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THE MAN WHO WAS GREENMANTLE
It is often said that Aubrey Herbert (d. 1923) was the inspiration for Sandy Arbuthnot in his
college friend John Buchan’s Greenmantle and other stories. Margaret Fitzherbert chose to
use the phrase The Man Who Was Greenmantle for her biography of her grandfather.
Aubrey Nigel Henry Molyneux Herbert was born in 1880 the second son of Henry Herbert,
4th earl of Carnarvon and his second wife, Elizabeth Howard. Despite being nearly blind he
obtained a first class honours degree in history, learnt some seven foreign languages including
Arabic, Turkish and Albanian, and became an MP, a diplomat and an intelligence officer. He
even found time to write poetry.
He travelled widely in the opening years of the 20th century. He travelled through the Balkans
and the Middle East, often dressed as a tramp, as well as Japan where he was a cultural
attaché in 1902—4 before moving to Constantinople. As a young Conservative MP for South
Somerset just before the First World War it was inevitable that he took an interest in foreign
affairs. His half-brother George, the 5th earl, discovered the tomb of Tutankhamun and
Aubrey corresponded with T E Lawrence. He was a passionate advocate of Albanian
independence, indeed he was so devoted to that country that he twice considered accepting an
offer to become king but before the war he was dissuaded by Herbert Asquith and in 1920
political changes in Albania would have made him an unpopular choice.
Aubrey was a very wealthy man, his mother gave him the Pixton Park estate (c. 5,000 a.) and
a villa at Portofino and his mother-in-law gave him a house in London. In 1910 at St James’s,
Piccadilly he married Mary, daughter of the 4th Viscount de Vesci and Evelyn [Charteris].
Her mother gave them a house in London. The couple became Roman Catholics. Among their
four children Laura married the writer Evelyn Waugh. The eldest son Auberon was named
after Aubrey’s favourite uncle.
During the war he joined the Irish Guards, despite his poor sight, and was wounded at Mons
but escaped capture. He joined military intelligence in Cairo and worked with Compton
Mackenzie in the Eastern Mediterranean. Later in the war he took charge of naval intelligence
in Mesopotamia and the Persian Gulf and on his return to England sought for a Royal
Commission on the Mesopotamian campaign. He continued with intelligence work including
negotiating with Turkey and Italy. He was raised to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel.
After the war military intelligence was transferred to Scotland Yard Special Branch and
Aubrey conducted foreign interviews as a Scotland Yard inspector. Later he became totally
blind and he was advised to have his teeth extracted. The operation resulted in blood
poisoning that killed him on 26 September 1923.
His extraordinary tomb in Brushford church carries an effigy of him in the manner of a
medieval knight, tall and slender as he had been in life. His copious correspondence, an
account of the war service in Turkey, and copies of his diaries are in the Somerset Record
Office.
Mary Suirat
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Mary Suirat
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