Peter Hennessy

Early life

Hennessy was born in Edmonton, north London, son of William Gerald Hennessy and Edith, née Wood-Johnson. He comes from a large Catholic family of Irish provenance. He was brought up in large houses requisitioned by the local council, first in Allandale Avenue and then in Lyndhurst Gardens, Finchley, north London.

He attended the nearby Our Lady of Lourdes Primary School, and on Sundays he went to St Mary Magdalene Church, where he was an altar boy. He was the subject of the first episode, first broadcast on 6 August 2007, of the BBC Radio 4 series The House I Grew Up In, in which he talked about his childhood.

Hennessy was educated at St Benedict's School and then at a grammar school in Ealing, west London. After his father's job led the family to move to the Cotswolds, he attended Marling School, a grammar school in Stroud, Gloucestershire. He went on to study at St John's College, Cambridge, where he was awarded a BA in 1969 and a PhD in 1990. Hennessy was a Kennedy Memorial Scholar at Harvard University from 1971 to 1972.

Career

Journalism

Hennessy was a journalist for the Times Higher Education Supplement from 1972 to 1974. From 1974 to 1982, he wrote leaders for The Times, for which he was also the Whitehall correspondent. He was The Financial Times lobby correspondent at Westminster in 1976. In June 1977, Hennessy accused Donald Beves of being the "fourth man" in the Cambridge Spy Ring (then-known participants were Philby, Burgess, and Maclean), but Geoffrey Grigson and others quickly leapt to the defense of Beves, considering him uninterested in politics.

Hennessy wrote for The Economist in 1982. He was a regular presenter of Analysis on BBC Radio 4 from 1987 to 1992. On 17 November 2005, he made a trenchant appearance alongside Lord Wilson of Dinton before the House of Commons Public Administration Select Committee on the publication of political memoirs.

In July and August 2013 he was the interviewer for BBC Radio 4's Reflections, a series of four biographical interview programmes featuring Shirley Williams, Jack Straw, Norman Tebbit and Neil Kinnock. Hennessy continues to present the programme.

On 17 April 2022, he was interviewed by BBC Radio 4's Broadcasting House. On the subject of the Metropolitan Police fines issued to Boris Johnson for lockdown breaches during the Partygate scandal, he said "I think we're in the most severe constitutional crisis involving a prime minister that I can remember."

Academic career

Hennessy co-founded the Institute of Contemporary British History in 1986. From 1992 to 2000, he was professor of contemporary history at Queen Mary and Westfield College, University of London. From 1994 to 1997, he gave public lectures as Professor of Rhetoric at Gresham College, London. From 2001, he has been Attlee professor of contemporary British history at Queen Mary, University of London.

His analysis of post-war Britain, Never Again: Britain 1945–1951, won the Duff Cooper Prize in 1992 and the NCR Book Award in 1993.

His study of Britain in the 1950s and the rise of Harold Macmillan, Having It So Good: Britain in the 1950s, won the 2007 Orwell Prize for political writing.

Elevation to the peerage

On 5 October 2010 the House of Lords Appointments Commission said that Hennessy was to be a crossbench (non-political) peer. He was created a life peer on 8 November 2010, taking the title Baron Hennessy of Nympsfield in the County of Gloucestershire. He was introduced to the House of Lords on 25 November.

"I'm terribly pleased and honoured", Hennessy said at hearing the news. "I hope I can help the House of Lords a bit on constitutional matters. I'll certainly give it my best shot." In August 2014, Lord Hennessy was one of 200 public figures who were signatories to a letter to The Guardian opposing Scottish independence in the run-up to September's referendum.

Personal life

Hennessy is married with two daughters. He lives in London with his wife Enid. In September 2019, he stated in an interview that he had early-stage Parkinson's disease.

On 7 May 2023, Hennessy was the guest for BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs.

Bibliography

Hennessy is the author of numerous articles and of the following books:

• Cabinet (1986) Blackwell
• Whitehall (1989) Secker & Warburg (revised & extended in 2001)
• Never Again: Britain 1945–51 (1992) Jonathan Cape (revised & updated in 2006)
• Pathways to the Pigeon Hole?: The Effectiveness of Official Inquiries (1993) University of Strathclyde
• The Hidden Wiring: Unearthing the British Constitution (1995) Gollancz
• Ready, Steady, Go!: New Labour and Whitehall (1997) Fabian Society
• The Blair Centre: A Question of Command and Control? (1999) Public Management Foundation
• The Prime Minister: The Office and Its Holders since 1945 (2000) Allen Lane
• The Secret State: Whitehall and the Cold War (2002) Allen Lane (republished & extended in 2010, see below)
• Rulers and Servants of the State: The Blair Style of Government, 1997-2004 (2004) Office for Public Management
• Having It So Good: Britain in the Fifties (2006) Allen Lane
• Cabinets and the Bomb (2007) Oxford University Press
• The New Protective State: Government, Intelligence and Terrorism (2007) Continuum
• The Secret State: Preparing For The Worst 1945–2010 (2010) Penguin
• Distilling the Frenzy: Writing the History of One's Own Times (2012) Biteback
• Establishment and Meritocracy (2014) Haus Publishing
• Kingdom to Come: Thoughts on the Union Before and After the Scottish Referendum (2015) Haus Publishing
• Reflections: Conversations with Politicians (2016) Haus Publishing (expanded & reissued in 2020, see below)
• The Silent Deep: The Royal Navy Submarine Service Since 1945 (2015) with James Jinks Allen Lane
• Winds of Change: Britain in the Early Sixties (2019) Allen Lane
• The Complete Reflections: Conversations with Politicians (2020) Haus Publishing
• A Duty of Care: Britain Before and After Corona (2022) Penguin
• The Bonfire of the Decencies: Repairing and Restoring the British Constitution (2022) Haus Publishing
• On the Back of an Envelope: A Life in Writing (2024) Haus Publishing (with Polly Coupar-Hennessy)

References

Sources

• 'Corrected Oral Transcript of Oral Evidence presented to the House of Commons Public Administration Select Committee on the publication of political memoirs on 17 November 2005 by Lord Wilson of Dinton and Professor Peter Hennessy', 7 December 2005. Retrieved 31 December 2005

References

1. "Queen Mary College website biographical note on Peter Hennessy". School of History, Queen Mary, University of London.
2. Debrett's Peerage and Baronetage 2019, ed. Susan Morris, Debrett's Ltd, 2020, p. 2991
3. "''The House I Grew Up In'', featuring Peter Hennessy".
4. 'Who was the fourth man?' in ''[[The Times]]'', issue 60032, dated Friday, 17 June 1977, p. 17.
5. "Series 1, Reflections with Peter Hennessy - Episode guide - BBC Radio 4".
6. (17 April 2022). "No 10 parties: PM's lockdown fine constitutional crisis, says historian". BBC News.
7. Pauli, Michelle. (25 April 2007). "Orwell prize winner is Having it So Good". The Guardian.
8. {{London Gazette. (11 November 2010)
9. "House of Lords Business".
10. (6 October 2010). "Professor Hennessy joins the House of Lords". Queen Mary University of London.
11. (7 August 2014). "Celebrities' open letter to Scotland – full text and list of signatories". The Guardian.
12. Crace, John. (23 March 2004). "Peter Hennessy: Whitehall force". The Guardian.
13. Goodhart, David. (7 September 2019). "Our sense of decency survived the war. It won't survive this". [[The Times]].
14. (7 May 2023). "Professor Peter Hennessy, historian".
15. (2019). "Debrett's Peerage".