Background
He was born in Quetta in Pakistan, the only surviving child of Alexander Hore-Ruthven and Zara Eileen née Pollok.
He was born in Quetta in Pakistan, the only surviving child of Alexander Hore-Ruthven and Zara Eileen née Pollok.
Hore-Ruthven studied at Cambridge University in 1931 and met society beauty Pamela Fletcher while he was temporarily rusticated from Cambridge in 1932 for having bitten a policeman"s nose.
On the outbreak of the Second World War, Hore-Ruthven was posted to Cairo. She also worked in Intelligence with the anti-Nazi Arab Brotherhood of Freedom, while Hore-Ruthven joined the newly formed SAS. He was promoted to captain on 31 August 1941. Hore-Ruthven was Temporary Major when he died in Misurata Italian Hospital in Libya from wounds he received in a raid on a fuel dump near Tripoli.
He died on 24 December 1942, and was buried in the war cemetery in Tripoli.
A memorial fountain was constructed at Government House in Canberra.