Napier Sturt, 3rd Baron Alington

Captain Napier George Henry Sturt, 3rd Baron Alington (1 November 1896 – 17 September 1940) was a British peer, the son of Humphrey Sturt, 2nd Baron Alington.

He was born in November 1896 in St. Marylebone district of London. He succeeded to the Barony on 30 July 1919 on the death of his father. He owned the Crichel House estate in Dorset.

He married Lady Mary Sibell Ashley-Cooper,^[1] daughter of Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 9th Earl of Shaftesbury, on 27 November 1928. They had one child: Hon. Mary Anna Sibell Elizabeth Sturt (b. 1929, d. 2010)^[2] who later fought the Government and won, leading to the resignation of a Minister, in the Crichel Down Affair.

Alington may well be most notable for having dated Tallulah Bankhead in the 1920s. Alington was described as "well cultivated, bisexual, with sensuous, meaty lips, a distant, antic charm, a history of mysterious disappearances, and a streak of cruelty."^[3] His bisexuality was well known.^[4] He was a friend of the Polish composer Karol Szymanowski who dedicated his highly sensuous Songs of an infatuated Muezzin Op.42 to the handsome young Englishman, on their publication in 1922.^[5]

He had no male heir upon his death, so the title became extinct. The Crichel estate passed to his 11-year-old daughter Mary, who later married Commander George (known as "Toby") Marten.

War service

In the First World War, he was a Captain in the Royal Air Force. In the Second World War, he was commissioned on 2 July 1940 as an officer of the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve in the Administrative and Special Duties Branch^[6] and was posted to Cairo, possibly serving as a staff officer at HQ Middle East. He died on 16 September 1940 aged 43 in Cairo on active service of a short illness after pneumonia, and is buried in the New British Protestant Cemetery, Cairo, Egypt, plot E.221-222^[7]

Anecdotes on Napier (Naps) Sturt

Naps' sister Lois Ina Sturt ( 1900-1937) married Hon. Evan Frederic Morgan, ( 1893-1949), the last Viscount Tredegar. From 1934 until 1937 Lois was Viscountess Tredegar. William Cross, FSA Scot has written several books on Evan Morgan that also include many colourful anecdotes about Naps Sturt, the last Lord Alington. In 2014 Cross wrote a tribute to Naps' beloved sister Lois, entitled Lois Sturt: Wild Child.

William Cross is currently researching for a long biographical sketch on Naps to be published in the Spring of 2017.

References

1. "Mary Sibell Sturt (née Ashley-Cooper), Lady Alington". National Portrait Gallery, London.
2. "Mary Anna Sibell Elizabeth Sturt: died 2010". Timesonline. Retrieved 2012-10-07. (subscription required (help)).
3. DAH-LING The strange case of Tallulah Bankhead, Robert Gottlieb, The New Yorker, 16 May 2005
4. Moffat, Ivan; Lambert, Gavin (2004), The Ivan Moffat File: Life Among the Beautiful and Damned in London, Paris, New York, and Hollywood, Pantheon Books, p. 107, ISBN 0-375-42247-1
5. "Songs of the Infatuated Muezzin, Op.42 (Szymanowski, Karol) - IMSLP/Petrucci Music Library: Free Public Domain Sheet Music". Imslp.org. Retrieved 2012-10-07.
6. J.N. Houterman. "Royal Air Force (Volunteer Reserve) Officers 1939-1945 - A". Unithistories.com. Retrieved 2012-10-07.
7. Reading Room Manchester (1940-09-16). "Casualty Details". CWGC. Retrieved 2012-10-07.

Books from William Cross, FSA Scot that mention Naps Alington and his sister Lois.

• Aspects of Evan: The Last Viscount Tredegar by Monty Dart and William Cross. ISBN 978-1-905914-15-9 (2012)
• A Beautiful Nuisance: The Life and Death of the Hon. Gwyneth Ericka Morgan by Monty Dart and William Cross. ISBN 978-1-905914-10-4 (2012).
• Not Behind Lace Curtains : The Hidden World of Evan, Viscount Tredegar by William Cross. ISBN 978-1-905914-21-0 (2013)
• Evan Frederic Morgan, Viscount Tredegar: The Final Affairs, Financial and Carnal by William Cross. ISBN 978-1-905914-24-1 (2014)
• Lois Sturt, Wild Child: A Glance at Hon. Lois Ina Sturt, Viscountess Tredegar. by William Cross. ISBN 978-1-905914-31-9. (2014)
• The Engagement Diaries of Hon. Lois Sturt : 1919-1924 . by William Cross. ISBN 978-1-905914-34-0. ( Release date December 2015.)
• Naps, Lord Alington by his Friends : The short but shocking life of Napier Sturt, the last Lord Alington of Crichel. by William Cross. ISBN 978-1905914-39-5. ( Release date 31 March 2017).