#11606, Francis Jack Richard Patrick NEEDHAM

Francis Jack Richard Patrick Needham succeeded to his uncle's titles in 1961.  He did not inherit the Kilmorey estate of Mourne Park near Kilkeel in Northern Ireland but instead inherites contents to the value of the estate.  It is said that the 5th Earl did not believe any of his own family would wish to live in Northern Ireland again.  Lady Norah Kilmorey, his aunt and widow of the 4th Earl continued to live at Mourne Park until her death in 1985 when the estate passed to the Anley family.  Patrick was a Major in the Grenadier Guards and fought in World War II.

In his book Battling for Peace his son, the 6th Earl says of his father "He was easily the nicest man I have ever met but entirely unsuited for a world after empire.  He retired from the Grenadiers at the age of thirty two and became a gentleman market gardener in Falmouth, from where he sent anemones in the winter, daffodils in the spring and hydrangers in the summer to Covent Garden.  He had no money, so we lived partly off my mother's inheritance from her father, which consisted mainly of lovely 'things' that quietly disappeared at regular intervals.  My father's pitiful earnings from anemones and daffodils were also supplemented by an allowance from my intimidating grandmother.  She had a tight fist and a voice like a foghorn.  nevertheless, I had an idyllic upbringing in the far south-west of England."