14 Facts About Humphry Berkeley

Humphry John Berkeley was a British politician and author.

Humphry Berkeley was noted for his three changes of parties and his early support for gay rights.

Humphry Berkeley was born on 21 February 1926, at Marlow, Buckinghamshire.

Humphry Berkeley attended Malvern College followed by Pembroke College, Cambridge, and was President of both the Cambridge Union Society and Cambridge University Conservative Association in 1948.

Humphry Berkeley knew Rab Butler, who arranged a job for him at Conservative Central Office during this time; Butler advised him to keep the hoax letters and their replies safely, and publish them a quarter of a century later.

Humphry Berkeley established his own public relations company and became head of publicity and public relations for a group of civil engineering companies.

Humphry Berkeley was a strong internationalist who supported the work of the United Nations; his father had supported the League of Nations.

Humphry Berkeley served on the Parliamentary Assembly of the Western European Union and the Council of Europe from 1963.

When he won second place in the ballot for Private Member's Bills in 1965, Humphry Berkeley decided to introduce a bill to legalise male homosexual relations along the lines of the Wolfenden report.

Indeed, according to a 2007 article published in The Observer, Humphry Berkeley was well known to his colleagues as a homosexual, and not much liked.

Humphry Berkeley's Bill was given a second reading by 164 to 107 on 11 February 1966, but fell when Parliament was dissolved soon after.

Unexpectedly, Humphry Berkeley lost his seat in the 1966 general election, and ascribed his defeat to the unpopularity of his bill on homosexuality.

Out of Parliament, Humphry Berkeley took a job as chairman of the United Nations Association.

Humphry Berkeley then spent time apparently working as a roving ambassador of the now defunct Republic of Transkei, a bantustan, until he was abducted one night in February 1979 while dining at the Umtata Holiday Inn, and assaulted on the side of a road, put into the boot of a car, and dumped over the border at Kei Bridge.