Thomas Cochrane, 1st Baron Cochrane of Cults
British politician (1857-1951)
Thomas Horatio Arthur Ernest Cochrane, 1st Baron Cochrane of Cults (2 April 1857 – 17 January 1951), was a Scottish soldier and Liberal Unionist politician. He was Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department under Arthur Balfour between 1902 and 1905.
Background and education
Cochrane was the second son of Thomas Cochrane, 11th Earl of Dundonald, and Louisa Harriet, daughter of William Mackinnon, and the younger brother of Douglas Cochrane, 12th Earl of Dundonald. He was educated at Eton and Cheltenham College.
Military career
Cochrane was an honorary lieutenant colonel of the 4th Battalion Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, and served in the 93rd Highlanders and the Scots Guards. He served in the Second Boer War, where he was Deputy Assistant Adjutant-General. He was also a lieutenant colonel of the 2/7 Black Watch from 1914 to 1917.
Political career
Cochrane sat as Unionist Member of Parliament for North Ayrshire from 1892 to 1910. He was Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Colonial Secretary Joseph Chamberlain from 1895 to 1901 and served in Arthur Balfour's Unionist administration as Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department from August 1902 to 1905. In 1919 he was raised to the peerage as Baron Cochrane of Cults, of Crawford Priory in the County of Fife.
“Thomas Cochrane, 1st Baron Cochrane of Cults” enters the record as british politician (1857-1951). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Thomas, Cochrane and Baron can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q377175. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1857, 1951, 1902 and 1905.
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This entry incorporates text from “Thomas Cochrane, 1st Baron Cochrane of Cults” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.