John Langford-Holt

Sir John Anthony Langford-Holt (30 June 1916 - 23 July 1993) was a British Conservative Member of Parliament for Shrewsbury from 1945 to 1983. Unlike most other members of Parliament, Sir John made it clear that he would never seek ministerial office and would refuse it he were offered such a post.

He was born in Studdale, Waldershare, Kent on 30 June 1916 and educated at Shrewsbury School, the town in which his father had served as mayor. During the Second World War, he served as a pilot, first in the Battle of Britain and later with the Fleet Air Arm.

During his political career, his positions included serving on the Parliamentary Science Committee, the Estimates Committee, the Expenditure Committee and the Select Committee on Defence. During Churchill's later years, he was entrusted by the Tory Whips to look after the grand old man himself. He was knighted in 1962.

He was married four times, firstly to Elisabeth Neustadtl in 1943. The couple were divorced in 1951, and she remarried Major Robert Rivers-Bulkeley. In 1953, he remarried Flora Stuart but the marriage was dissolved in 1969, after which he married Maxine Veale in 1971. After the couple divorced in 1982, he was married for the last time to Irene Kerr. He died in London on 23 July 1993, aged 77.

References

• Times Guide to the House of Commons 1979.
• Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs

External links

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by John Langford-Holt