Lee of Fareham, Viscount (Arthur Hamilton Lee), 1868-1947

Born, Bridport, 1868; educated at Cheltenham College, Royal Military Academy, Woolwich; joined the Royal Artillery 1888; served in China, earning high commendation from the War Office, 1889-1890; Professor of Strategy and Tactics, Royal Military College, Kingston, Canada, 1893-1898; organised Military Survey of the Canadian Frontier, 1894-1896; appointed British military attach with the US Army during the Spanish-American war, 1898; honorary member of Roosevelt's Rough Riders, and became a close friend of Theodore Roosevelt; military attach in Washington, USA, 1899; returned to England and retired from the army, 1900; Conservative MP for Fareham, Hampshire, 1900-1918; joined the Board of Admiralty as a civil lord, 1903-1905; introduced and promoted the White Slave Traffic Act through Parliament, 1912; rejoined the army as a colonel on the staff, 1914; detailed for special service with the Expeditionary Forces and mentioned in despatches twice; Parliamentary Military Secretary, Ministry of Munitions, 1915-1916; knighted, 1916 (KCB); Personal Military Secretary to the Secretary of State for War (Lloyd George), 1916; Director-General of Food Production, 1917-1918, in recognition of his work made Baron Lee of Fareham; Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, 1919-1921; First Lord of the Admiralty, 1921-1922; British Delegate to the Washington Conference on reduction and limitation of arms, 1921-1922; Viscount, 1922; presided over three Royal Commissions, the Civil Service in India, 1923-1924, London Cross-River Traffic, 1926, and Police Powers and Procedure, 1928; Chairman of the Radium Commission and Trustee of the National Radium Fund 1929-1933; President of Cheltenham College, 1917-1940; Trustee of the Wallace Collection, 1924; Trustee of the National Gallery, 1926-1933, 1941-1947 (chairman 1931 and 1932); member of the Royal Fine Art Commission, 1926 and Deputy Chairman, 1940; member, Executive Committee of National Art Collections Fund; Chairman, Management Committee of the Courtauld Institute of Art, 1932-1937; Chairman, Warburg Library and Institute, 1933-1945; restored and furnished the Chequers Estate, which he gave to the Nation, 1921; bequeathed his art collection to the Courtauld Institute of Art; died, Gloucestershire, 1947. Publications: The English Heritage Series joint editor (Longmans & Co, London, 1929-)

From the guide to the LEE, Arthur Hamilton, Viscount Lee of Fareham (1868-1947), [1878-1954], (Courtauld Institute of Art)