Alexander Lyle-Samuel

Throughout his life, the name of Alexander Lyle-Samuel was very rarely off the pages of newspapers in both in the United Kingdom and United States. The son of a non-conformist Minister, Samuel was born in Birmingham and educated at the city’s King Edward’s School (attended shortly after Samuel by J. R. R. Tolkein), before going to Trinity College, Cambridge. He studied law at Cambridge and after working in the banking profession, became a journalist and then, in 1908, was admitted to the Middle Temple and practiced as a lawyer. He had the first of two bankruptcy orders made against him that same year (annulled in 1913)

Samuel spent some time in the United States giving lectures, and during one of his visits his first wife died back in the UK in August 1914. Six months later, Samuel married American millionairess Julia Gertrude Lyle.

Lyle, as Julia Hannon, worked as a nurse and following the death of John S. Lyle’s wife in 1907 she looked after him. He was a landowner, merchant, philanthropist, and one of the wealthiest men in New Jersey. In 1910, three years after meeting, the pair eloped to New York City and eventually married. She was 31 at the time and Lyle was 92 and estimated to be worth $20 million, quite a sum for 1910, and probably more than $500 million in 2020. She ended up a rich widow after less than three years of marriage, and in February 1915 married Alexander Samuel in a small ceremony at New York, just one month after meeting. Samuel then changed his name by deed poll to Lyle-Samuel.

The couple returned to England and Lyle-Samuel served in World War I with the Territorial Force Reserve until invalided out in 1918, the same year that his brother George was killed in action. Also in 1918, Alexander became Liberal MP for the Eye division of Suffolk, a seat he held for five years, and served as the First Secretary to the Treasury for just over 18 months. Shortly after taking up his seat in Westminster he was involved in a much publicised libel case following allegations made against him during the election campaign, claiming in part he only married his two wives for their money! Lyle-Samuel won his case and £500 damages plus costs.

After ending his political career, Lyle-Samuel returned to New York but continued to have mounting financial problems, and in 1928 faced a second bankruptcy order following debts of £2,434, a large part of which was owed to his oldest son Winston, who was killed in a bobsleigh accident in 1929, just a few months after the start of the bankruptcy hearing. Lyle-Samuel’s wife Julie died in 1939 and she left around $5 million in her will, but none of it went to Lyle-Samuel. He was found dead in his bed in a Manhattan Hotel room three years later.