William Barron Coutts

He was born at the family home of Green Croft in Kinghorn, Fife on 26 May 1885, the son of Elizabeth Martin Barron and Robert Alexander Coutts, a bank accountant. He attended Kirkcaldy High School until 1903.[1]

Originally accepted to study latin and mathematics at the University of Edinburgh in 1904, after limited success in these fields he transferred to study natural philosophy (physics) as part of a broader science degree, again with only partial success. However, he graduated MA in science in 1909. After university he taught at George Heriot's School in Edinburgh. In 1912 he received a further BSc (Pure) by the University of Edinburgh. During this period in Edinburgh he lived in a flat at 125 Warrender Park Road.[2] In 1913 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, his proposers were Ralph Allan Sampson, John Brown Clark, Cargill Gilston Knott and James Robert Milne.[3]

In the First World War he was commissioned as a lieutenant in the Royal Garrison Artillery[4] on 24 November 1915,[5] serving in Gibraltar in the role of coastal defence.[6]

During the war he had begun to specialise in trajectory paths, range-finding and optics and obtained a post as a senior lecturer at the Artillery College within the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich near London. After the war (from 1919) he was awarded a full Professorship in Military Science, a role which he continued until 1946, shortly before he died.

In 1926 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society, his address then was given as 74 Vanburgh Park, Blackheath, London.[7]

He died at Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford on 16 December 1946.

He was married to Isabella Muirhead Allen (1884–1973). She was from Chorlton near Manchester in England.