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Maclean of Dunconnell
Sir Fitzroy Maclean of Dunconnel, 1st Bt., KT, CBE, 1911-1996

Blazon: Quarterly, 1st Argent a lion rampant Gules, armed and langued Azure;
2nd Azure a castle triple-towered Argent, masoned Sable, windows, portcullis and flags Gules; 3rd Or a dexter hand couped fessways Gules, holding a cross crosslet fitchée Azure, 4th Or a galley, sails furled, oars in saltire Sable, flaged Gules, in a sea in base Vert a salmon Argent; At the centre point a portcullis Sable ( for difference )

SOURCES, NOTES & CREDITS: BLG 19th edition Scotland, 2001; Internet: Wikipedia article; Internet: Independent News, UK: Obituary by Frank McLynn.

Fitzroy Hew Maclean of Dunconnel was born on 11 Mar 1911 in Cairo, Egypt to Major Charles Maclean, then serving with the Queen’s Own Cameron Highlanders, and Frances Royle. Maclean was descended from the Macleans of Ardgour whose chiefs had their seat Duart Castle on the Isle of Mull. Educated at Eton and King’s College, Cambridge Maclean joined the diplomatic service in 1933. Per request he was posted to Moscow in 1937 in time to see, first hand, the purges of Stalin. He attended the trial of Bukharin, one of the revolutionary red communists.. He travelled extensively throughout the Soviet Union shadowed by the NKVD.

When WW2 started he as a diplomat was locked into a reserved occupation. He got out of this by being elected to Parliament, then joined the Queen’s Own Cameron Highlanders as a Private. In 1941 he was commissioned and sent to Africa and was seconded to the SAS under David Stirling where he distinguished himself on raids. Apparently he followed in the operational philosophy of T. E. Lawrence brilliantly and was so written up in a letter of introduction to Churchill. In 1943 Maclean was picked by Churchill with a mission to evaluate Tito. He was effective in this and became friends with Tito in addition to supporting Tito with arms and material from the West. He rose to the rank of Brigadier during the War and to Major General after.

After the War he continued to served as the MP for Lancaster until 1959 and in 1959 switched to became the MP of Bute and North Ayrshire to serve Scottish interests until he retired in 1974.

Maclean then ran a hotel and became a producer, writer and presenter of travelogues and a behind the scenes advisor to Harold Wilson and Margaret Thatcher. He was the kind of conservative who valued order and hierarchy but not a reactionary..

Maclean Married Veronica Nell Fraser-Phipps daughter of the 16th Lord Lovat and a Catholic, the widow of naval hero Lt. Alan Phipps killed in 1943 in 1946. They had two sons: Charles Edward born in 1946, his heir, and Alexander James Simon Aeneas
( Jamie ) in 1949.

MacLean received CBE in 1944, in 1957 he was created baronet of Maclean of Strachur and Glensluain, made 15th Hereditary Keeper and Captain of Dunconnel Castle in 1981 and a Knight of the Thistle in 1994.

Maclean as an author wrote more than a dozen books some of which are:
Eastern Approaches 1949
Yugoslavia 1969
Concise History of Scotland 1970
Holy Russia 1978
Tito 1980
The Isles of the Sea 1985
Bonnie Prince Charlie 1988
Highlanders: A History of the Scottish Clans 1995

Sir Fitzroy Hew Maclean of Dunconnel, Bt., KT, CBE died on 15 Jun 1996, age 85.


The artwork is a rendering by John Hamilton Gaylor.

2018 1129

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MacPhersonCluny.jpg Fitzroy_Maclean_(ca__1980).jpg MacleanDunconnel.jpg 0000_Maclagan_001.jpg Maclagan.jpg
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