Shane Leslie

{{Short description|Anglo-Irish diplomat and writer (1885–1971)}} {{Similar names|John Leslie (disambiguation){{!}}John Leslie}} {{EngvarB|date=November 2013}} {{Use dmy dates|date=December 2023}} {{Infobox person | name = Sir John Randolph Leslie, 3rd Baronet | image = Shane Leslie LCCN2014686812 (cropped).jpg | imagesize = | caption = | birth_date = {{birth date|1885|09|24|df=y}} | birth_place = [[Castle Leslie]], County Monaghan, Ireland | death_date = {{death date and age|1971|08|14|1885|09|24|df=y}} | death_place = 15b Palmeira Court, [[Hove]], [[East Sussex]], England | father = [[Sir John Leslie, 2nd Baronet]] | mother = Leonie Jerome | spouse = {{marriage|Marjorie Ide|11 June 1912|8 February 1951|end=died}} {{marriage|Iris Frazer|30 May 1958}} | children = 3 | relatives = [[Anita Theodosia Moira Rodzianko King|Anita Leslie]] (daughter) [[Sir John Leslie, 4th Baronet|John Leslie]] (son) [[Desmond Leslie]] (son) [[Leonard W. Jerome]] (maternal grandfather) [[Jennie Churchill]] (aunt) [[Winston Churchill|Sir Winston Churchill]] (1st cousin) [[Henry Clay Ide]] (father-in-law) | education = [[Ludgrove School]] [[Eton College]] | alma_mater = [[King's College, Cambridge]] | occupation = Writer, diplomat, [[Literary criticism|literary critic]], public speaker | nationality = | module = {{Infobox writer | embed = yes | genre = Novel, biography, translation, [[criticism]] | notableworks = ''The Cantab'' }} }}

'''Sir John Randolph Leslie, 3rd Baronet''' (24 September 1885 – 14 August 1971),<ref>{{Cite book|last=Rauchbauer|first=Otto|title=Shane Leslie: Sublime Failure|publisher=[[Liliput Press]]|year=2009|isbn=9781843511564|location=Dublin|pages=}}</ref> commonly known by his nickname, '''Shane Leslie''', was an [[Anglo-Irish people|Anglo-Irish]] diplomat and writer.<ref>{{cite book|last=Leslie|first=Shane|title=[[Maria Anne Fitzherbert|Mrs. Fitzherbert]] A Life. Chiefly from Unpublished Sources|year = 1939|publisher=Burns Oates|asin=B0006D99I0}}</ref> He was a first cousin of [[Winston Churchill|Sir Winston Churchill]]. In 1908, Leslie became a [[Catholic Church|Roman Catholic]] and supported [[Irish Home Rule]].

==Childhood and education== Leslie was born in [[Glaslough]], [[County Monaghan]], into a wealthy [[Anglo-Irish]] landowning family (49,968 acres). His father was [[Sir John Leslie, 2nd Baronet]], and his mother, Leonie Jerome, was the sister of Winston Churchill's mother, [[Jennie Churchill|Jennie]]. Both were daughters of [[Leonard W. Jerome]]. His ancestor, the [[The Right Reverend|Right Reverend]] [[John Leslie (bishop of Clogher)|John Leslie]], [[Bishop of the Isles]], moved from [[Scotland]] to Ireland in 1633 when he was made [[Bishop of Raphoe]] in [[County Donegal]] and was made [[Bishop of Clogher]] in 1661.<ref>''[[Burke's Peerage]]''</ref> Bishop Leslie was a vocal opponent of [[Oliver Cromwell]].{{Citation needed|date=December 2010}}

