Cranley Onslow

Quality 0.50 · 1 view · Updated 2 months ago

British politician (1926–2001)

title: "Cranley Onslow" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["1926-births", "2001-deaths", "chairmen-of-the-1922-committee", "people-educated-at-harrow-school", "graduates-of-the-royal-military-college,-sandhurst", "alumni-of-oriel-college,-oxford", "knights-commander-of-the-order-of-st-michael-and-st-george", "queen's-own-hussars-officers", "conservative-party-(uk)-life-peers", "life-peers-created-by-elizabeth-ii", "members-of-the-privy-council-of-the-united-kingdom", "conservative-party-(uk)-mps-for-english-constituencies", "uk-mps-1964–1966", "uk-mps-1966–1970", "uk-mps-1970–1974", "uk-mps-1974", "uk-mps-1974–1979", "uk-mps-1979–1983", "uk-mps-1983–1987", "uk-mps-1987–1992", "uk-mps-1992–1997", "members-of-kent-county-council", "onslow-family", "british-army-personnel-of-world-war-ii"] description: "British politician (1926–2001)" topic_path: "history" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cranley_Onslow" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary British politician (1926–2001) ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox officeholder"]

Field	Value
honorific-prefix	The Right Honourable
name	The Lord Onslow of Woking
honorific-suffix
image	Cranley Onslow.jpg
office	Chair of the 1922 Committee
term_start	1984
term_end	1992
leader
predecessor	Edward du Cann
successor	Marcus Fox
office2	Member of the House of Lords
status2	Lord Temporal
termlabel2	Life peerage
term_start2	31 October 1997
term_end2	13 March 2001
parliament3	United Kingdom
constituency_MP3	Woking
term_start3	15 October 1964
term_end3	8 April 1997
predecessor3	Harold Watkinson
successor3	Humfrey Malins
birth_name	Cranley Gordon Douglas Onslow
birth_date
birth_place	London, England
death_date
death_place	Hereford, England
party	Conservative
spouse
children	4
education	Harrow School, Royal Military College, Sandhurst
alma_mater	Oriel College, Oxford
caption	Onslow in 1973
::

Family background

Onslow was born in Wandsworth, London, in 1926. He was related to the Earl of Onslow, and was named for one of the subsidiary titles of the Earldom: Viscount Cranley. His parents were Francis Robert Douglas Onslow and Mabel Strachan. He had a younger brother, Ian Denzil Onslow (1929–2013). Onslow was a descendant of George Onslow, eldest son of Lieutenant-General Richard Onslow, nephew of the first Baron and uncle of the first Earl.

Early life and career

He was educated at Harrow School and then Sandhurst. He then joined the military in 1944 and was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Queen's Own Hussars.

Political career

Onslow resigned from the civil service in 1960 and became active in politics, first being elected to Dartford Rural District Council and later to Kent County Council. In 1963 he was selected to succeed Harold Watkinson as MP for Woking and he was elected the following year in the 1964 general election.

Once elected, Onslow demonstrated his right wing credentials by calling for lower taxes on the middle class and a reduction in third world aid. He also pursued a strong non-partisan interest in aviation, eventually chairing the Conservative aviation committee.

Government

He would later serve as Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Aerospace from 1972 to 1974 in Edward Heath's government. In Margaret Thatcher's government he was made a Minister of State at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in 1983, but resigned a year later after Thatcher sacked his boss, Francis Pym.

1922 Committee

In 1984, he was elected to chair the 1922 Committee, and was therefore considered to be the most powerful backbencher in the Conservative party. In this post, he conveyed to Mrs Thatcher the desire of backbenchers that Leon Brittan should resign over the Westland affair and in the 1990 leadership contest that many backbenchers wanted a broader choice of candidates, contributing to her decision to drop out. This angered many allies of Thatcher, and in 1992 he was toppled as Chairman of the 1922 Committee by Marcus Fox.

Honours and styles

Honours

Having been sworn of the Privy Council in the 1988 New Year Honours, Onslow was appointed to the Order of St Michael and St George as a Knight Commander (KCMG) for "political service" in the 1993 New Year Honours and upon stepping down from Parliament in 1997 his life peerage was announced in the Resignation Honours, and he was raised to the peerage as Baron Onslow of Woking, of Woking in the County of Surrey.

Personal life

In 1955, he married Lady June Hay, daughter of George Hay, 14th Earl of Kinnoull. They had four children.

Onslow died at a hospital in Hereford on 13 March 2001, at the age of 74.

References

Garnett, Mark. (2005). "Onslow, Cranley Gordon Douglas, Baron Onslow of Woking (1926–2001), politician".
(19 March 2001). "Obituary: Lord Onslow of Woking". The Guardian.
{{London Gazette. (30 December 1987)
{{London Gazette. (30 December 1992)
{{London Gazette. (1 August 1997)
{{London Gazette. (4 November 1997)
{{London Gazette. (5 November 1997)

::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::