Sydney Turing Barlow Lawford

Lieutenant-General Sir Sydney Turing Barlow Lawford, KCB (16 November 1865 – 15 February 1953) was a British Army officer, and the father of movie star Peter Lawford.

Life and career

He was born in Tunbridge Wells, Kent, England. His first marriage was on 30 September 1893, at St. Paul's Church, Knightsbridge, London to Lillian Maud Cass, who died on 26 November 1900.[1]

Lawford served in the Boer War in South Africa as a captain in the British Army. His second marriage was on 20 May 1914 in London to Muriel Williams.[1] During World War I, Lawford was promoted to the rank of major-general, and commanded the 41st Division, the junior division of the New Army, throughout its existence. His nickname of 'Swanky Syd', used by others behind his back, apparently derives from his habit of donning full dress regalia for every occasion, including all medals.[2] He was knighted in the field.[3]

Lawford was promoted to lieutenant-general, the third highest rank in the British Army, and was posted to India after World War I. While serving in India in the early 1920s, and while still married to Muriel, he fell in love with the wife of one of his officers, May Somerville Aylen, and she became pregnant with his child. Colonel Ernest Aylen, May's husband, upon hearing this news, divorced her over the scandal. (He died on 12 October 1947).[4]

General Lawford and Muriel divorced. He then married May Aylen, and their child was Peter Lawford (born in 1923). The Lawfords returned to England. But the scandal eventually drove the family to settle in France, and they then moved to the United States by the late 1930s. Peter had appeared in his first film before age ten, learned several languages, and also appeared in several movies in France.[5]

References

  1. 1 2 Peter Lawford: The Man Who Kept the Secrets, by James Spada, 1992.
  2. ↑ http://www.firstworldwar.bham.ac.uk/nicknames/lawford.htm.
  3. ↑ The Peter Lawford Story, by Patricia Seaton Lawford, New York, Carroll and Graf Publishers, 1988, p. 8.
  4. ↑ "Death notice of Colonel Ernest Aylen" (PDF). 4 July 2009.
  5. ↑ The Peter Lawford Story, by Patricia Seaton Lawford, New York, Carroll and Graf Publishers, 1988, pp. 13–27.
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