Name Victor Montagu | Died February 25, 1995 | |
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Parents George Montagu, 9th Earl of Sandwich Children John Montagu, 11th Earl of Sandwich Grandchildren The Hon. Orlando William Montagu, Luke Montagu, Viscount Hinchingbrooke, Lady Jemima Mary Montagu | ||
Alexander Victor Edward Paulet Montagu (22 May 1906 – 25 February 1995), known as Viscount Hinchingbrooke from 1916 to 1962, as the Earl of Sandwich from 1962 to 1964 (when he disclaimed his peerages) and as Victor Montagu from 1964 to 1995, was a British Conservative Member of Parliament (MP). He was usually known to family and friends as 'Hinch Hinchingbrooke' or 'Hinch Sandwich' or, later, as 'Hinch Montagu'. In 2015, it was revealed that he was cautioned for indecently assaulting a child for a period of two years between 31 December 1970 and January 1972.
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Early life
Montagu was the eldest son of The 9th Earl of Sandwich and his wife, Alberta (née Sturges), and was educated at Eton and Trinity College, Cambridge. In 1926, he joined the 5th (Huntingdonshire) Battalion, Northamptonshire Regiment as a Lieutenant.
Political career
A member of the Conservative Party, Montagu was Private Secretary to the Lord President of the Council, Stanley Baldwin, from 1932 to 1934 and Treasurer of the Junior Imperial League from 1934 to 1935.
He briefly served in France in 1940, during World War II. A year later, he was elected MP for South Dorset, replacing Viscount Cranborne, who was called up to the House of Lords. A radical backbencher, Montagu set up the Tory Reform Committee in 1943, and was its founding chairman until a year later. It was at this time he wrote Essays in Tory Reform, a response to the party's moves toward liberalism.
Montagu was elected in the following five general elections, and continued as MP for South Dorset until 1962 when his father died. Montagu succeeded to his titles and could no longer sit in the House of Commons.
Lord Sandwich disclaimed his peerages in 1964, however, under the Peerage Act, which was passed a year earlier. He unsuccessfully stood as Conservative candidate at Accrington at the 1964 general election. Although he did not sit in the House of Commons again, Montagu was President of the Anti-Common Market League from 1962–84; he also joined the Conservative Monday Club in 1964 and wrote The Conservative Dilemma in 1970.
Personal life
Montagu, who was gay, married firstly Rosemary Peto (1916-1998), on 27 July 1934. She was a goddaughter of Queen Maud of Norway and the only daughter of Major Ralph Peto. They had seven children but were divorced in 1958, after she left him for a female companion. Their youngest son, therapist Robert Montagu, has since alleged that his father sexually abused him on an almost daily basis from ages seven to eleven.
In addition to his son's allegations of child sexual abuse, in 2015, Freedom of Information requests revealed that Victor Montagu "was let off with a caution by police and the director of public prosecutions in 1972 for indecently assaulting a boy for nearly two years".
He married secondly Lady Anne Holland-Martin (née Cavendish), the youngest daughter of The 9th Duke of Devonshire and widow of Christopher Holland-Martin, MP. Their marriage was annulled in 1965.
Montagu died in 1995, aged 88 and his eldest son, John, succeeded as the 11th Earl. A grandson lives in Brighton, England.