Together with his brother Norman, Leslie's early education began at home where a German governess, Clara Woelke, was their first teacher.<ref>{{cite book|last=Dooley|first=Terence|title=The Decline of the Big House in Ireland|year=2001|publisher=Wolfound Press Ltd|isbn=0-86327-850-7}}</ref> As children the brothers had more contact with servants than they had with their parents. Leslie's own daughter, Anita, said that "In my parents' view schools performed the same functions that kennels did for dogs. They were places where pets could be conveniently deposited while their owners travelled."<ref>{{Cite book |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/giltgingerbreada0000lesl/page/68/mode/1up |title=The Gilt and the Gingerbread: an Autobiography |chapter=Curious Schooldays |first=Anita |last=Leslie |publisher=[[Hutchinson Heinemann|Hutchinson]] |isbn=0091456304 |page=68 |date=1981 |access-date=2024-06-21 |via=Internet Archive |chapter-url-access=registration}}</ref>

Leslie was educated at [[Ludgrove School]], then [[Eton College]] and [[King's College, Cambridge]]. While at [[Cambridge University]] he became a [[Catholic Church|Roman Catholic]] and a supporter of [[Irish Home Rule]]. He adopted an anglicised Irish variant of his name ("Shane"). Not overly impressed by Eton, Leslie refused to send his own sons there. They were educated at Roman Catholic Benedictine schools: Jack at [[Downside School]] and Desmond at [[Ampleforth College]].{{citation needed|date=June 2017}}

==Adult life== In the [[January 1910 United Kingdom general election|January 1910 general election]] Leslie stood as the [[Irish Parliamentary Party]] candidate for the [[Londonderry City (UK Parliament constituency)#Elections in the 1910s|Londonderry City]] division, losing by just 57 votes. In the second general election later that year he was again narrowly defeated by the Unionist candidate.

Before [[World War I]], Leslie travelled extensively<ref>{{cite book|last=Leslie|first=Shane|title=American wonderland: Memories of four tours in the United States of America (1911–1935)|publisher=M Joseph Ltd|year=1936|asin=B00085VWEU}}</ref> and in 1912 he married Marjorie Ide, the youngest daughter of [[Henry Clay Ide]], then United States ambassador to Spain and former Governor-General of the [[Philippines]]. His parents and other family members moved temporarily to London at the outbreak of war.

During the war he was in a British Ambulance Corps, until invalided out; he was then sent to Washington, D.C. to help the British Ambassador, Sir [[Cecil Spring Rice]], soften Irish-American hostility towards England and obtain American intervention in the war in the aftermath of the 1916 [[Easter Rising]] in Dublin and the execution of its leaders. But he also looked to Ireland for inspiration when writing and edited a literary magazine that contained much Irish verse. He became a supporter of the ideals of [[Irish nationalism]],  although not physical force republicanism.

In the [[1918 United Kingdom general election in Ireland|1918 election]] the [[Irish Parliamentary Party]] lost massively to [[Sinn Féin]], putting an end to Shane Leslie's political career, but as the first cousin of [[Winston Churchill]] he remained a primary witness to much that was said and done outside the official record during the negotiation of the [[Anglo-Irish Treaty]] of 1921. Disappointed, he felt unwanted in Ireland and abandoned by the British. Like many members of the landed gentry from the 1880s who were obliged to turn to other occupations, he could no longer rely on income from landholdings.

He wrote extensively, in a wide range of styles, in verse, prose, and polemic, over several decades. His writings include ''The End of a Chapter'' (1916),<ref>[https://archive.org/details/endofchapter01lesl/page/n9/mode/2up Archive.org: ''The End of a Chapter'' by Leslie, Shane, 1885-1971]</ref> while hospitalised during the [[Great War]], ''The Oppidan'' (1922), a [[roman à clef]] about his life and contemporaries at Eton, an edition of the ''Letters of [[Herbert Cardinal Vaughan]] to [[Elizabeth Herbert, Baroness Herbert of Lea|Lady Herbert of Lea]]'' (1942), and a biography ''[[Mrs Fitzherbert]]: a life chiefly from unpublished sources'' (1939), together with an edition of her letters (with Maria Anne Fitzherbert), ''The letters of Mrs Fitzherbert and connected papers; being the second volume of the life of Mrs. Fitzherbert'' (1944). He also wrote ''[[Mark Sykes]]: His Life and Letters'' (1923), a biography of the English traveller, Conservative Party politician and diplomatic advisor. He advised budding novelist Scott Fitzgerald on the title of his 1st novel, they shared correspondence with the future Mnsg William A Hemmick who was Fitzgerald's teacher at the now shut Newman School.

