Iain Graham Menzies (1895-1979)

Major Iain Graham Menzies, of Cannon Hall, Hampstead

Associated Houses

Dorchester House

London W1

Cannon Hall

Hampstead

He was educated at Eton where he was a member of "Pop". He joined the Coldstream Guards in 1914 and two years later was recruited from Special Reserve to serve in France during World War I with the Brigade Machine-Gun Company. He resigned with the rank of Lieutenant in 1919. He lived in London and was often at his mother's country home near Woking in Surrey. In 1964, he inherited Cannon Hall from his eccentric aunt, Muriel Thetis Wilson. He married "Alice" Liesel Stottinger whose father was a member of the Nazi party. Not sharing his politics, she came to England from Roitham in Austria in about 1937 and worked as a floor show dancer at the London Casino. Her elder sister, Friedl (Fredericka) Gaertner, had been married to a German Jew and moved with him to Palestine but after they divorced she joined Liesel in London and became the double agent "Gelatine," recruited by Menzies' brother, Stewart. He and Alice were the parents of a son (Alasdair) and two daughters (Lorna and Malise).
Contributed by Mark Meredith on 01/10/2019 and last updated on 27/01/2023.