George Bingham, 6th Earl of Lucan

Who was George Bingham, 6th Earl of Lucan?

George Charles Patrick Bingham, 6th Earl of Lucan MC, known as Lord Bingham from 1914 to 1949, was an Irish peer, British soldier and Labour politician.

Pat Lucan was the eldest son of The 5th Earl of Lucan and his wife, Violet Sylvia Blanche, daughter of J. Spender Clay. He was educated at Eton College and at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst. He was a Colonel in the Coldstream Guards and commanded the 1st Battalion of the regiment from 1940 to 1942 during the Second World War. From 1942 to 1945 he was Deputy Director for Ground Defence in the Air Ministry. He succeeded his father in the earldom in 1949 and took his seat on the Labour benches in the House of Lords. Lord Lucan served under Clement Attlee as Captain of the Yeomen of the Guard from 1950 to 1951 and as Under-Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations in 1951. Between 1954 and 1964 he was Chief Opposition Whip in the House of Lords.

Lord Lucan married Kaitlin Elizabeth Anne, daughter of Captain The Hon. Edward Stanley Dawson, in 1929. They had two sons and two daughters. He died in January 1964, aged 65, and was succeeded in the earldom by his eldest son Richard John Bingham, who became famous for his sudden disappearance in 1974. The Dowager Lady Lucan died in 1985.