Oliver Ridsdale Baldwin, 2nd Earl Baldwin of Bewdley

The Right Honourable The Earl Baldwin of Bewdley
Baldwin as an officer of the Armenian army, 1920
Member of Parliament for Dudley
In office 1929–1931
Preceded by	Joseph Maclay
Succeeded by	Dudley Jack Barnato Joel
Member of Parliament for Paisley
In office 1945–1947
Preceded by	Cyril Edward Lloyd
Succeeded by	Douglas Johnston
Personal details
Born	(1899-03-01)1 March 1899 Astley Hall, Worcestershire, England
Died	10 August 1958(1958-08-10) (aged 59) Mile End, London, England
Political party	Labour

Oliver Ridsdale Baldwin, 2nd Earl Baldwin of Bewdley (1 March 1899 – 10 August 1958), known as Viscount Corvedale from 1937 to 1947, was a British socialist politician who had a career at political odds with his father, the Conservative prime minister Stanley Baldwin.

Educated at Eton, which he hated, Baldwin left as soon as he could. After serving in the army during the First World War he undertook various jobs, including a brief appointment as an officer in the Armenian army, and wrote journalism and books on a range of topics. He served two terms as a Labour Member of Parliament between 1929 and 1947.

Baldwin never achieved ministerial office in Britain. His last post was as Governor of the Leeward Islands, from 1948 to 1950.

Baldwin was born at Astley Hall, Worcestershire, the elder son of the businessman Stanley Baldwin and his wife Lucy, née Ridsdale. Baldwin senior was elected a Conservative MP in 1908, and rose within fifteen years to become prime minister. He sent his son to Eton College, where the boy failed to fit in. He hated what he saw as the school's snobbery and cruelty, and to his teachers he appeared to be "full of silliness, egotism, un-divine discontent, contempt for others (and of course for authority, discipline, tradition etc)". His Who's Who entry states that he was educated "in football at Eton; in other things, beginning to learn". He was keen to leave school and join the army to fight in the First World War, and was commissioned in the Irish Guards in June 1917. He did not join the fighting in France until June 1918, but then distinguished himself by his bravery. His war service strengthened his idealism and increasingly socialist views.

After the war Baldwin served briefly as British Vice-Consul in Boulogne, and then travelled in north Africa. He refused to be supported by his father, and earned a living as a journalist and travel writer. A chance meeting in Alexandria led to an appointment as an infantry instructor in the newly-independent Armenia, but soon after he took up the post in 1920 the democratic government collapsed and Baldwin was imprisoned by Bolshevik-backed revolutionaries. He was freed two months later when democracy was restored, but en route back to Britain he was arrested by the Turkish authorities, accused of spying for Soviet Russia. He was held for five months, in grim conditions, with execution a constant threat. He later wrote a book about his experiences, called Six Prisons and Two Revolutions.