22 Facts About Ernest Tennant

Ernest William Dalrymple Tennant OBE was an English merchant banker and industrialist.

Ernest Tennant was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1919.

Ernest Tennant was associated with various financial institutions, including what is called the Bank Leumi in Israel.

Ernest Tennant was initially enthusiastic about Nazism and in 1933 his article "Herr Hitler and His Policy: March 1933" was published in Douglas Francis Jerrold's The English Review, a journal that was otherwise sceptical about the Nazis despite largely admiring Italian fascism.

Ernest Tennant wrote again for the journal in January 1935, claiming in his article "Herr Hitler's Constructive Policy" that many of the stories of Nazi excesses that appeared in the British press were exaggerations and part of "a smoke-screen of anti-Hitler propaganda".

Ernest Tennant accompanied Paul Rykens and Montagu Norman on trips to Germany and was, along with Lord Rothermere, Esmond Harmsworth and George Ward Price, one of four guests of honour at a banquet thrown by Hitler on 19 December 1934.

Davidson, Ernest Tennant was able to arrange a meeting between von Ribbentrop and Lord President of the Council Stanley Baldwin in November 1934.

Accounts of the meeting vary, with Ernest Tennant claiming that Baldwin liked von Ribbentrop but Davidson suggesting the opposite.

Ernest Tennant attempted to use the meeting as a basis for a Baldwin visit to Germany but, after some consideration, he declined the invitation and sent his Parliamentary Private Secretary Geoffrey Lloyd in his stead, a decision that Hitler interpreted as a snub.

Ernest Tennant was able to arrange another meeting between von Ribbentrop and Baldwin in February 1935 but this was an altogether frostier affair, with Ernest Tennant condemning Baldwin roundly for what he considered the future Prime Minister's lack of diplomacy.

Ernest Tennant dined with von Ribbentrop and several British businessmen at the Savoy Hotel on 26 November 1934 at which they decided to organise the pro-German interests on a more formal basis.

Ernest Tennant was appointed the first secretary of the new group.

Ernest Tennant was a prominent financier of the AGF and following its formation he was recognised as the main driving force behind the group, which for a time enjoyed widespread influence in the higher echelons of British society.

Ernest Tennant was for a time close to Richard Meinertzhagen, having met him through his father and brother, both of whom were merchant banking colleagues of Tennant.

Ernest Tennant was one of a group of prominent Britons who attended the Nuremberg rally in 1935.

Ernest Tennant was not a convinced Nazi and as early as 1935 had acknowledged that Nazi antisemitism was a source of embarrassment to those in the UK advocating closer links to Germany.

Ernest Tennant added that he intended not to listen to any specifically anti-Jewish speeches delivered at the rallies.

Ernest Tennant helped to facilitate David Lloyd George's visit to Germany the same year, with the former Prime Minister subsequently writing a favourable tribute to Hitler after the visit.

Ernest Tennant initially accepted the German justification for their activities in central Europe - that they were merely safeguarding German minority populations - and wrote to The Times in defence of the march into the Rhineland in 1936.

Ernest Tennant was still keen to stress however that he was not a Nazi, and rejected membership of the Link when it was established in 1937, reasoning that the group was too pro-Nazi.

Ernest Tennant was one of a number of leading pro-German Britons sent to Germany clandestinely with the approval of the British government in 1939 in an attempt to avoid war by conversing with Nazis considered sympathetic to the UK.

Ernest Tennant married Eleonora Fiaschi on 11 April 1912 and the couple had four children together before divorcing.