Harold Watkinson
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The Right Honourable The Viscount Watkinson CH PC |
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|---|---|
 |
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| Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation | |
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In office 20 December 1955 – 14 October 1959 |
|
| Monarch | Elizabeth II |
| Prime Minister |
Sir Anthony Eden Harold Macmillan |
| Preceded by | John Boyd-Carpenter |
| Succeeded by | Ernest Marples |
| Minister of Defence | |
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In office 14 October 1959 – 13 July 1962 |
|
| Monarch | Elizabeth II |
| Prime Minister | Harold Macmillan |
| Preceded by | Duncan Sandys |
| Succeeded by | Peter Thorneycroft |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 25 January 1910 |
| Died | 19 December 1995 (aged 85) |
| Nationality | British |
| Political party | Conservative |
| Alma mater | King's College London |
Harold Arthur Watkinson, 1st Viscount Watkinson, CH, PC (25 January 1910, in Walton on Thames – 19 December 1995, in Bosham) was a British businessman and Conservative Party politician. He was Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation between 1955 and 1959 and a cabinet member as Minister of Defence between 1959 and 1962, when he was sacked in the Night of the Long Knives. In 1964 he was ennobled as Viscount Watkinson.
Educated at Queen's College, Taunton, and at King's College London, Watkinson worked for the family engineering business between 1929 and 1935 and in technical and engineering journalism between 1935 and 1939. He saw active service as a Lieutenant-Commander in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve during the Second World War.
Watkinson was elected Member of Parliament (MP) for the new constituency of Woking, Surrey in 1950, holding the seat until 1964, and was initially Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to the Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation, John Maclay, from 1951 to 1952. He became a government member under Winston Churchill as Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour and National Service in 1952, a post he held until December 1955, when he was made Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation by Sir Anthony Eden, entering the cabinet in January 1957, and remaining there when promoted to Minister of Defence under Harold Macmillan in 1959. Watkinson was one of seven cabinet ministers sacked in July 1962 in Macmillan's Night of the Long Knives. He was appointed a Privy Counsellor in 1955, a Companion of Honour in 1962, and raised to the peerage as Viscount Watkinson, of Woking in the County of Surrey, in 1964.
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