David Cecil was a prominent British historian, biographer, academic, and literary and art critic. He held the courtesy title Lord David Cecil as the son of a peer. In 1932, he married Rachel MacCarthy, daughter of Sir Desmond MacCarthy and Mary (Molly) MacCarthy. They had three children (including Hugh Cecil, who co-authored a biography of his maternal grandparents). David Cecil was a prolific writer best known for his biography of Lord Melbourne, Queen Victoria's first Prime Minister; his other subjects included
Jane Austen, William Cowper and Sir Max Beerbohm.
