Family
Duggan was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina where his father Alfred was honorary Attaché to the British Legation. At an early age the family returned to England where Duggan and his elder brother Alfred Duggan, the historical novelist, were brought up. Alfred Duggan senior was a Roman Catholic and his sons were brought up in that faith, but he died "of drink" in his early thirties when Duggan was 11.
His immensely rich American mother Grace married leading statesman Lord Curzon in January 1917. Duggan was therefore well-connected with the Conservative Party from an early age. As neither his stepfather nor his mother were Catholic, his faith gradually lapsed.
Duggan regarded his stepfather positively and countered suggestions that the humourless image he projected to the public was accurate in private. In later years he angrily denounced W. Somerset Maugham's comedy Our Betters which gently satirised Americans marrying into aristocratic British families.
Read more about this topic: Hubert Duggan
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