The Chief and Family
John Michael Baillie-Hamilton Buchanan of that Ilk
Chief of the Name and Arms of Buchanan
“The Buchanan,” John Michael Buchanan of that Ilk and Arnprior, was born on 14 September 1958. He is the son of John Neil Buchanan Baillie-Hamilton of Arnprior and the Hon. Caroline Barbara Barrie.
Michael married “The Lady Buchanan,” Paula Frances Hickman M.D., daughter of John Hickman, on 22 October 1994.
Michael graduated from Oxford University, Oxford, Oxfordshire, England, with a Master of Arts (M.A.). Michael is the manager of Cambusmore Estate in the southern highlands near Callander, Stirlingshire.
He has four children; Angus, Bruce, Lucy and Rory.
Mike was born in Edinburgh and for the first few months he and his parents lived at Straid, a house on Cambusmore Estate, which the American based singer songwriter, Sheena Easton, is thought to have lived at for a short while, but is now used as a B&B. Then at around 6 months old, he moved into the estate’s ‘big house’, Cambusmore, where he still lives today.
Mike then went to the local primary school in Callander until he was the right age to go to Craigflower, a prep school in Fife. From there he went to Wellington College in England and after this to Oxford University to read Engineering.
He gained an exhibition to study at Christchurch, as he had done very well in his previous exams from school.
During three hard working, but fun packed years, he rowed for a Christchurch junior eight which won their class. He also continued his hobby of rifle shooting from being in the school team at Wellington to representing Scotland in their target and match rifle teams.
Indeed it soon became apparent that he had a real ability and good eye for straight accurate shooting over both short and long distances from 25 yards to 1200 yards. As such he was selected for eight teams to represent Oxford University against Cambridge. For these he was awarded eight half blues and was in five winning varsity teams. These were in the disciplines of pistol, small bore, target and match rifle.
After graduating from Oxford with an MA in Engineering, Mike joined Sir Alexander Gibb and Partners, now part of the Jacobs Law group. He worked for them for 7 years, including two years in Sri Lanka where he helped build the Victoria hydroelectric dam and gained chartered civil engineer status.
Then Mike returned to Scotland, specifically to Edinburgh University, to study for and gain an MBA. Following this he spent two years working with a small start-up firm supplying automation equipment to industry before returning to the family patch at Cambusmore.
Soon after returning to work on the Estate with his father, Mike was selected to represent Scotland at Target Rifle in the 1994 Commonwealth Games in Victoria, Canada. Going to Canada for these games was a big privilege and adventure which I remember well, since I was Mike’s fiancee at this stage and we went over to Canada together.
Mike and his team partner achieved fourth place in the fullbore pairs in which 22 countries entered, making it the discipline with the largest entry in these games. Interestingly it is the only event in the Commonwealth Games which is open to both men and women. Mike has also toured with British or Scottish teams to Canada, Kenya, New Zealand and Zimbabwe.
After we married, Mike continued working on Cambusmore Estate while we raised our 4 children.
During this time he has been Captain of the Scottish Match Rifle team for 9 years, leading the Scottish team which beat England, Wales and Ireland to win the Elcho Shield at Bisley for a record 4 times in a row for Scotland. (Our first dog was called Elcho !)
Mike has also won the main national championship in the Match Rifle class, called the Hopton, which is competed for over ranges from 1,000 to 1,200 yards at Bisley Camp, Bisley being the National Shooting Centre for the UK.
Over 100 people enter this competition which takes place over four days of individual competitions.
The Hopton is awarded to the person who gets the highest aggregate score and as such is highly competitive and a much prized award. Mike has won the Hopton an impressive 5 times.
Mike has also been a Community Councillor (non political) and chaired or served as trustee on three charities and two other rifle clubs.
After the great honour of becoming the Clan Chief of Clan Buchanan, Mike is now looking forward to travelling round the world as much as he can to meet fellow clan members and do what he can to work with the CBSI in supporting the worldwide Buchanan Clan.
The Lady Buchanan
Paula, qualified as a Medical doctor from London University in 1987, training at Charing Cross and Westminster University London.
After qualifying, she worked for a few years in a variety of English hospitals in various medical specialities; including medicine, surgery obstetrics, gynaecology, psychiatry endocrinology, paediatrics and emergency medicine.
Fascinated by MRI imaging, she attended Oxford University to study for a PhD Clinical Biochemistry (except at Oxford they like to be a bit different and they call it a DPhil).
It was when she was there that she first met Mike, at a sporting event.
In less than a year they were engaged.
Soon after, Mike participated in the Commonwealth Games representing Scotland. Then they were married in Oxford, at the beautiful and historic Christchurch Cathedral. By a coincidence, Christchurch was Mike’s former college and her present one.
Following that, Paula was whisked off to Scotland to live in a wee cottage on the Cambusmore estate.
After having our first two children, Angus and Bruce, Paula became fascinated by research into the effects of toxic chemicals on our health. Continuing her research, she published an academic paper that many prominent scientists acknowledge to have created an entirely new field of medicine: the paper exposed the link between the toxic chemicals in our food and environment and the increasing global problem of obesity.
Paula has published two books; The Detox Diet (Penguin UK 2002) and Toxic Overload (Penguin Putram NY 2005). These publications showed the links between the toxic chemicals people are exposed to in everyday life and the main health issues of modem day life, such as cancer, lung and heart issues and a weakened immune system. The books also outline ways to make food safer and to improve health naturally using foods, natural herbs and spices.
Since then she has spent her time looking into discovering all the natural ways to improve health to reverse the damage chemicals are having on us all, as well as adding Lucy and Rory to her family!
For many years Paula has advised the Soil Association (the main body dealing with Organic Certification of foods in the UK) sitting on their food processing standards committee. She is currently a Visiting Fellow in Occupational and Environmental Health at Stirling University and for over 20 years has been conducting research into how to improve health naturally.
Now with Mike becoming the Chief, I look forward to supporting him in this role.
Angus John Baillie-Hamilton Buchanan
Younger
Bruce Charles Baillie-Hamilton Buchanan
Lucy Caroline
Baillie-Hamilton Buchanan
Rory Baillie-Hamilton Buchanan
Cambusmore estate
Seat of Clan Buchanan. The estate is home to a diverse range of activities from traditional farming, housing and forestry. Other countryside pursuits such as fishing and deer stalking are also found here (contact for availability). There are a number of other large and small activities on the estate and we are always happy to work with those who wish to make their projects a reality.
