Petrie, Sir Charles Alexander (1895–1977), 3rd baronet of Carrowcarden , historian, and journalist, was born on 28 September 1895 at New Heys, Sandfield Park, West Derby, Liverpool, England, second of two sons of Sir Charles Petrie (1852–1920), baronet, businessman, leading conservative member of Liverpool corporation, and lord mayor of the city in 1901–2, and his wife Hannah, daughter of William Hamilton of Liverpool. The Petries were of Scottish origin, but Sir Charles's branch of the family settled near Enniscrone, Co. Sligo, from the end of the eighteenth century. George Petrie (qv), the artist and antiquarian, was a collateral ancestor. He was educated privately before going up to Corpus Christi College, Oxford, where his studies were interrupted by service in the Royal Garrison Artillery during the first world war and a period attached to the historical section of the war cabinet. He finally came down from Oxford in 1920.
He had a lifelong interest in politics and politicians. In Oxford he was the first president of the conservative Carlton Club, and stood unsuccessfully as a conservative candidate in the general election of 1923. Thereafter, although he claimed to be a tory who believed in a strong executive monarchy rather than a conservative, he remained a figure of some influence in conservative politics and knew many prominent politicians and activists, including Austen Chamberlain, a close friend whose biography he later wrote. In the interwar years he travelled widely in Europe, where he met and interviewed many of the leading personalities of the time. He developed a particular empathy with Spain, the complexities of whose history, politics, and culture he strove to explain in word and print in the hope of making Spanish civilisation better understood and appreciated in Britain. In the 1940s he was vice-chairman of the South Kensington Conservative Association, and also served as chairman of the 1900 Club, which for a time played a significant role in shaping conservative party policies. He strongly believed that the conservatives had badly misunderstood and mishandled the Irish question.
He observed that once a man has smelt printers' ink he can never get the smell out of his nostrils. In 1925 his career as a professional journalist commenced with the Outlook, a weekly journal owned by the duke of Westminster. He subsequently wrote for the Saturday Review. In 1931 he became foreign editor of the influential English Review, edited by Douglas Jerrold and owned by the publishers Eyre & Spottiswoode, on whose board he was later to serve. He also worked for the Observer, then edited by J. L. Garvin and later edited the Empire Review during the second world war, when he also lectured extensively to civilians and troops on behalf of the Ministry of Information and the extramural departments of a number of universities. After the war he refounded with Jerrold and edited the New English Review, later the English Review Magazine. He edited the Household Brigade Magazine 1945–76, and from 1958 wrote a regular column in the Illustrated London News. He was an authority on royalty throughout Europe and a frequent contributor to the BBC on monarchical topics. Possessed of enormous energy and gifted with an exceptionally lucid pen, he wrote twenty-eight books, including contributions on political and diplomatic history, biographies, and two entertaining volumes of memoirs. His most important publications relating to Ireland were his pioneering two-volume The Jacobite movement (1932), The marshal duke of Berwick (1953), and The great Tyrconnell: a chapter in Anglo-Irish relations (1973). He was a fellow of the Royal Historical Society and a member of the Royal Spanish Academy of History.
His reputation as a Jacobite scholar and his Irish connection attracted the attention of a group of scholars and army officers who were in the process of establishing the Military History Society of Ireland in 1949, and he accepted an invitation to be the Society's first president, retaining office for twenty-eight years till his death. He welcomed the opportunity to renew relations with the land of his ancestors and proved an inspired choice. Although he continued to reside in England, he gave the Society considerable commitment and, till his last years, never failed to chair the annual general meeting and dinner. From the outset the Society strove consciously to attract Irishmen of differing military traditions who shared an interest in its stated objectives: the study of warfare in Ireland and Irishmen in war. It was a ground-breaking achievement at that time to bring together successfully in a single organisation, even for study purposes, the opposing Irish military traditions. Under Sir Charles's capable and diplomatic leadership army officers and scholars from both parts of Ireland and from Britain mixed easily in probably the only organisation on the island whose membership included Éamon de Valera (qv) and Lord Rathcavan (qv), former speaker of the Northern Ireland parliament. Petrie chaired meetings and outings with dignity, erudition and wit, and contributed several articles to the Irish Sword (1949–), the Society's journal, which became the principal vehicle of its singular contribution to Irish military historiography. He valued the friendships he made in the Society and came greatly to admire the Irish army and its officer corps. The respect was mutual.
His first marriage (1920) to Ursula Gabrielle Dowdall was dissolved in 1925. They had one son, Charles, who succeeded as 4th baronet. His second marriage (1926) was to Cecilia Mason, who became conservative mayor of Kensington in the 1950s. They had one son, Peter, who joined the foreign office. In appearance Sir Charles was small in stature, bearded, and somewhat rotund, while in personality he was warm and lively, engaging in conversation, and an excellent raconteur. For most of his life he lived in London, except for a decade spent in Dorset (1934–44). He delighted in club life and was a member of the Carlton Club, London, and the University Club, Dublin. He enjoyed the conviviality of the latter institution, where he generally stayed on his visits to Dublin, installing his wife, when she accompanied him, in the nearby Shelbourne Hotel. His portrait in oils by A. C. Davidson-Houston is reproduced as the frontispiece of his book A historian looks at his world (1972). He was awarded the CBE shortly before his death, which occurred in London on 13 December 1977.