John Buchan, 2nd Baron Tweedsmuir

John Norman Stuart Buchan, 2nd Baron Tweedsmuir

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John Norman Stuart Buchan, 2nd Baron Tweedsmuir, the son of John Buchan, 1st Baron Tweedsmuir was a "brilliant fisherman and naturalist, a gallant soldier and fine writer of English, an explorer, colonial administrator and man of business."

Early life

John Norman Stuart Buchan was born in London in 1911, the son of John Buchan and Susan Grosvenor. He was educated at Eton College. In 1930 he went up to his father's old college at Oxford, Brasenose where he graduated with a fourth Class degree in History. He passed into the Colonial Administrative Service, and served for two years as assistant district commissioner in the Uganda Protectorate, where he contracted severe amoebic dysentery.

Military service

With the outbreak of the Second World War he enlisted in the Governor General's Foot Guards and was with the first Canadian troops to land in England in December 1939.

His father died in Montreal in February 1941, and Buchan succeeded to the title of Baron Tweedsmuir and simultaneously received his army company on the same day.[1] As second-in-command of the Hastings and Prince Edward Regiment, and then as Officer Commanding, he saw action in Sicily, where he led his regiment up the Rock of Assoro, a bastion which had not been scaled in war for eight centuries. For this feat of arms he received an OBE.

He was twice mentioned in despatches. The next day, he was wounded, and invalided out to North Africa. From then on, he served with the General Staff in Italy, responsible for liaison between the British and Canadian contingents. He was later Honorary Colonel of the regiment and in 1964 awarded the CD.

Family life

In 1948, he married Priscilla, Lady Grant, the widow of Sir Arthur Grant Bt, and MP for South Aberdeen till she too was elevated to the House of Lords in 1970. He and his wife were one of the few couples to both hold titles in their own right. She died of cancer in 1978. Their daughter, Priscilla Susan Buchan was born on 22 August 1949.

In 1980 he married Jean, another Lady Grant. They moved to Oxfordshire, where he had lived as a child, and they spent the next fifteen years in Kingston House[1] at Kingston Bagpuize.

Public life

In his public existence he was the Rector of the University of Aberdeen, where he led scientific expeditions to Libya and St Ninian's Isle. For twenty-one years he was President of the British Schools Exploring Society. He also served on the boards of BOAC, Dalgety plc and Sun Alliance, among other companies. He was also chairman of the Advertising Standards Authority.

Death

In 1994 his health began to fail. In 1996, under his wife’s devoted care he was able to return to his beloved Scotland, to a cottage in North Berwick, where he died on 20 June 1996.