Charles-Louis de Beaumont OBE 1902 - 1972

The following is adapted from the address given in the Memorial Service at Holy Trinity Church, Brompton on 27 July, 1972.

Those who knew Charles well will think first of his vitality, of that unbounding energy unequalled in anyone else that I have known, and of his gaiety. If I were a lyric writer, and had I been asked to write a lyric about him, I would have borrowed from the song we all know from My Fair Lady, but I would have altered the words so that they ran :

"1 could have danced all night

I could have worked all day

And still come back for more."

These words are very true of Charles.

He was a man of other parts too. He had initiative, a quick and clear mind and an infinite capacity for taking pains ; he possessed a special gift for languages and the power, born of his French ancestry, to understand and to communicate with people of other countries, a thing which the conventional English mind often finds so difficult to do. Above all, Charles was a man of action. He got things done. Life was to him a challenge and he used his opportunities for the benefit of others as well as himself.

I wonder whether Charles was ever consciously influenced by his family motto Mihi res, non me rebus - "Things and circumstances are for me to turn to account. I am not governed by circumstance." Whether he was influenced by this precept or not, he lived by it. 

When he was a young man he established his own business as an antique dealer in Kensington which he managed, in effect, single-handed throughout his life. He made his business into a success and he won for himself a high personal reputation. Those cares and responsibilities would have occupied the time and attentions of the ordinary man fully, but they were not enough to occupy Charles. He interested himself in the affairs of his profession, and became active in the Counsels of the British Antique Dealers' Association. The value of the services he gave and the appreciation of his fellow-members is reflected in the honours which that Association showered upon him. In 1966 he was elected its president, and in the following year a precedent was set when he was re-elected to a Second year of office, so that he could be the president in the year of the Association's golden jubilee. But office without service was to Charles office without honour, and his exceptional work for his profession over the years was recognised last year by the award to him of the Association's gold medal for distinguished services, an honour that has been very rarely awarded in the Association's history. Only a few months ago too he was elected to the presidency of the International Federation of Antique Dealers and it is sad that he did not live to take up this office. 

These distinctions alone speak for the high personal regard in which Charles was held by the members of his profession. I would, nevertheless, like to quote to you a spontaneous tribute that was paid to Charles a week or two ago by an old friend of mine, a senior and very distinguished figure in the world of antiques and a man of great sincerity who knew Charles for many years in business. He said : "I have always known Charles de Beaumont to be a most upright man. He was the same as when he took guard." I quote this tribute, because I think Charles, like, indeed, any other fencer, would feel proud to know that others thought he had conducted his life in accordance with the traditions of honour historically, associated with the practice of arms. 

It is of Charles as a friend and as a fencer that I am qualified to speak. He and I knew each other for nearly forty years. He began fencing when he was an undergraduate at Cambridge and he continued to learn, when he lived in Milan for two or three years, at the hand of the greatest épée master of his time (Giuseppe Mangiarotti) - a privilege of which Charles always remained proud. On his return to England he became one of the best two or three British épée fencers of his generation. He won the épée championship in three successive years, four times in all, was a member of the British fencing team at the Olympics in 1928 and 1932 and its captain from 1936 onwards. 

But it is not for his personal performance as a fencer that Charles will be best remembered in British fencing, but by the services that he gave to fencing for forty years. To say that his services were unique would be true, but it would only be half the tale. He not only gave to fencing more than any other has given, but he gave his heart and his soul - and a large part of his life. In doing so he forewent other pleasures that he would have liked to be able to enjoy more often - riding, hunting and travelling for private pleasure ; but Charles did what he liked and he liked what he did, and we can be certain, and glad, that he enjoyed the work he did for fencing to the full. 

He was the Honorary Secretary of the AFA for twenty years before he was elected its president in 1966, an office he continued to hold until his death, and he took upon his shoulders more duties and responsibilities than rightly attached to those offices. There was no task, big or small, that Charles was not willing to undertake if it needed to be done, and, whatever he did, he did well. "Second best” did not exist for Charles, and the amount of work that he did was amazing. How familiar to those of us who were concerned with Charles in the administration of fencing were those tatty envelopes we received from him through the post. They were used envelopes with an economy label stuck on them to save the A.F.A. the cost of a new envelope. Addressed in Charles's own scrawling hand, they would contain some letter or memorandum, typed (and not well typed) by Charles himself on a typewriter that might have qualified as an antique, but clearly expressed and outlining some plan or scheme he had carefully thought out and which must have meant for him the burning of much midnight oil. 