A passionate advocate of reforestation, {{Citation needed|date=December 2010}} he found the business of running an estate uncreative and boring, and transferred the estate entailed to him to his eldest son, John Norman Leslie, who succeeded as the 4th Baronet. He transferred [[St Patrick's Purgatory]] on [[Lough Derg (Donegal)|Lough Derg]] to the Roman Catholic [[Bishop of Clogher]], [[Eugene O'Callaghan]].

The wealth of the Leslies had waned by the 1930s following the [[Wall Street crash]] of 1929 and a farm that was loss making. In his unpublished memoirs, he wrote "a gentleman's standing in his world was signalled by his list of clubs and it was worth paying hundreds of pounds in subs". They continued to maintain their lifestyle, involving attendance at the London season and the entertainment of distinguished visitors, including [[Anthony Eden]] at Glaslough. At the outbreak of [[World War II]] in 1939 he joined the [[British Home Guard|Home Guard]]. He spent the remainder of his life between Glaslough and London.

==Family== He was the elder son of [[Leslie Baronets|Sir John Leslie, 2nd Baronet]], and Leonie Blanche Jerome. He married, firstly, Marjorie Ide, daughter of General [[Henry Clay Ide]], on 11 June 1912 and had two sons and one daughter:

*[[Anita Theodosia Moira Rodzianko King]] (21 November 1914 – 5 November 1985), novelist and biographer; was married (secondly) to Commander [[William King (Royal Navy officer)|Bill King]], World War II submarine commander and yachtsman; had two children; friend of [[Hazel Lavery]] who was reputedly a [[Extramarital sex|paramour]] of [[Michael Collins (Irish leader)|Michael Collins]]. *[[Sir John Leslie, 4th Baronet|Sir John Norman Ide Leslie, 4th Baronet]] (6 December 1916 – 18 April 2016), popularly known as ''Sir Jack Leslie'', never married or sired children. *[[Desmond Leslie|Desmond Arthur Peter Leslie]] (29 June 1921 – 21 February 2001).

His first wife Marjorie died on 8 February 1951. On 30 May 1958 at the Catholic Church of St Peter & Edward, Westminster, Shane Leslie (72) married [[Iris Carola Laing | Mrs Iris Carola Frazer]] (55), who was the daughter of Charles Miskin Laing and [[Etheldreda Janet Laing]].<ref>''Evening Standard'', 30 May 1958</ref>

He died at 15b Palmeira Court, Hove, Sussex on 14 April 1971, aged 85 and a requiem mass was held for him in Westminster Cathedral on 12 October 1971.

==See also== * [[Bill King (Royal Navy officer)|Commander Bill King]]

==References== {{reflist}}

==External links== {{Commons category}} *[https://archive.today/20070929020553/http://www.nmgk.org/leslie/ The Shane Leslie Biography Project] *{{ISFDB name}} *[https://archivesearch.lib.cam.ac.uk/repositories/9/resources/1840 "The Shane Leslie-Godfrey Faussett Archive"] held at [[Churchill Archives Centre]]

{{s-start}} {{s-reg|uk-bt}} {{s-bef|before=[[Sir John Leslie, 2nd Bt.|John Leslie]]}} {{s-ttl|title=[[Leslie Baronets|Baronet]] '''(of Glaslough)'''|years=1944–1971}} {{s-aft|after=[[Sir John Leslie, 4th Baronet|John Leslie]]}} {{s-end}} {{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Leslie, Shane}} [[Category:1885 births]] [[Category:1971 deaths]] [[Category:20th-century Irish poets]] [[Category:Alumni of King's College, Cambridge]] [[Category:Anglo-Irish poets]] [[Category:Converts to Roman Catholicism from Anglicanism]] [[Category:Irish people of Scottish descent]] [[Category:Irish poets]] [[Category:Leslie baronets, of Glaslough|3]] [[Category:People educated at Eton College]] [[Category:People educated at Ludgrove School]] [[Category:Writers from County Monaghan]]