Peter George Grenfell, 2nd Baron St. Just (22 July 1922 – 1984) was an English peer, a member of the House of Lords from 1943 until his death.
Grenfell was the only son of Edward Grenfell, a partner in Morgan, Grenfell & Co., director of the Bank of England, and Member of Parliament for the City of London, and his wife Florence Emily Henderson.[1] He was educated at Sandroyd School and Harrow School.[2] In July 1935, while he was still there, his father was raised to the peerage as Baron St Just, of St Just in Penwith in the County of Cornwall.[3]
During the Second World War, Grenfell was commissioned as a Lieutenant into the King's Royal Rifle Corps. On 26 November 1941, his father died and he succeeded as Lord St Just,[1] but could not take his seat in the House of Lords until reaching the age of twenty-one two years later. On 1 June 1949, at St James's, Spanish Place, St Just married Leslie Nast, daughter of Condé Nast and Leslie Foster.[4] [1] They were divorced in 1955, and on 25 July 1956 he married secondly Maria Britneva,[1] a Russian-born actress, the daughter of Alexander Britnev, whose mother had brought her to England as a child.[5] They lived at Wilbury House in Wiltshire; Maria continued to live there until her death in 1994.[6]
By his first wife, St Just was the father of Laura Claire Grenfell (born 1950), and by Maria Britneva he had two further daughters, Katherine Grenfell (1957),[1] known as Pulcheria,[7] and Natasha Jeannine Mary Grenfell (1959). His daughter Katherine married Oliver Gilmour.[1]