Robert Bruce Lockhart
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Sir R. H. Bruce Lockhart KCMG |
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R.H. Bruce Lockhart in Malaya, 1909
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| British Vice Consul in Moscow | |
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In office 1912–1915 |
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| Acting British Consul General in Moscow | |
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In office 1915–1915 |
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| British Consul General in Moscow | |
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In office 1915–1917 |
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| Head of the unofficial British mission / Unofficial Ambassador to the Bolsheviks | |
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In office 1917–1918 |
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| Deputy Under Secretary of State for Political Warfare Executive | |
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In office 1941–1945 |
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| Personal details | |
| Born | September 2, 1887 |
| Died | February 27, 1970 (aged 82) |
| Spouse(s) |
Jean Bruce Haslewood (m. 1913) Frances Mary Beck (m. 1948) |
Sir Robert Hamilton Bruce Lockhart, KCMG (2 September 1887 – 27 February 1970) was a British diplomat (Moscow, Prague), journalist, author, secret agent and footballer. His 1932 book, Memoirs of a British Agent, became an international best-seller, and brought him to the world's attention.
He was born in Anstruther, Fife, the son of Robert Bruce Lockhart, the first headmaster of Spier's School, Beith, Ayrshire, Scotland. His mother was Florence Stuart Macgregor, while his other ancestors include Bruces, Hamiltons, Cummings, Wallaces and Douglases. He claimed he could trace a connection back to Boswell of Auchinleck. In Memoirs of a British Agent, he wrote, "There is no drop of English blood in my veins." He attended Fettes College in Edinburgh.
His family were mostly schoolmasters, but his younger brother Rob McGregor MacDonald Lockhart became an Indian Army general. His brother John Harold Bruce Lockhart was the headmaster of Sedbergh School, while his nephews Rab Bruce Lockhart and Logie Bruce Lockhart went on to become headmasters of Loretto and Gresham's. His great-nephew, Simon Bruce-Lockhart, is headmaster of Glenlyon Norfolk School.
At age 21, he went out to Malaya to join two uncles who were rubber planters there. According to his own account, he was sent to open up a new rubber estate near Pantai in Negeri Sembilan, in a district where "there were no other white men". He then "caused a minor sensation by carrying off Amai, the beautiful ward of the Dato' Klana, the local Malay prince… my first romance". However, three years in Malaya, and one with Amai, came to an end when "…doctors pronounced Malaria, but there were many people who said that I had been poisoned". One of his uncles and one of his cousins "bundled my emaciated body into a motor car and… packed me off home via Japan and America". The Dato' Klana in question was the chief of Sungei Ujong, the most important of the Nine States of Negeri Sembilan, whose palace was at Ampangan.
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