Colin Thornton-Kemsley


Sir Colin Norman Thornton-Kemsley, was a Conservative and National Liberal politician in the United Kingdom. He was the Member of Parliament for Kincardine and Western Aberdeenshire from 1939 to 1950, and for North Angus and Mearns from 1950 until his retirement at the 1964 general election.

Early life

Thornton-Kemsley was born in 1903 and grew up in a London suburb. He was educated at Chigwell School, and graduated from Wadham College, Oxford.
Whilst he had a Scottish grandfather, he had no real connection to Scotland until 1930, when he married Alice Thornton; his second cousin and the granddaughter of the prominent Dundee lawyer Sir Thomas Thornton. Thomas Thornton had purchased Thornton castle in Kincardineshire in 1893, and at the time of the wedding Thornton was the owner and resident of the property.

Political career

Thornton-Kemsley was an active member of the Conservative constituency association for the London suburb of Epping, where he lived. He also served as the Honorary Treasurer of Essex and Middlesex Provincial Area, National Union of Conservative and Unionist Associations. As a member of the Epping constituency party he made a name for himself in Conservative Party circles as a Neville Chamberlain loyalist who was central to bringing about a censure of Winston Churchill by the Epping Conservative Association.
In 1939 Malcolm Barclay-Harvey, the incumbent Unionist Member of Parliament for Kincardine and Western Aberdeenshire, was offered the position of Governor of South Australia. Thornton-Kemsley, due to his previous role in trying to bringing about a censure of Winston Churchill by the Epping Conservative Association, was offered the candidacy.