Cyril Radcliffe, 1st Viscount Radcliffe

The Right Honourable The Viscount Radcliffe GBE, PC, QC
Lord Radcliffe.
Lord of Appeal in Ordinary
In office 1949–1964
Personal details
Born	30 March 1899 Llanychan, Denbighshire, Wales
Died	1 April 1977
Nationality	British
Spouse(s)	Hon. Antonia Mary Roby Benson
Alma mater	University of Oxford

Cyril John Radcliffe, 1st Viscount Radcliffe GBE, PC, QC (30 March 1899 – 1 April 1977) was a British lawyer and Law Lord most famous for his partitioning of the British Imperial territory of India.

Background, education and early career

Radcliffe was born in Llanychan, Denbighshire, Wales. He was conscripted in World War I but his poor eyesight limited the options for service so he was allocated to the Labour Corps. He attended Oxford University, was elected to a Fellowship at All Souls College, and was called to the bar. His meteoric legal rise that followed was interrupted by World War II. Radcliffe joined the Ministry of Information becoming its Director-General by 1941, where he worked closely with the Minister Brendan Bracken. In 1944 he was made a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire (KBE).^{[citation needed]}

Indian Boundary Committees

Radcliffe was given the chairmanship of the two boundary committees set up with the passing of the Indian Independence Act. Radcliffe submitted his partition map in August 1947 and Pakistan and India were divided and declared as independent nations.

After seeing the mayhem occurring on both sides of the boundary that was created by him, Radcliffe refused his salary of 40000 rupees. He was made a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire in 1948.

Later career

In 1949 Radcliffe was sworn of the Privy Council, made a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary (law lord) and created a life peer as Baron Radcliffe, of Werneth in the County of Lancaster.^[1] Unusually, he had not previously been a judge. In the 1940s and 1950s he chaired a string of public enquiries in addition to his legal duties and continued to hold numerous trusteeships, governorships and chairmanships right up until his death. He chaired the Committee of Enquiry into the Future of the British Film Institute (1948), whose recommendations led to the modernisation of the BFI in the post-war period. From 1957 he was chairman of the Radcliffe Committee, called to enquire into the working of the monetary and credit system. He was also a frequent public speaker and wrote numerous books: he gave the BBC Reith Lecture in 1951 - a series of seven broadcasts titled Power and the State which examined the features of democratic society, and considered the problematic notions of power and authority. He also presented the Oxford University Romanes Lecture in 1963 on Mountstuart Elphinstone.^{[citation needed]} In 1962 he was made a hereditary peer as Viscount Radcliffe, of Hampton Lucy in the County of Warwick.^[2]

Personal life

Lord Radcliffe married the Honourable Antonia Mary Roby, daughter of Godfrey Benson, 1st Baron Charnwood and former wife of John Tennant, in 1939. He died in April 1977, aged 78, when the viscountcy became extinct.^[3] In 2006, two sets of Chancery barristers' chambers in Lincoln's Inn merged and adopted the name "Radcliffe Chambers" in his honour.^[4]

See also

• Radcliffe Line
• Partition of India

References

1. ^ London Gazette: no. 38627. p. 2748. 3 June 1949.
2. ^ London Gazette: no. 42729. p. 5563. 13 July 1962.
3. ^ thepeerage.com Cyril John Radcliffe, 1st Viscount Radcliffe
4. ^ radcliffechambers.com

Further reading

• Chester, Lucy P. Borders and Conflict in South Asia: The Radcliffe Boundary Commission and the Partition of Punjab. Manchester UP, 2009.

Academic offices
Preceded by New university	Chancellor of the University of Warwick 1965–1977	Succeeded by The Lord Scarman
Peerage of the United Kingdom
New creation	Viscount Radcliffe 1962 – 1977	Extinct