg also wrote "The Victory that Never Was" in which he argued that the Western Allies prolonged the Second World War for a year by invading Europe in 1944 rather than 1943.

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External links

* [http://politics.guardian.co.uk/politicsobituaries/story/0,1441,627710,00.html "Guardian" obituary]