Keighley Boys' Grammar School
www.kbgs.com
Herbert Butterfield
Herbert Butterfield (1900-1979) was born in Oxenhope, the son of Albert ,whose father had intended
him for the Methodist ministry, and Ada Mary who came from Leominster and whose
parents were Plymouth Brethren. Albert’s desire to be a minister was cut short
when his father died prematurely and he eventually became a clerk in a woollen
mill. It would be interesting to find out which mill this was. Herbert left
Keighley Trade and Grammar School in 1919 for Cambridge where he was a scholar
of Peterhouse. On his graduation in 1922, Peterhouse offered him a fellowship
and he remained a Fellow of that college almost until his death and was Master
from 1955-1968. He married Edith Joyce Crawshaw, called Pamela, in 1929.
He was one of the most
prominent historians of his day. In 1944 he was elected Professor of Modern
History at Cambridge and from 1963-1968 was Regius Professor. He was knighted
in 1968 and had a spell as a ,somewhat unwilling, Vice Chancellor of the
University from 1959-1961. He wrote many books the most important of which was
‘The Whig Interpretation of History’ in 1931. He was a teetotaller but a smoker
all his life. He played the piano and was a lay preacher in the Methodist
Church, although in his later days he attended Anglican services in Peterhouse
chapel. He died in 1979 and was survived by his wife and two sons.
Source: Tom Punt