Aubrey Herbert: Remembering The Man Who Was Greenmantle

 

Remembering Aubrey Herbert At The Centenary

Of His Death

                                  Aubrey Nigel Henry Molyneux Herbert 

                                                    1880–1923

Aubrey Herbert died 100 years ago today, 26 September 1923, five months after his revered half-brother Porchy - George Herbert,  5th Earl of Carnarvon- the discoverer with Howard Carter of the Tomb of Tutankhamun.

 

Despite being born near blind Aubrey overcame his medical condition to lead a full life, but ironically died after a botched operation to restore his sight resulted in blood poisoning.

 

A very fine and courageous man, one of the last adventurers, an accomplished traveller, expert on the Middle East ( especially of Turkey and the Balkans) and a notable politician before and after the Great War.

 

John Buchan modelled the character Ludovick Gustavus Arbuthnot better known as ‘Sandy’ Arbuthnot the side kick of the famous Richard Hannay (of ‘ The 39 Steps’ fame) around Aubrey Herbert in the superb spy novel “ Greenmantle”.

 

A friend of Albania, as was his dear mother, Elizabeth, 4th Countess of Carnarvon, he argued for that small nation’s independence – and was offered the country’s crown - twice.

 

His sister in law Almina, 5th Countess of Carnarvon treasured and adored him and was secretly in love with him. In 1911 she vigorously campaigned for him to win as the Member of Parliament for South Somerset & she nursed him at Highclere Military Hospital in WW1 and saved him from the near death wounds he’d received in battle.

 

A master of disguise ( just like Sandy Arbuthnot) best illustrated at the outbreak of the First World War, when Aubrey joined the Irish Guards- despite his near blindness - by simply buying himself a second lieutenant's uniform and falling in as the Regiment boarded their ship for France.

 

Aubrey’s legacy remains – with surviving descendants ( produced with a formidable wife, Mary Vesey, who lived until 1970) and there’s a good biography of him by his granddaughter Margaret Fitzherbert under the title “The Man Who Was Greenmantle.”

Aubrey's Herbert line is almost certainly  the TRUE succession blood line to the title "Earldom of Carnarvon" since the 6th Earl of Carnarvon was the son of Prince Victor Duleep Singh. 

Aubrey Herbert was a friend of TE Lawrence ( of Arabia fame) and when Aubrey was re-elected to his Somerset Parliamentary seat in 1922 Lawrence quipped

 “ I note your re-election by your usual absurd majority which of course you would get if you declared yourself a Bolshevik or a Wee Free or a Prohibitionist or a Mormon.”

 

We shall not ever see his like again.

 

William Cross, FSA Scot

William Cross is the biographer of Almina, Countess of Carnarvon and several books on the Carnarvons of Highclere Castle.

 Contact him by email

williecross@aol.com

THE MAN WHO WAS GREENMANTLE

Aubrey's Effigy & Tomb At Brushford Church, Somerset

The Curse Of Tutankhamun : From William Cross, FSA Scot.

Carnarvon - Tutankhamun and Howard Carter

Howard  Carter’s view of the so called curse of Tutankhamun  was summed up by him  in one  word,  ‘Tommyrot’.  

It was something man made and encouraged by local Egyptians  whose heritage was being removed by foreigners all around them,  coupled with daft stories  fuelled  by journalists fighting for a good headline.  

After  1922 there were  several deaths of folk caught up in the Tutankhamun tale, the curse was introduced and hysteria and human playfulness  set  it to work.

Lord Carnarvon’s death (from throat cancer) was inevitable, it was inconvenient and had to be  staged managed. 

Some of the other demises attributed to the curse were  exaggerated   odd-ball, they  were not well enough explained or  facts were taken liberty with,  but nothing of this was  owing to any curse from the ancients.  Causes of death are often secret or  bizarre and complicated by circumstances of  fate and madness or even  medical incompetence. 

Many of those folk who feature  in the King Tut  story were affected by family secrets,  bad habits, poor health and incautious living. The hot climate of  Egypt  affected many of them  more so than any curse acting to strike them down dead.  

Howard Carter lived and ate, slept and worked constantly  in the tombs in Egypt  for many years,  he was not afraid or needed to be afraid of curses, he was more concerned with avoiding disease and taking sufficient respite and drinking enough whisky to  blot out  a hard day’s graft and  ease his  fragile body frame!

Moreover Carter did not subscribe to the stories ( fostered even by some  academics)  about  so called warning  signs  being present  for  him and Carnarvon  or threats being  given. Carter deemed these  the work of  troublemakers. 

There are no warnings in old writing texts  that Carter considered  wary,  or dangerous,   or fearsome  other than those from and by errant priests to  warn off  grave robbers, thieves and the gullible. There was  certainly no threatening  sign of death will come etc  to those who disturb the tomb. Nothing  like this was found  in or above the tomb  or evidence of intervention by the gods, the crazy things cited were only of acts that were the work of human hands. 

The cobra that consumed Carter’s canary, the lights going out in Cairo as Carnarvon died, a dog  howling and  perishing at the same moment  at Highclere  Castle.  These are  all fictions or have scanty facts dressed up as true.   All a charade,  the work of hacks planting and keeping going a story,  that began with  the Cairo correspondent of Reuters News Agency making world  news with  the so called insect bite affecting Carnarvon  rather  than revealing the true story of  Carnarvon being in extremis with a  terminal illness.  

Ploys by news agencies like Reuters  were to deflect attention away from the real crisis of Carnarvon being doomed, especially with so much money at stake with media deals etc  All this chaos and crisis caused Almina’s daughter Lady Evelyn  Herbert ( acting as the Earl's nurse)  to panic, Carter was at loggerheads with the Carnarvons and turned his back on his patron,  and Almina ( Carnarvon's wife)  rushed to her husband’s bedside to aid his passage into peace and oblivion.

All that said Lord Carnarvon was superstitious by nature  and had a keen perception of all the  ancient myths, however  his vaulting ambition to make money from the tomb overcame his fears. 

Carnarvon, Carter and Tutankhamun's lives were all cursed, they were affected personally and across  their overlapping lives  on more down to earth factors, on account of bad genes, inbreeding and  trauma during their development years. This blighted them and made them the people that they were, three dysfunctional adults.

But all that said no one can take away the glory of  Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon being celebrated this year, 100 years after 1922 for discovering the great tomb of Tutankhamun. 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT THE AUTHOR WILLIAM CROSS  

   email  williecross@aol.com

NB William Cross's latest book written for the centenary of 2022  is entitled  "Lies, Damned Lies and the Carnarvons" and challenges many of the landmark events in the story of the discovery of Tutankhamun. 

"Lies, Damned Lies and the Carnarvons"
From William Cross, FSA Scot