- Wyndham Portal, 1st Viscount Portal
Wyndham Raymond Portal, 1st Viscount Portal PC GCMG DSO MVO (
9 April 1885 –6 May 1949 ) was a British politician.The eldest son of
Sir William Wyndam Portal, 2nd Baronet , andFlorence Elizabeth Mary Glyn CBE, daughter of Hon.St Leger Glyn , 2nd son ofGeorge Glyn, 1st Baron Wolverton , he was educated at Eton andChrist Church, Oxford .In 1909 he married Lady Louise Rosemary Kathleen Virginia Cairns, MBE, only child of
Arthur Cairns, 2nd Earl Cairns .He was commissioned into the
Hampshire Yeomanry in 1903, was promotedLieutenant in 1905, and transferred to the9th Lancers later the same year. He transferred to the1st Life Guards as a Second Lieutenant in 1908 and was promoted Lieutenant again later the same year, but left the Army in 1911. He rejoined the Hampshire Yeomanry in 1914 and served inWorld War I . He was promoted Captain in 1914 while serving asadjutant of theRoyal 1st Devon Yeomanry . Transferring back to the Life Guards (Special Reserve ) in 1915, he was promotedLieutenant-Colonel in 1916 when he took command of theHousehold Battalion . In 1917 he was awarded theDistinguished Service Order and appointed a Member of the Royal Victorian Order (MVO). He relinquished command of the battalion in 1918 and reverted to the rank of Captain, but was soon promotedMajor and attached to theMachine Gun Corps as a battalion commander, again with the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel. He resigned his commission in 1919.He was Regional Commissioner for Wales under the Civil Defence Scheme from 1939. He served in government as Additional
Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Supply from 1940–1942, and as Minister of Works and Planning from 1942–1944.He was subsequently Chairman of the Bacon Development Board and of the Coal Production Council, and was President of the Olympic Games in 1948. He was
Lord Lieutenant of Hampshire from 1947.Portal succeeded to his father's baronetcy in 1931. In 1935 he was raised to the peerage as Baron Portal, of Laverstoke. He was appointed a Privy Counsellor in 1942, created Viscount Portal in 1945 and awarded the
GCMG in 1949.He was succeeded to the Baronetcy only by his uncle, Sir Spencer John Portal.
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