Thomas Dugdale , 1st Baron Crathorne Thomas Lionel Dugdale , 1st Baron Crathorne PC ( 20 July 1897 – 26 March 1977 ) , known as Sir Thomas Dugdale , 1st Baronet , from 1945 to 1959 , was a British Conservative Party politician . A government minister , he resigned over the Crichel Down Affair , often quoted as a classic example of the convention of individual ministerial responsibility . Personal life . Thomas Dugdale was the son of Captain James Lionel Dugdale of Crathorne Hall near Yarm in Yorkshire . He was educated at Eton College and Sandhurst . He joined the Army in 1916 , serving with the Scots Greys in World War I and the Yorkshire Hussars in World War II . Dugdale married Nancy , daughter of Sir Charles Tennant , 1st Baronet , and Marguerite ( née Miles ) in 1936 . He died in March 1977 , aged 79 . By then a peer , his son , James succeeded him as Baron Crathorne . Political career . In 1929 , Dugdale was elected as Member of Parliament ( MP ) for Richmond , North Yorkshire , where he remained until 1959 . He served as Parliamentary Private Secretary to several ministers , including Stanley Baldwin , and Deputy Chief Whip . He was later Chairman of the Conservative Party and Chairman of the Party ' s Agricultural Committee . He was made a baronet in 1945 . The Crichel Down affair . When the Conservatives won the 1951 election , Churchill made Dugdale his Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries . Crichel Down was a piece of farmland in Dorset compulsorily bought by the government for defence use . Commander George Martin , whose wife Mary was the only child and heiress of the original owner of the land Lord Alington , wanted to buy the land back in the 1950s now that it was no longer used by the MoD . However the Ministry of Agriculture resisted , wanting to use the land for experimental farming in a time of rationing and agricultural development . However , Martin , a former equerry in the Royal Family , had very influential friends and stirred up much trouble in the local Conservative Party and government backbenches . There followed a public inquiry which criticised the department ' s decision and civil servants , especially their methods . It was seen as an example of an over - powerful state . Finally Dugdale announced that Martin could buy the land back and told the House of Commons he was resigning . Resignation . Dugdale ' s resignation went down in history as an honourable , even heroic , one : a minister taking responsibility for civil servants ' actions , which would lead to the perceived code of individual ministerial responsibility . However , in papers released thirty years after the affair , it was found that Dugdale had known and approved of his civil servants ' actions and had to an extent passed the buck to them himself . It was also found that the inquiry was inaccurate and biased , led by a former Conservative candidate who was very against civil servants and state interference . Dugdale ' s junior minister , Lord Carrington , tried to resign too but was refused . He went on to be Foreign Secretary , and finally succeeded in resigning in 1982 over the Falklands War . Commander Martin got his land but not a Conservative seat , which he had hoped for . Dugdale himself was raised to the peerage as Baron Crathorne in 1959 and had a second political career in Europe , building links with parliamentarians in NATO and the Council of Europe .