Hess was hoping to see the Duke of Hamilton

Retired headmaster and Strathaven rotarian Ian Valentine gave a talk to Ayr Rotary Club recently.

The Strathaven Rotary Club member discussed the strange tale of Rudolph Hess – and his mystery visit to Scotland in 1941 on his visit to Ayrshire.

Ian began by identifying three key characters in Hess’s wartime life: Hess, himself, was born in Egypt in 1894 and, in 1914, joined the German army in Munich and fought on the Italian front before training to be a pilot.

After the First World War he enrolled at Munich University to study geopolitics and fell under the influence of the charismatic Professor Karl Haushofer, thus beginning down the road to Nazism and his eventual rise to Deputy Fuhrer.

The second person in Ian’s story was George, Duke of Kent; an amiable, but flawed, right-wing libertine who was a British air commodore in 1940; he had met Haushofer at the 1936 Berlin Olympics.

The third principal in the story was Douglas, Duke of Hamilton, who was prominent in opposition to the government and Winston Churchill.

On the night of May 3, 1941, Hess flew to Scotland and, with the aircraft running out of fuel, parachuted to safety, landing at Floors Farm, Eaglesham, East Renfrewshire.

It is of note that Dungavel House, the summer retreat of the Duke of Hamilton, was only 12 miles from the crash site of Hess’s plane.

Hess told his captors that he had an important message for the Duke of Hamilton and the local Home Guard unit escorted him to their headquarters in nearby Busby.

He was next taken to the police station at Giffnock and, after interview there, was taken under guard firstly to Maryhill Barracks in Glasgow and then to Buchanan Castle.

From there he was moved to secure premises south of the border.

When the war ended, Hess was charged at the Nuremberg trials and found guilty of crimes against peace.

Hess spent the rest of his life in Spandau prison, Berlin where he died by hanging himself on August 17, 1987 at the age of 93.