| AdminHistory | William Humble Eric Ward, 13th Lord Ward, Third Earl of Dudley, Baron of Birmingham and Viscount Ednam was born on 30th January, 1894. He was educated at Eton and Christchurch, Oxford. After the First World War (1914-1918), in which he served and was wounded in, he married his first wife Rosemary Millicent, daughter of the 4th Duke of Sutherland, in 1919 (she died in an aeroplane disaster in 1930). He was an active figure in public life, becoming an MP for Hornsey Borough in 1921-24, and for Wednesbury 1931-32. He was made the Third Earl of Dudley in 1932, and resided at Himley Hall (until 1946 when the building was bought by the National Coal Board, and eventually taken over by the local authorities). He became Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Under-Secretary for India in 1921-23. His other endeavours included becoming the President of the Society of British Gas Industries (1926-27), the British Iron & Steel Federation (1935-36), Birmingham Chamber of Commerce (1937-39), the Federation of Chambers of Commerce of the British Empire (1937-45) and the British Iron & Steel Institute (1938-40). In 1943, he married his second wife Frances Laura, Viscountess Long, but the marriage was dissolved in 1954. His third marriage was to 38 year-old Princess Grace Radziwill, on 21 July, 1961. Through his dealings with industry, including his involvement in the revival in the fortunes of the Round Oak Steelworks in Brierley Hill, and Baggeridge Colliery in Himley, in the 1920s and 1930s, he became one of the chief industrialists of the region. He died in Paris, on 26th December, 1969. |