Grieving son's life sentence; Marquess's sudden death forced Earl into control of 6,000 acres and one of Britain's oldest titled families.
L IKE any other loving son, Henry Seymour was distraught when his father died.But unlike most grieving 39-year-olds, he received what his mother called a "life sentence".
The Earl of Yarmouth suddenly became the 9th Marquess of Hertford and head of one of Britain's oldest titled families.
This meant taking complete control of a 6,000-acre Warwickshire estate and a magnificent 320-year-old 110-room Palladian mansion.
However, the new Lord Hertford is no stranger to Ragley Hall near Alcester or its estate.
He has been running both for the last seven years but fortunately for him, his father - a former Deputy Lieutenant of Warwickshire - was always on hand to help out.
His father's death also brought a seat in the House of Lords.
But anyone who thinks the second chamber's newest recruit will oppose Government plans to abolish hereditary peerages should think again.
Because - quite simply - he couldn't care less.
In fact, he "wouldn't mind if the House of Lords was abolished tomorrow".
In his first interview since his 67-year-old father died of a brain tumour last December, Lord Hertford says he doesn't see the point of Parliament's upper chamber.
Last June, he thought it would be at least 20 years before he inherited his father's title.
That's what he told Labour's International Development Minister Clare Short when she visited Ragley during an open day.
"I told her I thought it would be better if I were invited to sit in the Lords in recognition o say, services to agriculture rather than being able to take up some hereditary right," he said.
"She was interested in what little I had to say.
"I think she was also pleased I didn't scream at her and ask what the hell a load of Trotskyite so-and-sos thought they were playing at."
Since his father died, he has been inundated with requests to find out if he'll take his seat.
Just one party - the Tories - has asked which side he'd sit on.
"I wrote back saying that even if I did sit, it was unlikely I would sit with them," he says.
Despite that, two Tory peers - Lord Montagu and Christies' chairman Lord Hindlip - are to meet him at the Lords on Wednesday.
Both were friends of his father who was a very active - although maverick - Tory peer. He hit the headlines when he urged Conservatives in Enoch Powell's constituency to vote Labour in the 1970 General Election because he was so disgusted with Powell's views on immigration.
And months before his death he clashed publicly with William Hague about the Tory Party's abandonment of the hereditary principle.
But the Eton-educated former Grenadier Guard's first love was always Ragley.
In the 1950s and 60s, the house was virtually falling down.
At one point it was going to be demolished.
But Hertford senior helped turn it into the thriving estate it is today and was one of the first to open his house to the public.
He promoted it with gusto, earning himself the nickname of The Showman Peer.
He water-skiied on Ragley's lake at a time when few in Britain had ever seen the sport, dressed up as a Roman and even took part in a boxing match.
"My wife and I want to build on that lifetime's success," says Lord Hertford.
"Because of my father and what we've done over the last seven years, we can justifiably say that Ragley is an ongoing economic concern.
"The accountants may not agree but, as my father used to say, none of us would have been able to live here if we'd listened to all the professional advice we've been given."
He lives at Ragley with his 38-year-old Brazilian-born wife, Lady Beatriz, and their three children - Lady Gabriella, aged six, Lord Conway, aged three, and his son and heir, the five-year-old Earl of Yarmouth. A fourth child is due in July.
His mother used to live at Ragley until she and the 8th Marquess separated in 1991. She continues to live in another house on the estate.
"It was a very amicable split, they remained close friends until he died," says Lord Hertford.
"They just wanted to live apart."
He is only too aware of how lucky he is to be living at Ragley, where he says reality tends to stop at the gate.
He is also aware how lucky he is even to be alive.
He broke his neck in 1987 and was temporarily paralysed after a three-wheel buggy he was driving hit a rock, flipped over and landed on him.
In an earlier crash he narrowly avoided being decapitated after the MG Midget he was in skidded out of control and went underneath a stationary Land Rover. He was saved only by hurling himself into the empty front passenger seat.
In 1980 he had another miraculous escape when a car crashed into him, sending his own car flying through the air. It flipped over and landed on top of him, trapping him under it and ripping most of the skin off his face.
In many ways the accidents have been the making of him - they helped put his life into a different perspective.
He had a difficult childhood. Teachers at school refused to acknowledge the dyslexia from which he suffers. He was forced to spend virtually every Saturday afternoon writing out 5,000 times "I must spell properly".
The experience made him very bitter. By the time he went to Harrow public school, he says he was "unteachable".
"I was so anti-establishment that I wouldn't even join an anti-establishment group."
It was only on his 21st birthday that the responsibilities of being Ragley's heir dawned on him.
He intends to hand over control of the estate to his son when he turns 30.
"That's 25 years and counting," he says with a smile.
"Although I love this place dearly, I sometimes feel I am a prisoner marking off crosses on the wall."
He says he won't force Lord Yarmouth to take on Ragley and will support him in whatever he chooses - "even if he wants to be a journalist".
If he doesn't want Ragley, Lady Gabriella will be "welcome to it".
She is two years older than her brother, so that'll be two years off Lord Hertford's sentence...
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| Publication: | Sunday Mercury (Birmingham, England) |
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| Date: | Mar 29, 1998 |
| Words: | 1044 |
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