Sue Young Histories

Evan Frederic Morgan, Lord Tredegar 1893 - 1949

May 28, 2009

Evan Frederic Morgan, 2nd Viscount Tredegar 1893 - 1949 was the only son to Courtenay Morgan (the future Lord Tredegar of Tredegar Park, Monmouthshire) and the Lady Katherine Carnegie.

Evan Morgan was a Chamberlain to Popes Benedict XV and Pius XI yet, as an accomplished occultist, was hailed by Aleister Crowley as “Adept of Adepts”.

Evan Morgan was a patient of John Moorhead Byres Moir, and a friend of Aleister Crowley, Frederick Albert Theodore Delius, Philip Arnold Heseltine, Aldous Huxley, Herbert George Wells,

Evan Morgan was a poet and author of volumes such as “Fragments”, “At Dawn”, “The Eel” and “The City of Canals.” Evan Morgan was a Chamberlain to Popes Benedict XV and Pius XI yet, as an accomplished occultist, was hailed by Aleister Crowley as “Adept of Adepts”.

Morgan succeeded to the titles of 4th Baron, 2nd Viscount Tredegar in May 1934 on the death of his father.

A noted eccentric, he kept at his seat of Tredegar House in Newport a menagerie of animals including a boxing kangaroo, honey bear, baboon and macaw. His week end house parties which attracted such figures as Aldous Huxley, Herbert George Wells, Augustus John and Aleister Crowley, gained local notoriety, as did the host’s extravagant lifestyle.

Evan came from what the Duke of Bedford described as “The oddest family I have ever met.”: his mother is rumoured to have built bird’s nests big enough to sit in; in 1925 his sister, Gwyneth Erica Morgan, was found dead at the age of 29 in the River Thames, while his father owned one of the largest yachts in the world.

Despite his known homosexuality and reputation for dissipation, he married twice. His wives were: Hon. Lois Sturt (1900-1937), an actress and daughter of Napier Sturt, 2nd Baron Alington; they married in 1928, and Princess Olga Sergievna Dolgorouky (born 1915); they married in 1939, in Singapore, China, and the marriage was annulled in 1943.

Lord Tredegar died in April 1949 at the age of 55.


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