Gilbert
Mitchison
was
born on 23rd March 1890. Educated at Eton
and New College, Oxford.
He qualified as a lawyer but on the outbreak of the First
World War joined the British
Army.
While on leave in 1916 Mitchison married the VAD
nurse, Naomi
Mitchison.
Mitchison
served with the Queen Bays on the Western
Front and promoted to the rank of major became a member of the
British Mission to French Forces in Italy.
Mitchison suffered a fractured skull in a road accident at Gamache.
When he left hospital he joined the Staff College. After finishing
his training in the summer of 1917 he obtained a staff post in France.
A
member of the Labour Party Mitchison unsuccessfully
contested the Kings Norton division of Birmingham
in 1931 and
1935. Mitchison was successfully elected
to represent Kettering in 1945.
Mitchison
was opposition spokesman on Housing and Local Government (1955-59),
Treasury and Trade Affairs (1959-61), Science (1961-63), Works (1962-63),
Treasury Affairs (1962-63) and Pensions (1963-64). On the election
of the Labour Government in 1964, Harold Wilson
appointed Mitchison as parliamentary secretary to Ministry of Land
and Natural Resources.
In August
1964 he was created Baron Mitchison and joined the House
of Lords. He also became a member of the Harlow Development Corporation
(1966-70). Gilbert Mitchison died on 14th February, 1970.
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