Derek Boileau Lang was born in Guildford, Surrey, on 7 Oct 1913. He was descended from a long line of army officers, the son of Colonel Cecil Frederick Grant Lang, an Indian Army officer, and Mabel Forbes. He was educated at Wellington. He was an accomplished sportsman. While at RMA Sandhurst he played rugby, tennis, golf, rackets and polo. He was commissioned into the QO Cameron Highlanders in 1934 and served in Sudan with the 1st Battalion. He was transferred to the 2nd Battalion in Palestine during the Arab revolt. In Feb 1938 he was posted as adjutant in the 4th Bn in which capacity he served in WW2 until his capture in 1940.
When the 4th Battalion went to France in 1940 they were part of the 51st Highland Division. They became detached from the BEF and missed out on the Dunkirk evacuation. The division defended positions south of the Somme but were driven to St Valéry-en-Caux where they put up a heroic resistance until forced to surrender. Captain Lang was manning a Lewis gun on a boat that was sunk by artillery fire. He was injured and spent a week in hospital before joining a long march of prisoners into Germany. He escaped from the column of PoWs but was recaptured and put in a prison camp in Belgium.
He made an amazing escape from this camp and made his way through France to Marseilles. He stowed away on a ship to Beirut which was controlled by Vichy France. He contacted an Englishman who helped him avoid capture and make his way to Palestine. For this exploit he was awarded the MC. By 1944 he was appointed commanding officer of the 5th Battalion, after a mix-up where he thought he was going to the Cameronians. The 5th QO Cameron Highlanders had suffered heavily in the Normandy bridgehead so that they had lost four COs and 25 per cent casualties in 6 weeks.
Lt-Colonel Lang proved to be an inspirational leader in the final phase of the Caen-Falaise battle. He was hailed as a liberator by the mayor of St Valéry when the 51st Division cleared the town of Germans in Sep 1944. The battalion advanced to Maas in Nov and Dec 1944. He had a strong sense of duty to his men, visiting forward companies however late at night and however bad the weather. He was not austere which made him popular, and he was not a stickler for obeying orders. On his own initiative he infiltrated men across the Zig Canal to seize and hold the bridgehead. This meant that the army could advance 4 days earlier than expected and he was awarded the DSO.
His first postwar appointment was command of the BAOR School of Infantry at Sennelager. In 1947 he was on the staff at Staff College. Until 1958 he had staff appointments in Australia and Canada as well as London. He then rejoined the 51st Highland Division as Commander of 153rd Brigade. He commanded the Division in 1962 and was appointed GOC Scottish Command in 1966. He initiated many projects, notably his OPMAC scheme in which the Army served the community.
Lieutenant-General Lang was appointed CB in 1964 and knighted as KCB in 1967. He maintained contact with the Cameron Highlanders before and after amalgamation. He organised the first Highland Division reunion in Perth and always attended divisional lunches and dinners. He was the leading light of the 60th Anniversary Pilgrimage to St Valéry in June 2000. His last project was a new wing of the Dutch National War Museum at Overloon dedicated to the Scottish regiments involved in the liberation. It was opened in 2001 but sadly General Sir Derek Lang died on 7 April 2001, before the opening. His obituary was published in the Daily Telegraph on 13 April 2001, forming the basis for this article.
He was married four times, firstly in 1942 to Morna Massy-Dawson with whom he had a son and daughter. She died in 1953 and he married secondly, later in 1953, Anita Maclean, who died in 1969. Thirdly he married, in 1969, Elizabeth Balfour who died in 1982. His fourth and final wife was Maartje McQueen who he married in 1983. The photo shows him as a young subaltern in 1934, wearing the dress uniform of the Queen’s Own Cameron Highlanders.
