Obituary: Addie MacKenzie, last of the Lovat Scouts and Scotland's first male matron

Died: May 24, 2019

ADDIE MacKenzie, who has died aged 95, was the last connection with the legendary Lovat Scouts who saw such courageous service during the Second World War. MacKenzie joined the elite regiment as a teenager in 1942 and with them and the 10th Infantry Indian Division fought in the arduous advance through Italy after the fall of Monte Cassino. They battled their way through the Apennine mountains which proved a tortuous assignment as the Germans had covered their retreat by laying mines on all the major routes north.

MacKenzie followed his military service with a distinguished career as a psychiatric nurse and tutor and held various posts in hospitals throughout Scotland.

Addie (he was given the name Alastair but he was always Addie) MacKenzie was one of eight children and along with his twin sister was the son of Charles MacKenzie, a master tailor, and his wife, Margaret. He was born and brought up at Allarburn, Kiltarlity near Beauly. He attended Tomnacross School, left at 15 but on the outbreak of war joined the Seaforth Highlanders transferring, aged 18, to the Lovat Scouts.

The training was intense. It was carried out throughout the Highlands (often on the Cairngorms) and in Snowdonia. They were also sent to Jasper in the Rockies to learn personal endurance on the Athabasca glacier in Columbia.

The Lovat Scouts were given this specialist training so they could act, under the most testing conditions, covertly in the front line or behind enemy lines. Their principal aim was to disrupt the enemy’s activities by mounting patrols that caused maximum strategic problems to the Germans.

After the Armistice had been signed, MacKenzie’s regiment advanced across the Alps into Austria where they were on a detail to hunt and capture the many senior Nazi officers who were trying to flee to South America. The regiment was then posted to Salonika in Greece where, based in the Struma Valley, they were embroiled in civil unrest, helping to keep the peace between rival factions.

MacKenzie confessed years later, “Amidst these adverse conditions my mind often dwelt on the relative contentment of my prior life, some memories of the peaceful Highland village — going to church on Sunday and the honeysuckle that lined the route. I vowed then, that if a survivor of the conflict, I would be happy to remain permanently in that place.”

Eventually, MacKenzie was demobbed at the Cameron Barracks in Inverness. Two days later he was playing for the Lovat shinty team at the Glenurquhart Highland Games. The game had been a passion for him all his life and he remained a devoted member and supporter of the Lovat Shinty Club all his life.

In the late 1940s he trained as a psychiatric nurse at Craig Dunain hospital and as a general nurse at the Royal Northern Infirmary, both in Inverness. After gaining teaching qualifications in London he taught at Craig Dunain, where he met his wife, Ishbel also a nurse. MacKenzie was appointed principal tutor to Gartloch Hospital in Gartcosh, Glasgow. He then held various positions within several hospitals and proudly became Scotland’s first male matron. He was based in Stirling but his brief included supervising the care at five cottage hospitals. Finally, he became director of nursing education for the Forth Valley Health Board.

In the early 1980s he took early retirement and moved to Skerray a crofting and fishing village near Tongue in Sutherland which was where Ishbel had been brought up. He became a stalwart of the community and served with great dignity as justice of the peace and independent councillor on Sutherland district council.

Donald MacLeod, the administrator of Sutherland Community Council, served as MacKenzie’s secretary on the district council. “Addie was a delight to work with,” he told The Herald. “Very much a people’s person and totally devoted to the people and the area and always keen to be involved with local issues. He also served on the local committee of the Scottish Crofters Union.”

In 1990, after the death of his wife, he moved back to Inverness and renewed his links with shinty and especially the Lovat Shinty Club. In his youth he had been a star player at full-forward for the team. There is a photograph in the new Shinty Pavilion of the 1953 team – the winners of the Camanachd Cup - with MacKenzie proudly sitting in the front row with an impressive array of silverware at his feet. The club has also mounted a plaque in his memory.

In 2015 the club again won the Camanachd Cup. MacKenzie was not able to travel to Oban for the final but he held a celebration tea party in the Kiltarlity Coffee Shop.

Addie MacKenzie is survived by his daughter Kathleen.

ALASDAIR STEVEN