*** Welcome to piglix ***

William Whitelaw

The Right Honourable
The Viscount Whitelaw
KT CH MC PC DL
William Whitelaw in 1963.jpg
Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
In office
4 May 1979 – 10 January 1988
Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher
Preceded by Rab Butler
Succeeded by Sir Geoffrey Howe
Leader of the House of Lords
Lord President of the Council
In office
11 June 1983 – 10 January 1988
Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher
Preceded by Baroness Young
Succeeded by Lord Belstead
Home Secretary
In office
4 May 1979 – 11 June 1983
Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher
Preceded by Merlyn Rees
Succeeded by Leon Brittan
Shadow Home Secretary
In office
11 April 1976 – 4 May 1979
Leader Margaret Thatcher
Preceded by Ian Gilmour
Succeeded by Merlyn Rees
Chairman of the Conservative Party
In office
4 March 1974 – 11 February 1975
Leader Edward Heath
Preceded by Peter Carington
Succeeded by Peter Thorneycroft
Secretary of State for Employment
In office
2 December 1973 – 4 March 1974
Prime Minister Edward Heath
Preceded by Maurice Macmillan
Succeeded by Michael Foot
Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
In office
24 March 1972 – 2 December 1973
Prime Minister Edward Heath
Preceded by Office Created
Succeeded by Francis Pym
Leader of the House of Commons
Lord President of the Council
In office
20 June 1970 – 7 April 1972
Prime Minister Edward Heath
Preceded by Fred Peart
Succeeded by Robert Carr
Chief Whip of the Conservative Party
In office
16 October 1964 – 20 June 1970
Leader Sir Alec Douglas-Home
Edward Heath
Preceded by Martin Redmayne
Succeeded by Francis Pym
Member of Parliament
for Penrith and The Border
In office
26 May 1955 – 11 June 1983
Preceded by Donald Scott
Succeeded by David Maclean
Member of the House of Lords
Lord Temporal
In office
11 June 1983 – 1 July 1999
Hereditary Peerage
Personal details
Born William Stephen Ian Whitelaw
(1918-06-28)28 June 1918
Nairn, Scotland
Died 1 July 1999(1999-07-01) (aged 81)
Penrith, England
Political party Conservative
Alma mater Trinity College, Cambridge
Religion Church of Scotland
a. ^ Office vacant from 18 October 1963 to 4 May 1979. b. ^ Office vacant from 10 January 1988 to 24 July 1989.

William Stephen Ian Whitelaw, 1st Viscount Whitelaw, KT, CH, MC, PC, DL (28 June 1918 – 1 July 1999), often known as Willie Whitelaw, was a British Conservative Party politician who served in a wide number of Cabinet positions, most notably as Home Secretary and Deputy Prime Minister.

Whitelaw was born at the family house called "Monklands" on Thurlow road, Nairn, in northeast Scotland. He never knew his father, William Alexander Whitelaw (born 1892), a member of a Scottish landed gentry family, who was killed in the First World War when he was a baby. Whitelaw was raised by his mother, whom was a local councillor in Nairn, and paternal grandfather, William Whitelaw (1868–1946), of Gartshore, Dumbartonshire, an Old Harrovian and alumnus of Trinity College, Cambridge, landowner, M.P. for Perth 1892–1895, and chairman of the London and North-Eastern Railway Company. His great-aunt, by marriage, Dorothy, was the niece of former Prime Minister and author Benjamin Disraeli.

Whitelaw was educated first at Wixenford School, Wokingham, before passing the entrance exam to Winchester College. From there he went up to Trinity College, Cambridge, where he won a blue for golf and joined the Officer Training Corps. By chance he was in a summer camp in 1939 on the outbreak of the Second World War and was granted a regular, not wartime, commission in the British Army, in the Scots Guards, later serving in the 6th Guards Tank Brigade, a separate unit from the Guards Armoured Division. He commanded Churchill tanks in Normandy during the Second World War and during Operation Bluecoat in late July 1944. His was the first Allied unit to encounter German Jagdpanther tank destroyers, being attacked by three out of the twelve of these vehicles which were in Normandy.


...
Wikipedia

...