Chloë Blackburn (died 2024)

 Chloë Blackburn, who has died aged 93, was the first wife of Sir Crispin Tickell, GCMG, KCVO, the environmentalist and diplomat. She was a talented sculptress.

Sir Crispin was a great-great grandson of Thomas Henry Huxley, the biologist and anthropologist, scion of that landed gentry family.

 She was born Chloë Gunn, daughter of the portrait painter Sir James Gunn, RA (1893-1964), and his first wife the former Gwendoline Thorne; and married 1954 (div 1976), as his first wife, Crispin Charles Cervantes Tickell (who was born 25 August, 1930), son of Jerrard Tickell and his wife the former Renee Haynes. Her husband served in the Coldstream Guards 1952-54; HM Diplomatic Servive, 1954; Foreign Office 1954-55; The Hague 1955-58; Mexico 1958-61; Foreign Office (Planning Staff) 1961-64; Paris 1964-70; Private secretary to successive ministers responsible for Britain's entry into the European Community 1970-72; Foreign and Commonwealth Office 1972-75; Fellow, Center for International Affairs, Harvard University 1975-76; Chef de Cabinet to the Commissioner of the European Community, 1977-81; Visiting Fellow, All Souls College Oxford 1981; Ambassador to Mexico 1981-83; Deputy Under Secretary of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, 1983-84; Perm Secretary, ODA, 1984-87; British Perm Rep to the United Nations, 1987-90; Warden, Green College, Oxford, 1990-97, appointed Chancellor of University of Kent, 1996 &c. He was appointed MVO [1958], KCVO [1983], and GCMG [1989]. He died 25 January, 2022. He was 91.

Chloë Tickell married secondly, in 1985, Bill Blackburn (died 2002), a lawyer. She leaves three children, Oliver, Oriana and James Tickell.

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