Lieutenant General Sir Peter Graham, Gordon Highlander who commanded the Ulster Defence Regiment

Yahoo

20-02-2025

Lieutenant General Sir Peter Graham, who has died aged 87, held several high-profile appointments in the course of a distinguished career, including command of the 1st Battalion The Gordon Highlanders in Belfast and command of the Ulster Defence Regiment.
Peter Walter Graham was born in London on March 14 1937. His father, Walter, was a doctor who served with the Royal Army Medical Corps in the Second World War. His mother, Suzanne, was of English and French descent. Young Peter was brought up at Fyvie in Aberdeenshire and educated at St Paul's School. He loved rowing and was part of the 2nd VIII.
After basic training at the Bridge of Don barracks he attended RMA Sandhurst. In 1956 he was commissioned into the Gordon Highlanders and joined the 1st Battalion (1 Gordons) in Dover. He subsequently served as a platoon commander in Celle, West Germany, and in 1962 he accompanied the battalion to Gil Gil in the Rift Valley in Kenya.
After a spell as recruiting officer with HQ Highland Brigade in Perth, he rejoined the battalion in Kenya and was involved in operations in Swaziland following an outbreak of civil unrest that led to a widespread strike.
In 1963 he married Alison Mary Morren. The two had met in May 1960 at the regimental depot when she won the Duchess Jean competition watched by 3,500 people. The title commemorated the celebrated Jean, Duchess of Gordon, who with her husband the Duke helped to raise the original Regiment in 1794.
Alison came from Huntly in Aberdeenshire, the heart of the Gordon country, and with her grace and charm – broadcasting on the BBC Overseas Service and the British Forces Network, sending greetings to Gordons all over the world, carrying out press interviews and visiting the soldiers in Germany – she gave tremendous impetus to the regiment's recruiting campaign.
In 1965, the battalion was deployed on operations in Borneo. For his service, Graham was awarded a Mention in Despatches. A staff appointment with HQ 1st (British) Corps at Bielefeld, West Germany, was followed by a course at the Royal Military College of Science at Shrivenham, and then Staff College in Australia.
After rejoining 1 Gordons at Minden, West Germany, in 1969, to command a company, Graham was posted to Lisburn in Northern Ireland on his appointment as brigade major of HQ 39 Infantry Brigade. He was appointed operational MBE at the end of his tour.
He served as second-in-command of 1 Gordons on another operational tour to Northern Ireland, in 1973, this time to Anderstown, and then to Singapore later in the year. After an appointment as military adviser to General Sir Cecil Blacker, the Adjutant-General, in 1976, he assumed command of 1 Gordons at Fort George in the build-up of training for an 18-month operational tour in Northern Ireland, based at Palace Barracks in Belfast. He was appointed operational OBE.
In 1978, Graham returned to West Germany as chief of staff of HQ 3 Armoured Division and was advanced to CBE at the end of his tour.
Command of the Ulster Defence Regiment followed. The UDR's primary tasks were to support the Royal Ulster Constabulary by patrolling, guarding keypoints and installations, establishing vehicle checkpoints on public roads and setting up roadblocks to hinder the activities of paramilitary groups. He was again Mentioned in Despatches.
He became deputy military secretary at the MoD in 1985 and GOC Eastern District in 1986; he was appointed to the Royal Company of Archers the same year. In 1989 he was made Commandant of the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. His youngest son, Dougie, was commissioned during his appointment in December 1990 and the commissioning parade was taken by the Princess of Wales. Sir Alexander Graham, Peter Graham's brother, was Lord Mayor of London that year.
In 1991 Graham was knighted upon taking up his final appointment as GOC Scotland and Governor of Edinburgh Castle. He retired from the Army in 1993 but immediately took on the chairmanship of the Gordon Highlanders Museum, and ran it and its fundraising campaign until 2003.
In 1994 the Gordon Highlanders were amalgamated with the Queen's Own Highlanders (Seaforths and Camerons) to form 1st Battalion The Highlanders (Seaforths, Gordons and Camerons). The Army cutbacks and the loss of the regiment as an infantry Regiment of the Line were cruel blows, but Graham pressed for a lasting memorial, and the result was the erection of a statue of the Gordon Highlander in Aberdeen City.
He was Colonel The Gordon Highlanders from 1986 to 1994 and his devotion to the regiment and his fellow Gordon Highlanders continued for the rest of his life. He loved pipe music, country pursuits, hill walking, game shooting and red-deer stalking.
A proud Scot and a fervent believer in 'the Union', he spent several years supporting the Better Together Campaign. The strain took a toll on his health from which he never properly recovered.
Peter Graham married Alison, a doctor. She survives him with their three sons: Jamie was an officer in the 51st Highland Volunteers (affiliated to the Gordons); Roddy was the Master of the Mercers' Company in 2017 and a member of the Royal Company of Archers; Dougie was an officer in the Gordon Highlanders.
Sir Peter Graham, born March 14 1937, died December 30 2024
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