Viscount Trenchard

Trenchard, Marshal of the RAF Sir Hugh (1873-1956), a crucial figure in the early development of British air power, though mainly as a shrewd political fighter rather than as a theorist. He achieved his wings shortly before his 40th birthday and was one of twenty pilots included in the Royal Flying Corps in 1912. By 1918 Trenchard had become chief of the air staff of the newly created RAF and was reappointed to the position in 1919 to guide the RAF through the retrenchment of the 1920s. Trenchard believed that strategic bombing was the future of warfare, but recognized that in fiscally stringent times such thinking was not popular. Instead he developed the policy of cost-effective aerial imperial policing to stave off efforts from the army and the navy to second the RAF to their purposes. When Trenchard retired in 1929 the independence of the RAF was secure, but so was the fatally grandiose doctrine that strategic bombing could win a war unaided. He was the first officer to hold the five-star rank of marshal of the RAF. His nickname ‘Boom’ referred to his loud voice, not to the products of his bombers.

Bibliography

• Ferris, John, The Evolution of British Strategic Policy, 1919-1926 (London, 1989).
• Gooch, John, Airpower: Theory and Practice (London, 1995)

— John Buckley

Trenchard, Hugh, 1st Viscount Trenchard (1873-1956). Soldier and airman. ‘Boom’ Trenchard began his service career as an infantryman. By 1912, when he learned to fly, he was a major whose career appeared to be going nowhere. But by 1915 he was a major-general in command of the Royal Flying Corps in France. When the Royal Air Force was established as the world's first independent air force in 1918, Trenchard became its first professional head as chief of air staff, a post he held with only a brief interruption until 1929.

Hugh Trenchard,
1st Viscount Trenchard

Viscount Trenchard, of Wolfeton in the County of Dorset, is a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. It was created in 1936 for Marshal of the Royal Air Force, Hugh Trenchard, 1st Baron Trenchard. He had already been created a Baronet, of Wolfeton in the County of Dorset, in the Baronetage of the United Kingdom in 1919 and Baron Trenchard, of Wolfeton in the County of Dorset, in 1930, also in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. His second son, the second Viscount, held junior ministerial positions from 1979 to 1983 in the Conservative administration of Margaret Thatcher. As of 2009 the titles are held by the latter's son, the third Viscount, who succeeded in 1987. In 2004 he replaced the recently deceased Lord Vivian as one of the ninety elected hereditary peers that are allowed to remain in the House of Lords after the passing of the House of Lords Act 1999. Lord Trenchard sits on the Conservative benches.

The family seat is Standon Lordship, near Ware, Hertfordshire.

Viscounts Trenchard (1936)

• Hugh Montague Trenchard, 1st Viscount Trenchard (1873–1956)
• Thomas Trenchard, 2nd Viscount Trenchard (1923–1987)
• Hugh Trenchard, 3rd Viscount Trenchard (b. 1951)

The Heir Apparent is the present holder's son Hon. Alexander Thomas Trenchard (b. 1978)

References

• Kidd, Charles, Williamson, David (editors). Debrett's Peerage and Baronetage (1990 edition). New York: St Martin's Press, 1990.
• Leigh Rayment's Peerage Page

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