By profession I am a lawyer and sometimes (but not always, since Charles usually knew his own mind) he used to consult me on some new rule or fencing regulation he had drafted. His drafting was brief and to the point, and I used to be surprised at his skill as a draughtsman until I realised that it was a skill probably inherited from his grandfather, twice Lord Chancellor of Ireland. 

Charles's duties took him everywhere. He must have visited almost every capital city in Europe (and some beyond) as a member of the F.I.E., of which he became the doyen and a membre d'honneur. There was hardly a major international fencing championship held during the last twenty-five years that he did not attend - and when a British team was competing he was always their captain. He never failed to be present at a British fencing championship, where he felt the president should be seen. He was for a generation fencing's representative in the British Olympic Association, and was elected to be its vice-president a few years ago. He represented fencing on the Central Council of Physical Recreation too and (it is almost needless to add) he was elected to its Executive Committee, on which he was a powerful voice. He was the corner-stone of British Fencing, and in the circles of amateur sport in this country the name "de Beaumont" became synonymous with fencing. The award to him in 1959 of the O.B.E, for services to fencing, was well earned. 

Charles did not only occupy himself with the big occasions or with important things. He cared about small matters too. He would answer a letter from some unknown schoolboy asking how and where he could learn to fence as carefully as he would a letter from the International Fencing Federation. He would visit a small fencing club in a distant part of England if he felt that his presence would give needed encouragement, as he would go to Mexico with the British Olympic team. He did these small things quietly and unobtrusively, as he did acts of kindness to personal friends. Charles was a man of independence, who stood on his own feet and believed that others should do the same, but to a friend who was in need Charles was a "friend indeed." 

It was this interest in others that made Charles such an outstanding captain of the fencing team on countless occasions, and it is as our captain that many of us, fortunate enough to fence for Britain under him, will remember him most warmly. At big international fencing occasions Charles was at his best, knowing everyone, liked and respected by everyone, renewing old friendships and making new ones young and old, combining a multitude of different functions and usually talking three languages at once with equal facility to the amazement of foreigners. When he was the British Captain, it was the interests of his team that were paramount. No British fencer ever had reason to fear that he might suffer an injustice while Charles was there to protect him, and he was tireless in ministering to their personal needs - and to their whims too. When defeat came Charles was the comforter. In his team’s victory he was jubilant, and I think that probably the happiest moments of his fencing life were when Gillian Sheen won Britain's first-ever Olympic gold medal for fencing in 1956 and when his own particular, beloved épée team, of which he had so often been a member in earlier years, won the Olympic silver medal four years later.  

The debt that British fencing owes to Charles can never be repaid, but the building in West Kensington that is the home of British fencing and bears his name will be a lasting monument to his memory. Had it not been for Charles's initiative, his drive - and his personal generosity, too - that building would not be standing today.  [Alas, of course, it no longer stands, having been bought by the Queen’s Club, at the time owned by the Lawn Tennis Association.]

The presence of so many at his service is a token of the many friendships he made and of his achievements in his profession and sport. One may only hope that the sympathy of his friends and the memory of achievements may be of some comfort, however small, to his family in their personal sorrow.

Emrys Lloyd

 The Hon. Mrs. Kathleen de Beaumont, Charles mother, now 96, writes :

 Although I have never been a fencer, I have always been interested in news of that great sport, Charles constantly came to see me on his way home from the de Beaumont Centre, and also on his return from what seemed to be endless trips abroad connected with international fencing matters. From his earliest days at Cambridge University, fencing had been his chief sporting activity. He devoted much time and study to it. 

Looking on the inflated egotism which seems to rule our world today. We look to the young in heart and mind to lead us towards the joy of universal fellowship : men of vision, men of courage and determination. dedicated to extend the hand of friendship to others who are engaged in the struggles of life. I have been told by some who knew him that my dear son was such a man, the rememberance of whose spirit will long survive his death in the hearts of those who came into contact with the ever-active and wide sphere of his influence.

Knowing, as I do, all that fencing meant to him, I am grateful to be given the opportunity to express my thankfulness for the happiness, combined with fruitful hard work, which came to Charles through his life-long devotion to the fencing fellowship.

May it ever grow and prosper !