VISCOUNT NOVAR

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21764, 2 April 1934, Page 9

VISCOUNT NOVAR

death announced THEIR MAJESTIES' TRIBUTE (Received April 1, 5.5 p.m.) CANBERRA, April 1 A message from London records the death of Viscount Novar. Their Majesties sent a message to Lady Novar expressing sympathy at the close of her husband's long and distinguished career. The Governor-General, Sir Isaac Isaacs, on behalf of the Government and people of Australia, lias cabled their deepest sympathy to Lady Novar. Ronald C'rauford Munro-Ferguson, Scottish statesman and administrator, who became Viscount Novar in 1920, was the son of Colonel R. Munro-Fer-guson, and was born in ]B6O. After passing through Sandhurst he obtained a commission in the 3rd Grenadier Guards. In 1884, however, he turned to politics, being elected Liberal M.P. for Boss and Cromarty. He held the seat for only a year, but in 1886 was re-

turned for the Leith Burghs, remaining in the House of Commons till 1914. Meanwhile he took a commission in the Fife Artillery Militia and later in the Fifeshire Light Horse Volunteers, in which ho.reached the rank of major. For two periods when Lord Roseberv was Foreign Minister —1886 and 1892 —Lord Novar acted as his private secretary. In 1894 he was made a Junior Lord of the Treasury in Lord Rosebery's Liberal Government, but went out of office in the following year when Lord Salisbury came into power. He was appointed chairman of the Departmental Committee on Forestry in 1902 and a year later chairman of the Indian Office Commission on Forest Service Training, as well as a member of the Royal Commission on Registration of Title in Scotlaud. In 1906 Lord Novar became Provost of Kirkaldy, but resigned in 1914 to accept the post of Governor-General of Australia, on which occasion he was awarded the G.C.M.G. He remained in Australia in his vice-regal post till 1920. At the family seat at Paith, near Kirkaldy, were a number of valuable portraits by Raeburn and he took a selection of these with him to Australia, an action which is said to have prompted the Commonwealth's enterprise in securing a representative collection of British masters for its .public galleries. In 1922 "in Mr. Bonar Law's Conservative Government Lord Novar was made Secretary for Scotland, remaining in that post under Mr. Baldwin until the Labour Government came into office in January, 1924. He was an hon. LL.D. of St. Andrews and Edinburgh and in 1926 was made a Knight of the Thistle. His widow (Ladv Helen Blackwood) is a daughter of the first Marquess of Duffer in. There is no heir to the viscountcy.