Sir Alan Herbert CH
(1890-1971)

Died aged c. 81

Sir Alan Patrick Herbert CH (A. P. Herbert, 24 September 1890 – 11 November 1971), was an English humorist, novelist, playwright, law reformist, and in 1935–1950 an independent Member of Parliament for Oxford University. Born in Ashtead, Surrey, he attended Winchester College and New College, Oxford, receiving a starred first in jurisprudence in 1914. He joined the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve as a seaman in the First World War, becoming an officer in the Royal Naval Division. He fought in Gallipoli and on the Western Front, as a battalion adjutant in 1917, before injury removed him from the front line. After the war he published The Secret Battle and in 1924 joined the staff of Punch. As an MP he campaigned for private-member rights, piloted the Matrimonial Causes Act 1937 through Parliament, opposed Entertainments Duty and campaigned against the Oxford Group. He joined the River Emergency Service in 1938, captaining a boat on the River Thames in the Second World War as a petty officer in the Royal Naval Auxiliary Patrol. In 1943, he joined a parliamentary commission on the future of the Dominion of Newfoundland.

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