Charles Howard

Brigadier Sir Charles Alfred Howard, GCVO, DSO* (29 July 1878 – 1958) was a British Army officer and parliamentary official from the aristocratic Howard family. He served as Serjeant-at-Arms of the House of Commons from 1935 to 1956.

Early life Howard was born at Hazelby Manor, East Woodhay, Hampshire, the youngest of four children of the Hon. Greville Theophilus Howard (1836–1880; a younger son of Charles Howard, 17th Earl of Suffolk) and Lady Audrey Jane Charlotte (died 1926), daughter of John Townshend, 4th Marquess Townshend. Howard's sister Joyce was married to Sir Arthur Doyle, 4th Baronet, and was the mother of Diana Spearman. His father died when he was 2, and his mother remarried General Sir Redvers Henry Buller. His half-sister was Dame Georgiana Buller.

Career After schooling at Eton College, Howard attended the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, and was commissioned a second lieutenant in The King's (Shropshire Light Infantry) regiment on 3 August 1898. He was posted in India until 1899 and then, from late February 1900, in South Africa, where he was an aide-de-camp to his stepfather during the Second Boer War. He was promoted to lieutenant on 9 May 1900. and from 1929 to 1932 he commanded the 162nd (East Midland) Brigade; from 1932 to 1935, he then commanded the 12th Infantry Brigade and Dover Garrison, she died in 1969. They had two children, a daughter Diana who died young, and a son Henry Redvers Greville Howard (1911–1978), an army officer and the father of Greville Howard, Baron Howard of Rising.