Edward Bruce, 10th Earl of Elgin

{{Short description|British noble}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2021}}

File:The Royal Navy during the Second World War A3177.jpg Sir Charles Gordon Ramsey, KCB, after the opening of the British Sailors Society Hostel, Rosyth, Fife.]]

Edward James Bruce, 10th Earl of Elgin, 14th Earl of Kincardine, {{Postnom|country=UK|KT|CMG|TD|CD|JP|sep=,|size=100%}} (9 June 1881 – 27 November 1968) was a Scottish nobleman and soldier. He was the eldest son of Victor Bruce, 9th Earl of Elgin and Lady Constance Carnegie. He was Assistant Private Secretary to the Secretary of State for the Colonies (1908–11) and a director of the Royal Bank of Scotland.{{cite web|title=Edward James Bruce, 10th Earl of Elgin and 14th Earl of Kincardine|url=http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw219413/Edward-James-Bruce-10th-Earl-of-Elgin-and-14th-Earl-of-Kincardine?LinkID=mp76108&role=sit&rNo=3|publisher=National Portrait Gallery}}

File:Coats of Arms of Edward Bruce, 10th Earl of Elgin and 14th Earl of Kincardine.svg

He had been a captain in the Forfar and Kincardine Royal Garrison Artillery (Militia), and when the Territorial Force was created in 1908 he became Commanding officer of the Highland (Fifeshire) Heavy Battery, RGA with the rank of Major, a position that he held at the outbreak of World War I.Burke's Peerage.Monthly Army List, August 1914. He served in the war, attaining the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel, and being mentioned in dispatches twice. In 1918–19 he was assistant director of Labour and a Temporary Colonel and Labour Commandant. After the war he received the CMG.

On 5 January 1921, he married the Hon. Katherine Cochrane, daughter of Lt.-Col. Thomas Cochrane, 1st Baron Cochrane of Cults and Lady Gertrude Boyle. In 1938, his wife was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE).[http://collections.ncc.nsw.gov.au/keemu/pages/nrm/Display.php?irn=32077&QueryPage=%2Fkeemu%2Fpages%2Fnrm%2FQuery.php Profile of Katherine, Countess of Elgin, DBE] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160408221336/http://collections.ncc.nsw.gov.au/keemu/pages/nrm/Display.php?irn=32077&QueryPage=%2Fkeemu%2Fpages%2Fnrm%2FQuery.php |date=8 April 2016 }}, ncc.nsw.gov.au; retrieved 29 March 2016.

The couple had six children:

  • Lady Martha Veronica Bruce OBE (7 November 1921 – 22 January 2023), who became governor of Greenock and Cornton Vale prisons
  • Lady Jean Christian Bruce (born 12 January 1923)
  • Andrew Bruce, 11th Earl of Elgin (born 17 February 1924)
  • Hon. James Michael Edward Bruce (26 August 1927 – 22 April 2013){{cite web|title=Hon James Michael Edward Bruce, CBE 1927-2013|date=25 April 2013|url=http://peeragenews.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/hon-james-michael-edward-bruce-cbe-1927.html|publisher=Peerage News}}
  • Lady Alison Margaret Bruce (born 17 October 1931)
  • Hon. Edward David Bruce (born 29 February 1936)

He was made a Knight of the Thistle (Scotland's premier order of chivalry) on 3 June 1933. He also held the Order of Polonia Restituta.

After the formation of the Scottish Home Guard in January 1941, Bruce was made commander of No. 3 Zone (Fife & Kinross-shire), South Highland Area. He held this appointment until the end of the war.Home Guard List, p. 49

As a Colonel in the Territorial Reserve the Earl held a number of honorary colonelcies in the Territorial Army and Canadian Militia:

On October 29, 1958, during the Dedication of the California Masonic Memorial Temple at 1111 California Street in San Francisco, Lord Elgin, then senior past grand master of the Grand Lodge of Scotland presented on its behalf a gift of a marshal's baton made of Scottish Oak to the Grand Lodge of California F.&A.M.. California Grand Marshal John T. Bond used this baton for the first time to escort Lord Elgin back to his seat. That same baton has been used each year by successive Grand Marshals to lead the ceremonial opening of the Grand Lodge of California in front of over a thousand attendees. California Grand Marshals each year are also given exact reproductions of the baton, for use at functions outside the Grand Lodge building and as a memento of their service, along with a history and symbolism of Lord Elgin's presentation."The History and Replication of the Grand Marshal's Baton" Grand Lodge of California F.&A.M.

He was also Lieutenant of the Royal Company of Archers the Queen's Bodyguard for Scotland.

In 1964, he commissioned a statue of Robert the Bruce.{{Cite web|date=7 September 2018|title= A very Canadian sort of hero? Robert the Bruce alias The Outlaw King at the Toronto International Film Festival |url= https://www.broomhallhouse.com/2018/09/a-very-canadian-sort-of-hero-robert-the-bruce/ |url-status=|archive-url=|archive-date=|access-date=8 July 2021|website=Broomhall}}

He died at the age of 87 in 1968.

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