Martin Michael Charles Charteris, Baron Charteris of Amisfield GCB GCVO QSO OBE PC (7 September 1913 – 23 December 1999) was a courtier of Queen Elizabeth II.[1]
Charteris was the son of Hugo Francis Charteris, grandson of Hugo Charteris, 11th Earl of Wemyss and a brother of the 12th Earl of Wemyss. He was educated at Eton and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst and was commissioned in the King's Royal Rifle Corps. He fought in the Middle East during World War II, rising to the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel. On his return, he married Hon. Mary Margesson (a daughter of the 1st Viscount Margesson) on 16 December 1944 and they had three children. He retired from the Army in 1951.
In 1950, he was appointed Private Secretary to Princess Elizabeth, who was then Duchess of Edinburgh and heiress presumptive to the British throne. From her accession in 1952 until 1972, he served as her Assistant Private Secretary under Sir Michael Adeane. On Adeane's retirement in 1972, he was promoted to Private Secretary. He held this post until his retirement in 1977 and returned to Eton as its Provost. He was granted the honour of being a Permanent Lord in Waiting.
In 1966, Charteris received the Grand Decoration of Honour in Silver for Services to the Republic of Austria and in 1978 he was created a life peer as Baron Charteris of Amisfield, of Amisfield in East Lothian.
Charteris was probably most notable through an interview he gave to The Spectator in 1995, in which he described the Duchess of York as "vulgar", the Prince of Wales as "whiney" and the Queen Mother as "a bit of an ostrich."
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Categories: Companions of the Queen's Service Order | Grands Officiers de la Légion d'honneur | Knights Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath | Knights Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order | Officers of the Order of the British Empire | Royal Victorian Chain | Grand Decoration of Honour in Silver for Services to the Republic of Austria | Royal Military Academy Sandhurst | King's Royal Rifle Corps Officers | British Army, World War II | Privy Counsellors of the United Kingdom | Saint Peter's Churchyard, Stanway, Gloucestershire | Notables