{{short description|Wife of Alec Douglas-Home}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}} {{Infobox person | honorific_prefix = The Right Honourable | name = The Lady Home of the Hirsel | image = Elizabeth Douglas-Home (retouched) 2.jpg | caption = Douglas-Home in 1963 | known_for = Spouse of the prime minister of the United Kingdom (1963–64) | birth_name = Elizabeth Hester Alington | birth_date = {{birth date|1909|11|6|df=yes}} | death_date = {{death date and age|1990|9|3|1909|11|6|df=yes}} | spouse = {{marriage|Alec Douglas-Home|3 October 1936}} | father = Cyril Alington | children = 4, including David, 15th {{avoid wrap|Earl of Home}} }}

'''Elizabeth Hester Douglas-Home, Baroness Home of the Hirsel''' ({{nee|'''Alington'''}}; 6 November 1909 – 3 September 1990) was the wife of British politician and prime minister Alec Douglas-Home.

==Biography== She was born Elizabeth Hester Alington,{{sfn|Hurd|2004|loc=under "Marriage and the Second World War"}} the second daughter of the Very Rev Cyril Alington{{sfn|Card|2004}}—headmaster of Shrewsbury School and Eton College successively, as well as chaplain to King George V{{sfn|Card|2004}}—and his wife, Hester Margaret Lyttelton, daughter of George Lyttelton, 4th Baron Lyttelton.{{sfn|Card|2004}} Elizabeth was the first woman to become a fellow (governor) of Eton.{{citation needed|date=July 2018}}

She married Alec Douglas-Home on 3 October 1936.{{sfn|Hurd|2004|loc=under "Marriage and the Second World War"}} Thanks to her husband acquiring and renouncing various titles, she had, according to ''The Guinness Book of Records'', more names successively in her lifetime than any other once-married, British-only woman.{{sfn|''Guinness Book of Records 1985''}}{{page needed|date=July 2018}}

The couple had four children: * Lady (Lavinia) Caroline Douglas-Home DL (b. 11 Oct 1937), who served as a Lady-in-Waiting to various members of the Royal Family * Lady Meriel Kathleen Douglas-Home (b. 27 Nov 1939), m. Adrian Darby, Bursar of Keble College, Oxford * Lady Diana Lucy Douglas-Home (18 Dec 1940 - 22 August 2024), m. James Wolfe Murray * David Alexander Cospatrick Douglas-Home, 15th Earl of Home (20 Nov 1943–22 Aug 2022).

She died on 3 September 1990 at the age of 80.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://homepages.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~hume/tree/26044.htm |title=Confirmation of birthname |website=RootsWeb |access-date=2 April 2016}}</ref> Her husband outlived her by just over five years.{{sfn|Hurd|2004|loc=under "Retirement"}} They had been married for nearly 54 years.

==References== {{reflist}}

==Bibliography== {{refbegin}} * {{cite book |first = Cherie |last = Blair |author-link = Cherie Blair |author2 = Cate Haste |author2-link = Cate Haste |year = 2005 |title = The Goldfish Bowl: Married to the Prime Minister 1955–1997 |publisher = Vintage |isbn = 978-0-09-946202-6 }} * {{cite ODNB |id=30379 |title=Alington, Cyril Argentine |first=Tim |last=Card |year=2004}} * {{cite book |ref={{harvid|Guinness Book of Records 1985}} |title=Guinness Book of Records 1985 |year=1985 |publisher=Guinness World Records Limited |publication-date=19 October 1984 |isbn=978-0-85112-419-3}} * {{cite ODNB |url=http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-60455/version/0 |title=Home, Alexander Frederick [Alec] Douglas-, fourteenth earl of Home and Baron Home of the Hirsel |first=Douglas |last=Hurd |authorlink=Douglas Hurd |year=2004 |freearticle=y}} {{refend}}

==External links== * {{commons-inline}} * {{NPG name}}

{{s-start}} {{s-other|Unofficial roles}} {{s-bef|before=Dorothy Macmillan}} {{s-ttl|title=Spouse of the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom|years=1963–1964}} {{s-aft|after=Mary Wilson}} {{s-end}}

{{Spouses of the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom}} {{Alec Douglas-Home|state=collapsed}} {{authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Douglas-Home, Elizabeth}} Category:1909 births Category:1990 deaths Category:20th-century British people Category:20th-century British women Category:Spouses of prime ministers of the United Kingdom Home of the Hirsel Home Category:Spouses of life peers Category:Wives of knights Category:Alec Douglas-Home Category:Burials in the Scottish Borders