Greig and King George VI
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Full name | Louis Leisler Greig | ||||||||
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Date of birth | 17 November 1880 | ||||||||
Place of birth | Glasgow, Scotland | ||||||||
Date of death | 1 March 1953 | (aged 72)||||||||
Place of death | Ham, Surrey, England | ||||||||
School | Glasgow Academy & Merchiston Castle School | ||||||||
University | University of Glasgow | ||||||||
Occupation(s) | Stockbroker, surgeon, royal equerry | ||||||||
Rugby union career | |||||||||
Playing career | |||||||||
Position | Forward | ||||||||
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Group Captain Sir Louis Leisler Greig, KBE, CVO (17 November 1880 – 1 March 1953) was a British naval surgeon, rugby union player, courtier and intimate of King George VI.
Greig was a successful rugby player, and was capped for Scotland and the British and Irish Lions when they took their 1903 British Lions tour to South Africa. He took part in all three tests against South Africa as well as some of the provincial matches.
The son of a Glasgow merchant, Greig was educated at Glasgow Academy and Merchiston Castle School before studying medicine at Glasgow University. Academically gifted, Greig was also an excellent rugby union and tennis player. After a few years practicing as a junior doctor in the Gorbals, he joined the navy in 1906 and won the gold medal during his training at Haslar.
In 1909, Greig entered officer training at the Royal Naval College, Osborne, where he met Prince Albert, later George VI. He lived at Thatched House Lodge at the time. He served as a mentor for the gauche and diffident prince, and the two served together in HMS Cumberland, where he was posted as a surgeon. He was transferred to the Royal Marines in 1914, and was captured at the fall of Antwerp, spending eight months as a prisoner of war. Earlier his elder brother Robert C Greig of Capelrig, Renfrewshire had founded the firm of RC Greig stockbrokers of Glasgow and London, and his elder sister Constance had married John Scrimgeour, stockbroker in London.