T. E. Utley

Thomas Edwin Utley (1 February 1921 – 21 June 1988), known as Peter Utley, was a British Tory journalist and writer.

Early life Utley was adopted by Ann Utley and christened Thomas Edwin, although he was always known as Peter. Ann Utley had been born in Liverpool in 1885,

At the age of nine, Utley was struck with blindness as a result of juvenile glaucoma. He developed a meticulous memory, after being forced to rely on having books read aloud to him, and learnt how to dictate logical arguments in clear prose. Educated privately as a child, Ann Utley died in September 1940. Utley was by then reading History under Kenneth Pickthorn and Charles Smyth at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, and went on to graduate BA, gaining a First with distinction. On 3 September 1938 came a letter in the Hull Daily Mail advising the British government to "leave no doubt whatsoever that we are prepared to join France and Russia in defending Czechoslovakian integrity."

Journalism Leaving Cambridge during the Second World War, Utley initially joined the staff of the Royal Institute of International Affairs at Chatham House, then went into journalism, and by 1944 was a leader writer for The Times. He composed its leader in response to the 20 July plot to kill Hitler and welcomed it as evidence of anti-totalitarian forces in Germany which might help end the war if encouraged. However, he rewrote the article after the Foreign Office objected to any hint of willingness to negotiate with a post-Nazi German government. Utley's revised leader omitted any mention of support for German resistance to Hitler. His 1975 work, Lessons of Ulster, was described by The Times as "less a study of Irish politics than a brilliant dissection of the inadequacies of liberal statecraft faced with the intransigent passions of nationalism".

He was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 1980 Birthday Honours.

Personal life In 1951 Utley married Brigid Viola Mary (1927–2012), daughter of Dermot Morrah, a Times journalist, Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, and later Arundel Herald Extraordinary at the College of Arms. Utley and his wife had two sons and two daughters. One son, Tom, is a columnist for the Daily Mail.

A chain smoker and heavy drinker, Utley's financial situation was often precarious. He died in London on 21 June 1988.

Works Essays in Conservatism (1949). Modern Political Thought (1952). The Conservatives and the Critics (1956). Documents of Modern Political Thought (Joint editor, 1957). Not Guilty: The Conservative Reply (1957). Edmund Burke (1957). Occasion for Ombudsmen (1963). Your Money and Your Life (1964). Enoch Powell: The Man and his Thinking (1968). What Laws May Cure (1968). Ulster - A Short Background Analysis (1972). Lessons of Ulster (first edition: 1975, second edition: 1997). Charles Moore and Simon Heffer (editors), A Tory Seer: The Selected Journalism of T. E. Utley (1989).