Obituary - The Duke of Manchester who has died aged 56, was for decades a farmer in Kenya, as an escapee from British taxation. His father, the 10th Duke, from whom he inherited the title in 1977, bought 10,000 acres in Kenya 31 years earlier. Father and son lived in a mud and wattle hut to begin with. They lived the lives of strenuous pioneers in the EA sun, driving tractors to cultivate the land, on which they worked from dawn to dusk. Though it was six years before they had finished building their own home, they meanwhile put up a school for 100 African children.

When the house was ready they had family treasures sent out from England, including paintings, carpets, and a library of 13,000 books. The family had a staff of 187 on the farm with 14 houseboys and 20 gardeners. On their 10,000 acres the family raised wheat, maize, coffee and cattle.

The 10th Duke and his family stayed in Kenya throughout the Mau Mau atrocities. After years of endeavour they could not easily be persuaded to follow the example of other settlers by leaving, though for safety's sake some of the family heirlooms, among them seven works by Holbein and a Van Dyck were sent back to England. When the 10th Duke died in 1977 he left £68,500 personal assets in England. His son did not hurry to London to take his seat in the House of Lords.

Less than a year afterwards the 11th Duke sold the farm. He and his wife moved into a modest 3 bedroomed house in 5 acres outside Nairobi, and he switched to air-charter work. As a young man, the Duke was a keen motorist. He did well in the EA Safari car rally in 1961 and again 5 years later.

The family seat was at Kimbolton Castle, near Huntingdon, where Catherine of Aragon, the Spanish-born first wife of King Henry VIII was confined for her last years until she died in 1536. The castle, home of the Montagu family since 1612, was sold by the 10th Duke for £12,500 in 1950. The county council converted it into a boys' school. The family also had another seat in Ireland, Tandaragee Castle, in Co. Armagh. As Viscount Mandeville, in 1975 the 11th Duke sold the Kimbolton Estate of 3,243 acres round the village of Kimbolton. The estate consisted of 6 tenanted farms, 18 cottages, and 600 acres of woodland valued at more than £1 million. Christened Sidney Arthur Robin George Drogo Montagu the Duke inherited also the titles of Baron Mantague, Viscount Mandeville, 1620, and Earl of Manchester, 1628. He first married, in Nairobi in 1955, Miss Adrienne Valerie Christie, daughter of Mr J. K. Christie, S. African Commissioner for EA. This marriage ended in 1978, on the grounds of 2 years' separation by consent. The Duke then married Mrs Andrea Kent, former wife of the big-game hunter, Mr Geoffrey Kent.

The Duke's heir is his brother, Lord Angus Charles Drogo Montagu, aged 46. The Duke's grandfather, the 9th Duke, is remembered as the man who challenged the Kaiser's son to a duel for being a cad.

Wolseley-Lewis - Poor Andrea, for whatever reason, shut herself in her Mercedes and committed suicide with a hosepipe from the exhaust. It was a sad end for one who had tried so hard.

Cran - Kim Mandeville was a belted earl, a duke no less, a gentleman farmer with oceans of blue blood surging through his aristocratic veins. He was no ordinary mortal. But, despite having ancestors dating back to the time of King Alfred, Beowulf and Sir Bedivere, he wore his ermine lightly and was as friendly and as easy going as you could wish. With his charming wife he lived on a small farm in Subukia. For some reason his lovely partner found it necessary to fortify her existence with numerous daily draughts of mother's ruin, a practice which did nothing for her physical and mental wellbeing.

Kim had been, for a while, an amateur rally driver, competing in the East African Safari Rally. On one occasion he had been involved in an accident, which had resulted in a head injury. This, although serious, had healed well, with the exception of damage to one tear duct. As a result he had to frequently mop one weeping eye, a disconcerting habit, which had the uninitiated wondering what had been said or done to have thus stung poor Kim to the very quick.

Hut - Bought A.C. Hoey's Farm