Major Major (commandant in certain jurisdictions) is a military rank of commissioned officer status, with corresponding ranks existing in many military forces throughout the world. When used unhyphenated and in conjunction with no other indicators ...

Sir Ralph (Hugo) Anstruther, 7th Baronet (13 June 192119 May 2002) was a Scottish British Army officer and courtier.

Early life

The only son of Captain Robert Edward Anstruther MC of the Black Watch, only son of Sir Ralph William Anstruther, 6th Baronet, and Marguerite Blanche Lily de Burgh, he was educated at Eton and at

Magdalene College, Cambridge Magdalene College ( ) is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college was founded in 1428 as a Benedictine hostel, in time coming to be known as Buckingham College, before being refounded in 1542 as the College of St Mary ...

Career

He commissioned into the Coldstream Guards on 29 November 1941, and was awarded the Military Cross in 1943. He later served in Malaya in 1950, and was

mentioned in despatches To be mentioned in dispatches (or despatches, MiD) describes a member of the armed forces whose name appears in an official report written by a superior officer and sent to the high command, in which their gallant or meritorious action in the face ...

. He was

Equerry An equerry (; from French ' stable', and related to 'squire') is an officer of honour. Historically, it was a senior attendant with responsibilities for the horses of a person of rank. In contemporary use, it is a personal attendant, usually up ...

to the Queen Mother from 1959 to 1998, and Treasurer from 1961 to 1998. He was made a Commander of the Royal Victorian Order in 1967, and promoted to KCVO in 1976 and GCVO in 1992. As the Queen Mother's treasurer, Anstruther had the difficult job of trying to limit her spending, which became effectively impossible in later years. He suffered two strokes, and at times appeared at Clarence House in a state of altered cognition. In 1998, he was replaced by Hon Nicholas Assheton, becoming Treasurer Emeritus, but resisted his replacement and evinced hostility to Assheton and Sir Alastair Aird, the Queen Mother's Private Secretary. The Queen Mother finally told him to go and stay in Scotland, which he did for the rest of his life. He was also a Member of the Royal Company of Archers and Deputy Lieutenant of

Fife Fife (, ; gd, Fìobha, ; sco, Fife) is a council area, historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area of Scotland. It is situated between the Firth of Tay and the Firth of Forth, with inland boundaries with Perth and Kinross (i ...

from 1960 to 1997 and of

Caithness Caithness ( gd, Gallaibh ; sco, Caitnes; non, Katanes) is a historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area of Scotland. Caithness has a land boundary with the historic county of Sutherland to the west and is otherwise bounded by ...

from 1965.

Titles

He succeeded his grandfather in 1934 to the baronetcy of Anstruther of Balcaskie, and in 1980 succeeded his cousin,

Sir Windham Eric Francis Carmichael-Anstruther, 8th Baronet ''Sir'' is a formal honorific address in English for men, derived from Sire in the High Middle Ages. Both are derived from the old French "Sieur" (Lord), brought to England by the French-speaking Normans, and which now exist in French only as p ...

, to the baronetcy of Anstruther of Anstruther. With the latter he also became Hereditary Carver to the Queen. He was succeeded to the baronetcies by his cousin Ian Anstruther.

Ancestry

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Anstruther, Ralph 1921 births 2002 deaths Baronets in the Baronetage of Nova Scotia Knights Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order Coldstream Guards officers Recipients of the Military Cross British Army personnel of World War II People educated at Eton College Alumni of Magdalene College, Cambridge Equerries Deputy Lieutenants of Fife Deputy Lieutenants of Caithness British Army personnel of the Malayan Emergency Members of the Royal Company of Archers Ralph, 7th Baronet