The Full Monty

[steepholm]

As part of my ongoing-yet-desultory family researches, I took receipt today (via ABEbooks) of a book about the time of Henry Montagu Butler as Master of Trinity, Cambridge from 1886-1918. It was written by one of his sons, and published in 1925. (In case you're wondering, HMB was first cousin of my great-great-grandfather Thomas.)

I've not had a chance to look at it properly yet, but when I opened it I noticed on the first page a large signature, in pencil, reading "Monty Butler".



Montagu is a common family name (my grandfather was yet another), so I assume that this book belonged to a relation of mine - and besides, who else would want to read it? Looking through my family tree, however, the only Montagu I can find of the right date (apart from my grandfather, who always went by Christie) is HMB's nephew, Montagu Sherard Dawes Butler, whom I could show you looking slightly less weird but can't resist displaying in his full regalia as President of the Bombay Legislature (1921-22):



Montagu (or Monty?) Sherard Dawes Butler is known today, if for anything, as the father of R. A. Butler, the Conservative politician. To be honest, he doesn't look like the kind of unbuttoned person who would sign his books in pencil. Is there another Montagu I've missed? Was this a way of signalling his lack of interest in Uncle Henry's achievements? Or did the book belong, after all, to some quite unrelated Butler? If I find any further clues within, I shall post them here.

Comments

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

I'm guessing a nickname that isn't necessarily related to a first name, but look forward to finding out!

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Also, I forgot to consider the author of the book, James Ramsay Montagu Butler. Might he have been known as Monty, just as my grandfather Montagu Christie Butler was known as Christie? It's a possibility - in which case he was perhaps signing it as author rather than as owner.

Where's a Capulet when you need one?

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I was thinking something like that.

[heleninwales.livejournal.com]

I also wondered whether it was a "signed by the author" signature rather then a "this is my book" signature.

[drasecretcampus.livejournal.com]

Where were your Butlers based again? I seem to have tracked mine to Chatham (and the Newington Workhouse).

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Claines in Worcestershire seems to be their base, as far as I can track them back.

[gillpolack.livejournal.com]

Montague was one of my family names, too. My fahter's middle name, my great-uncle's first name: it suddenly fell out of fashion, though and there are no Montys anymore.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Yes, the only unrelated Monty I knew died back in 2006 or so, full of years. The Butler version, for reasons that remain obscure, has no final 'e'.

[gillpolack.livejournal.com]

I don't know whether I should say that the Polack version is more pretentious or that obviously my rellos are the full Monty. I suspect I should say neither.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Ah, it's too late now!

[calimac.livejournal.com]

I should have guessed that you were somehow related to old Rab. At which point I can drop in the fact that I once wrote an article on "R.A. Butler and the Inklings."

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

He's my third cousin twice removed, so not terribly closely related, but still - what was its gist? I didn't know he had any doings with the Inklings at all.

[calimac.livejournal.com]

The fact that Rab's name kept cropping up unexpectedly in Inklings contexts is what inspired me to write the article.

The only real personal relationship was that, as President of the RSL, he personally presented Tolkien with the A.C. Benson Medal in 1967. It does not sound from Rab's recorded remarks on that occasion that he had any idea what his recipient was being honored for.

It's more tenuous to note that his sister Dorothy was married to the brother-in-law of the Inkling R.E. Havard. Jack and Warnie Lewis met her at a dinner at Havard's house, and apparently she, or someone, managed to name-drop her connection to Rab in the conversation, because Warnie was impressed enough to mention it in his diary.

Less personally, when reading about the succession crisis of 1957, I recall that Salisbury was the brother of the Inkling Lord David Cecil.

And lastly, the author of the Butler Act is going to have a major impact on the lives of any Oxford dons of the time.

[cmcmck.livejournal.com]

You are so posh that I feel the urge to touch a forelock if I knew where to find one. :o)

Common as muck me-a genuine pit brow girl. The nearest I get is being related to the chap wot invented 'Snape's Patent Wholemeal Bread' (they call it Hovis these days).

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Ah, that branch of the family is much posher than mine, alas! The split comes back in the late 18th century, when there are two brothers. One, George, is Senior Wrangler, charismatic and athletic, becomes head of Harrow and Dean of Peterborough, goes on to spawn a family of academic, political and legal superstars (including HMB), and counts both Francis Galton and Josephine Butler amongst his children-in-law.

The elder brother, Weeden (like their father), takes over the school where they grew up in Chelsea, but he's widowed and loses a favourite son in quick succession, and succumbs to depression; the school falters and is sold; the family begins its long slide into genteel poverty - and beyond! That, combined with a tendency to eccentricity, has led inexorably to yours truly.

Hovis, on the other hand, is something to be proud of! *whistles New World Symphony*

[cmcmck.livejournal.com]

I love that term 'Senior Wrangler' (as does TP of course :o)

Eccentricity I can put up with- I class as eccentric aunt to quite a tribe of nephews and nieces!

That member of the Staffordshire Snapes sold out the rights to his invention and then proceeded to squander the proceeds. The nearest I get to posh is another Snape Grand Uncle who was publican of the Waldorf in Stafford. Hey! Perhaps I'm related to Prof Snape?

'We used ter dream of living in a shoebox'...............