Quintin Hogg, Baron Hailsham of Saint Marylebone

Quintin McGarel Hogg, Baron Hailsham of Saint Marylebone (9 October 1907 – 12 October 2001), was a British barrister and Conservative Party politician. He was known as the 2nd Viscount Hailsham between 1950 and 1963, at which point he disclaimed his hereditary peerage.

Like his father, Hailsham was considered to be a contender for the leadership of the Conservative Party. He was a contender to succeed Harold Macmillan as prime minister in 1963, renouncing his hereditary peerage to do so, but was passed over in favour of Alec Douglas-Home. He was created a life peer in 1970 and served as Lord Chancellor, the office formerly held by his father, in 1970–74 and 1979–87.

Background

Born in Bayswater, London, Hogg was the son of the 1st Viscount Hailsham, who was Lord Chancellor under Stanley Baldwin, and grandson of Quintin Hogg, a merchant, philanthropist and educational reformer, and an American mother; Hogg's great-grandfather was Sir James Hogg, 1st Baronet, a businessman and politician from Ulster. The middle name McGarel comes from Charles McGarel, an Ulsterman who had large holdings of slaves, and who financially sponsored Quintin Hogg's grandfather, also called Quintin Hogg, who was McGarel's brother-in-law.

Hogg was educated at Sunningdale School and then Eton College, where he was a King's Scholar and won the Newcastle Scholarship in 1925. He entered Christ Church, Oxford as a Scholar and he was President of the Oxford University Conservative Association and of the Oxford Union. He took Firsts in Honours Moderations in 1928 and in Literae Humaniores in 1930.