Charles Arnold-Baker - Civilian Career

Civilian Career

Charles Arnold-Baker was called to the Bar in 1948, and practised in the Admiralty Division until 1952 in the chambers of J. Roland Adams Q.C., a former colleague from MI6. He received the Gwylim Gibbons Award from Nuffield College, Oxford in 1959.

After leaving the Admiralty Division he accepted a post as Secretary of the National Association of Parish Councils. This body he transformed into the union of all rural local councils in England and Wales, the National Association of Local Councils, (NALC), and he endeavoured to strengthen local custom and government on a small scale against the growth of larger local government blocs. In 1966 he was awarded the OBE for this work. He served as a member of the European Committee of the International Union of Local Authorities 1966-1978, and was a Delegate to the European Local Government Assembly at Strasbourg 1960-1978.

In 1978 he left the NALC to pursue an academic career as a Professor of Arts administration at the City University, London, where he lectured in Law, and architecture a subject on which he had no formal training; his lectures were always nevertheless packed.

In 1966 he commenced writing The Companion to British History. The work was originally commissioned by the Oxford University Press, but after several disagreements with editors he decided to let his son publish his work using the family business of Longcross Press which he had founded. The book, longer than the Bible, has run through three editions plus a paperback version. It was the subject of a full-page story by the Daily Telegraph. In January 2009 the Spectator described it as "one of the most remarkable books ever written".

From 1942 he lived in the Inner Temple, where he was the Senior Barrister, and looked after his invalid wife. He completed a further edition of his Companion to British History published by Loncross Denholm Press (Dec 2008).

His Work "Local Council Administration" is on the bookshelf of every Parish, Town and District Clerk in the country and known in local government circles simply as "the Bible". The familiar yellow book is one of the master reference books for Local Councils to this day. J.K. Rowling's novel The Casual Vacancy takes its title from a quotation from Local Council Administration, with which the novel opens.

Charles Arnold-Baker married in Kensington, London, 2 January 1943 to Edith May, née Woods (1918–2010). They had two children:

• Henry Charles Edward Alexis von Blumenthal (b.1961) (resumed family surname 1979, confirmed by deed poll 2008), educated at Westminster School and Christ Church, Oxford University (M.A. Theology), who lives with his wife & two children in Luxembourg

• Katherine Elizabeth Arnold-Baker (b.1948), educated at Wychwood School, who lives with her two children.