Alexander Augustus Frederick William Alfred George Cambridge
Major-General Alexander Augustus Frederick William Alfred George Cambridge (1874-1957)
1957 Obituary [1]
The Right Hon. the Earl of Athlone, K.G., P.C., G.C.B., G.M.M.G., G.C.V.O., D.S.O., F.R.S., who died in London on 16th January 1957, was elected an Honorary Member of the Institution in 1936.
The Earl was born at Kensington Palace on 14th April 1874, the third son of the late Duke of Teck and the late Princess Mary Adelaide.
He had been Personal A.D.C. to H.M. the Queen since 1953, and before that to the late King George VI. He was an Honorary Major-General, retired, and a late Captain Seventh Hussars and Royal Horse Guards, and Second Life Guards. He served in Matabeleland 1896, in South Africa 1899-1900, and in the 1914-18 war. From 1923 to 1931 he was Governor-General of the Union of South Africa.
During the 1939-45 war the Earl of Athlone became Governor-General of the Dominion of Canada. During his term of office from 1940 to 1946 he and the Countess were extremely popular in Canada. When the scheme for giving Canadian engineering graduates post-graduate training in Britain (which was later to become known as the Athlone Fellowship Scheme) was inaugurated, just after the conclusion of the war, it was decided in view of his strong link with Canada to invite the Earl of Athlone to become patron of the Scheme. He agreed most readily to have his name associated with it.
The Earl showed the greatest interest in the Athlone Fellowship Scheme from its inception and he attended the receptions given for the Fellows.