Caroline Middleton DeCamp Benn (13 October 1926 – 22 November 2000), formerly Viscountess Stansgate, was an educationalist and writer, and wife of the British Labour politician Tony Benn (formerly 2nd Viscount Stansgate).
Born Caroline Middleton DeCamp, she was the elder daughter of James and Anne DeCamp of Cincinnati, Ohio, USA. Her father was a lawyer and she came from a privileged background. Educated at Vassar College (BA, 1946) and the Unive...
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Caroline Middleton DeCamp Benn (13 October 1926 – 22 November 2000), formerly Viscountess Stansgate, was an educationalist and writer, and wife of the British Labour politician Tony Benn (formerly 2nd Viscount Stansgate).
Born Caroline Middleton DeCamp, she was the elder daughter of James and Anne DeCamp of Cincinnati, Ohio, USA. Her father was a lawyer and she came from a privileged background. Educated at Vassar College (BA, 1946) and the University of Cincinnati (BA, 1948), she came to the United Kingdom in 1948 to study at Oxford University and voted for Henry Wallace, the Progressive Party candidate in that year's American Presidential election. She gained an English MA on Jacobean drama (specifically on the masques of Inigo Jones) at University College London in 1951.
She met Benn over tea at Worcester College in 1949 and nine days later he proposed to her on a park bench in the city. Later, he bought the bench from Oxford City Council and installed it in the garden of their...
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