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Alexander Duff, Duke of Fife, the last non-royal to be created duke in the British peerage

The last dukedom  in the United Kingdom created for a person who was not a son, grandson or consort of the Sovereign, was a title given to the son-in-law of a future king. In June 1889, Queen Victoria created Alexander Duff, 6th Earl Fife, as the first Duke of Fife. 

Born on 10 November 1849, he was the son of James Duff and his wife, Lady Agnes Hay. His father was a grandson of the 3rd Earl Fife and heir presumptive to the 4th Earl Fife. On 7 August 1879, he succeeded his father as 6th Earl Fife in the Peerage of Ireland. In 1885, Queen Victoria created him "Earl of Fife" in the Peerage of the United Kingdom.

On Saturday 27 July 1889, Lord Fife married Princess Louise, the eldest daughter of the then-Prince and Princess of Wales, at the Private Chapel at Buckingham Palace. By now, Earl Fife was a very wealthy man and was among Scotland’s largest landowners owning extensive estates in Elgin, Banff, and Aberdeen. The wedding marked the second time a descendant of Queen Victoria married a British subject (the first being the marriage of The Princess Louise, the Queen's fourth daughter, to the Duke of Argyll). On the day of the wedding, the Queen elevated Lord Fife to the further dignity of "Duke of Fife" and "Marquess of Macduff", in the County of Banff, in the Peerage of the United Kingdom.

The marriage of the Duke of Fife and Princess Louise produced three children: Alastair Duff, Marquess of Macduff (stillborn June 16, 1890); Princess Alexandra, 2nd Duchess of Fife (May 17, 1891 – February 26, 1959); and Princess Maud (April 3,1893 – December 14, 1945). The couple resided at Mar Lodge, a sporting lodge built for them by Alexander Marshall Mackenzie.



The first dukedom of Fife contained a remainder that provided that the titles would pass to a male heir lawfully begotten.  However, on April 24, 1900   Queen Victoria signed a new letters patent creating a second Dukedom of Fife, along with the Earldom of Macduff in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. A special remainder allowed the daughters of the 1st Duke, and then to their male descendants, to inherit his titles, in the absence of a male heir.

In 1905, King Edward VII created Princess Louise as the Princess Royal of the United Kingdom, the highest dignity that could be bestowed upon the princess of the blood. At the same time, the King declared that the two daughters of the Princess Royal would be styled as princesses, with the style and attribute of "Highness" and with precedence immediately after all members of the royal family bearing the style of "Royal Highness".

In December 1911, the Duke of Fife and his family were sailing aboard SS Delhi en route to Egypt when they survived a shipwreck. Although they remained unharmed following the sea mishap, the Duke of Fife contracted pleurisy and died at Assuan, Egypt, on January 29, 1912. His elder daughter, Princess Alexandra, succeeded to the dukedom of 1900, becoming Duchess of Fife and Countess of Macduff.

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