Julian Prideaux, National Trust manager who steered the organisation through turbulent times

Yahoo

21-02-2025

Julian Prideaux, who has died aged 82, spent nearly all his career at the National Trust, rising to be Deputy Director-General and Secretary from 1997 until his retirement in 2002.
More the power behind the throne than star of the show, he oversaw an increasing professionalism in the Trust's management of land during a time of exceptional growth in both membership and property, and steered the Trust calmly through a series of crises.
The first catastrophe came in 1989, when Uppark, one of Britain's finest William and Mary houses, high on the Sussex Downs, was gutted by fire. Its restoration was the largest and most complex ever attempted by the Trust, and it was Prideaux, as the Trust's chief agent, who led the recovery, first negotiating with lawyers and insurance brokers (even appearing in the High Court) to secure the funds needed, then working with Peter Pearce, the Trust agent assigned to the project, to harness a vast range of contractors, craftsmen and experts.
Scraps of wallpaper were traced to their original manufacturers in France; the main staircase was reconstructed from a single surviving step and riser; freehand plasterwork was recreated in lime plaster strengthened with goat's hair.
The Daily Telegraph's Hugh Massingberd feared he would find 'dear old Uppark' feeling like a fake, but 'looking around the subtly faded decoration of such splendid interiors… it is difficult, if not impossible, to distinguish between what is new and what is old,' he wrote. 'The hackneyed post-Second-World-War whinge of country-house buffs that 'you simply can't find the craftsmen today' can finally be put to rest.'
In 1997 the National Trust banned stag hunting following its commission of the Bateson Report into the welfare of hunted red deer. Though fraught with difficulty, once the decision was made it was Prideaux's responsibility to ensure its implementation, and he worked hard to ensure that it was as fair and practical as possible in the contested circumstances. It came at some personal cost, as he received death threats and had to check his car daily for bombs.
By the time foot and mouth broke out in February 2001, Prideaux was Deputy Director-General and Secretary under Fiona Reynolds, who had just replaced Martin Drury as Director-General. As confidence in British meat and farming plummeted, large swathes of the countryside had to be closed.
This was immensely difficult to implement, but Prideaux oversaw the closure of most National Trust properties, followed by the equally complex process of reopening them when it was permitted to do so. Prideaux and Reynolds were both very proud to have secured some exemptions for the rare Herdwick sheep flocks of the Lake District – many of them direct descendants of Beatrix Potter's flocks – from slaughter in the contiguous culls.
Julian Humphrey Prideaux was born on June 19 1942, the second of four sons of Sir Humphrey Prideaux, soldier and former chairman of Naafi, and his wife Cynthia, née Birch Reynardson. Julian was educated at Eton and the Royal Agricultural College, qualifying as a land agent in 1966.
By 1969 he had joined the National Trust as its 'baby agent' (the youngest in post) working for the then chief agent, Ivan Hills. He was soon posted to Cornwall, where he negotiated many 'Neptune' (coastal) acquisitions, and learnt to manage the National Trust/donor family relationship with skill and diplomacy.
His next role, in 1978, was to lead the Trust's work in the Northern Home Counties, and he was promoted to Regional Director for the Thames and Chilterns Region in 1983. Almost immediately a ferocious row blew up about the Trust's decision to lease land on the Bradenham estate in Buckinghamshire to the Ministry of Defence for a nuclear defence bunker. Though it led to an Extraordinary General Meeting in a huge marquee in Hyde Park, Prideaux's calm pragmatism quieted the outrage and ensured that the Trust learnt lessons about listening to members.
He was promoted to chief agent in 1987. He was famous for remembering everyone's names – including their children and pets – all written down in a small notebook he carried with him. Always impeccably dressed, kind and firm in equal measure, he knew almost every inch of the Trust's extensive – and growing – estate, and took a deep interest in both people and places.
He was a trustee of the Chelsea Physic Garden, Dorneywood, the Rural Housing Trust and the National Gardens Scheme.
Julian Prideaux married, in 1967, Rosamund (Jilly) Roney Dougal, with whom he had two sons. After happy periods in Cornwall, West Wycombe, then Donhead St Mary, they settled in Coggeshall in Essex, where Prideaux was chairman of the Coggeshall Society and led services in the church of St Peter ad Vincula.
Julian Prideaux, born June 19 1942, died February 12 2025
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