Douglas-Home, Alexander Fredrick 14th Earl of Home (Rt. Hon. )

   Another name for Alexander was Douglas-Home, Alec.

  General Notes:

SOURCE: Burke's Peerage, page 1277
"Sir Alexander(Alec) Frederick Douglas-Home, succeeded his father as 14th Earl of Home,..."

Baron Home of the Hirsel

1903–1995, British politician. Educated at Eton and Oxford, he was elected to the House of Commons in 1931 as a Conservative. As parliamentary private secretary (1937–39) to Neville Chamberlain, he supported the latter's policy of appeasement toward Nazi Germany. He lost his Commons seat in 1945; reelected in 1950 he resigned (1951) when he succeeded his father's peerage as the 14th earl of Home. He served as minister of state (1951–55), secretary of state for commonwealth relations (1955–60), and leader of the House of Lords (1957–60). As foreign secretary (1960–63), he pursued a policy of détente with the USSR and worked for the establishment of an independent British nuclear deterrent. In Oct., 1963, he became prime minister after Harold Macmillan's resignation, emerging as the controversial compromise choice of a divided party. The first peer to become prime minister since 1902, he renounced his Scottish title for life and took a seat in the Commons as Sir Alec Douglas-Home. As prime minister, he was handicapped by the divisions within his party and the continuing attention of the Profumo scandal. After the Conservative defeat in Oct. 1964, he led the opposition until July, 1965. He was foreign secretary (1970–74) under Edward Heath. In 1974 he was created a life peer.

Bibliography:
See his autobiography The Way the Wind Blows (1976).

  Noted events in his life were:

• AKA. Home of the Hirsel

Alexander married Elizabeth Hester Alington, daughter of Very Rev. Cyril Argentine Alington D.D. and Hon. Hester Lyttelton, on 3 Oct 1936 in Durham Cathedral. (Elizabeth Hester Alington was born on 6 Nov 1909 and died on 3 Sep 1990.)