A​ Sculpture in Wood, Presented to Shiela Minto, Former Administrator at 10 Downing Street,

A unique sculpture in wood, created by Ian Brennan, Wood Carver to the Royal Household. In the style of Mount Rushmore it features eight consecutive British Prime Ministers plus Sheila Minto. It was commissioned in 1989 to commemorate Sheila Minto’s 33 years of service at 10 Downing Street and the Prime Ministers under whom she served.

Sheila Minto, LVO, OBE (1908-1994) worked at 10 Downing St. from 1935 until her retirement in 1968. (It has been reported that while working at the War Office she attended the interview simply to see inside No.10) For 33 years Minto, a senior clerical staff administrator, served under eight Prime Ministers. She was awarded the M.B.E. in Churchill’s Resignation Honours of 1945.

Prime Ministers Minto worked with:

• Stanley Baldwin was in office when she joined the staff at No. 10 and she witnessed the growing crisis of the abdication of King Edward VIII.
• Next was Neville Chamberlain and the tensions of approaching war; she accompanied Chamberlain when he met with Mussolini in Rome in 1939.
• Then she served Winston Churchill throughout the war.
• Post war: Clement Atlee then Churchill again, followed by Anthony Eden, Harold Macmillan and Alec Douglas-Home.
• Harold Wilson was the last Prime Minister she served.

Minto worked a few more years as personal secretary to Lord Diplock, then the senior Law Lord before retiring at age 60. In retirement she was much sort after by journalists and television writers who saw her as an invaluable source of information on what went on behind the scenes.

This piece was commissioned in 1989 to commemorate her memorable life at 10 Downing St.

Carved in a light hardwood on a mahogany plinth, it measures 13.5cm tall, 11.5cm wide and 7cm deep. The plinth, on which it sits, measures 15x9x4cm.

Signed IB 1989.

Finest Hour: read about – Sheila Minto at 10 Downing St. p10

Item #110