Owen Frederick Morton Tudor

Early life and education

Born on 21 October 1900 in Twickenham, Tudor was the son of Admiral Henry Morton Tudor and Evelyn Laura (née Toulmin) Tudor and a nephew of Admiral Sir Frederick Tudor. The original family name was Jones, but it was changed to Tudor in 1890. Tudor attended the junior school at St. Lawrence College, Ramsgate, and then joined the Royal Navy in 1915 and served as a midshipman aboard HMS Repulse. After he suffered an eye injury, he was forced to leave the navy in December 1917. He attended St Lawrence College in 1918 and was involved in the school's sports programmes. Tudor won the Saddle at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, which well qualified him for the British Army's cavalry.

First marriage and later career

He entered the 20th Hussars, but later transferred to the 3rd The King's Own Hussars in 1921. The regiment was stationed in Constantinople, where Tudor reportedly met Larissa Haouk, who was reportedly working as a belly dancer in a Constantinople nightclub, and in 1923 he married her against the wishes of the colonel of his regiment. He was then forced to leave the regiment and transferred to the 3rd Battalion, the Royal Tank Corps, based at Lydd, Kent.

Tudor was devastated by Larissa's death in 1926 and took flowers or arranged for flowers to be delivered to her grave each 10 June until a few years before his own death. However, he remarried quickly, to Hon. Noreen Rosamund Anne Tufton, daughter of John Tufton, 2nd Baron Hothfield. Tudor was readmitted to his former regiment in 1927 and was quickly promoted. He retired from the army in 1950 with the rank of lieutenant-colonel. He refused to answer letters inquiring about Larissa's past. His daughter by his second wife, Idonea Rosamund Ierne Tudor (born 26 June 1932), married Baron Nils Taube.