Melford Stevenson - Personal Life

Personal Life

Stevenson married Anna Cecilia Francesca Imelda in 1929. He "turned her out" after he discovered that she had been having an affair with Colonel Maurice Buckmaster, head of the French section of the Special Operations Executive, and they were divorced in 1942. They had one daughter. He married his second wife, Rosalind Monica Wagner, the sister of Anthony Wagner, in 1947, and together they had a son – who also became a barrister – and a daughter.

After the war Stevenson stood as the Conservative Party candidate to represent Maldon in the 1945 United Kingdom general election. He opened his campaign by declaring that in the interests of a clean fight, he would make no allusions to the "alleged homosexuality" of his opponent, Tom Driberg, who heavily defeated him in the vote; Stevenson returned to his legal practice the following year.

Despite his severe manner Stevenson was extremely sociable, and he was often the centre of a lively crowd at the bar of the Garrick Club, of which he was a member. His home on the Sussex coast was called Truncheons, sometimes taken to reflect his authoritarian views, but the area had been known by that name for many years before his arrival. Following his retirement Stevenson called for the restoration of the death penalty for all murders, and made regular guest appearances on television until his health and eyesight began to fail. Among the programmes he took part in was Granada Television's six-part series The Bounds of Freedom, broadcast in 1979.

Stevenson died at St Leonards on 26 December 1987. A memorial tablet to him and his wife was erected in the Church of St Mary the Virgin, Rye, in 1992.