Rendall was the son of Henry Rendall JP of Bridport in Dorset. He was educated at University College School. In 1897, he married Amy, daughter of J J Young JP of Northend, Portsmouth. They had one daughter. Amy Rendall died in 1945 and Rendall was remarried, in 1946, to Beatrice Sophia, the daughter of Captain A W Brooke-Smith RNR.[1]
Career
After first working as a journalist, Rendall trained as a solicitor, passing the Law Society final examinations in January 1894 [2] and practising at Yeovil.[3] After he left Parliament, Rendall reverted to the law and was a partner in the firm of Rendall, Litchfield and Co. of Bournemouth.[4]
Politics
In 1895, Rendall joined the Fabian Society[5] but his political affiliation at this time was still Liberal, as reflected by his membership of the Cobden Club, and by 1905 he had been selected as a Liberal Parliamentary candidate.[6]
Rendall was, as indicated by his membership of the Fabian Society, always on the New Liberal wing of the party and identified himself as a Radical. He was sympathetic to many of the aims of the Labour Party. In 1918, he joined a group of Left-wing Liberals, formed by Josiah Wedgwood. The aim of the group was to formulate the best course to be adopted by those calling themselves ‘advanced radicals’ against the background of the formation of the Labour Party. The membership of the group included E D Morel, Charles Trevelyan and Arthur Ponsonby. While they were sympathetic to Labour they never came to a collective decision about how to work best with it, whether to merge or simply co-operate.[13] Wedgwood, Morel, Trevelyan and Ponsonby all defected to Labour in due course and in 1925, Rendall joined them.[14]