 Through his father, he was descended from a brother of Geoffrey de Mowbray, Bishop of Coutances, who was an adviser to William the Conqueror.Another relative, William de Mowbray, was one of the barons who forced King John to put his seal to Magna Carta in 1215; as a direct descendant, Charles travelled to Washington, DC in 1976 with a parliamentary delegation that presented one of the four copies of the Magna Carta held by the British Museum to the US Congress.He was educated at Ampleforth College and Christ Church, Oxford, and served as a lieutenant in the Grenadier Guards in the Second World War.