Robin Salvesen, who has died at the age of 89, was a shipping industrialist and fourth-generation scion of the Scots-Norwegian Christian Salvesen family business. A quietly spoken, courteous man, he was Vice Lord Lieutenant of East Lothian, a kirk elder, a Territorial Army major with the Royal Scots, a Conservative local councillor, a keen market gardener and a record 82-prize-winning bowman with The Royal Company of Archers, the monarch’s bodyguard in Scotland. For 25 years he was Consul General for Denmark in Edinburgh and Leith, for which he was created Knight First Class of the Order of the Dannebrog (the Danish flag). Other awards include the Scouting Silver Acorn and being named a ‘Pillar of Leith’ alongside businessman Sir Tom Farmer and Hibs legend Pat Stanton. Salvesen was the father of seven children and 19 grandchildren. His dedication to public service, shared with his wife Sari, saw them entertain a hugely diverse mix of contacts at Eaglescairnie, the family home near Haddington. An engineer by training, Salvesen held several senior executive and board positions in Christian Salvesen, the Leith-based firm founded in 1872 by his Norwegian great-grandfather Salve Christian Frederik Salvesen. Originally shipbrokers, the firm switched focus to become the world’s largest whaling business. From 1909 to 1963, it made its fortune in Antarctic waters from a base at Leith Harbour on South Georgia, 800 miles south-east of the Falklands. The mainstay of Salvesen’s career was his leadership of Christian Salvesen’s marine division, latterly focused on UK coastal transport. His knowledge, experience, and interpersonal skills found many outlets: negotiating the dockers’ disputes of the 1970s and 80s, helping adapt the fleet for the North Sea oil industry and helping pioneer company shipbuilding at the Sumitomo yard near Tokyo. During Salvesen’s career, much of it under the leadership of his cousin Max Harper Gow, Christian Salvesen became one of the largest family-owned businesses in the UK before floating on the stock exchange in 1985. The firm innovated aggressively, especially in cold storage, power generation and logistics. For decades, its giant white lorries seemed ubiquitous on roads across Britain and Europe. In 2007, the name disappeared following a merger with a French rival. Outside the business, from which he retired as a non-executive director in 2002, Salvesen held many positions related to seafaring, including the General Council of British Shipping, Lloyds Register of Shipping, the Glasgow College of Nautical Studies and the Lights Advisory Committee, which deals with lighthouses and navigation buoys. Robin Salvesen was born in Edinburgh in 1935 and brought up in Bonnington House near Kirknewton, now the home of Jupiter Artland. He was educated at Cargilfield and Fettes, where he played in an undefeated rugby first XV. He served in the 5th Battalion Queen’s Own Nigeria Regiment during National Service. His posting was to Ibadan, 75 miles north-east of Lagos. Among his trials in this hot and mosquito-ridden posting was overseeing the transfer of his company from Lagos back to barracks on bumpy roads in three-ton trucks full of soldiers, wives, children, cockerels and other livestock. In 1956, he went up to University College, Oxford, where he met Sari (née Clarke). The open house offered to students at Oxford’s Iona Society by Rev Raymond Bailey and his wife Mary inspired their own approach. Their son-in-law, the Rev Keith Ross, holds up their ecumenical partnership as an inspiration to practically minded Christians. In his 2003 memoir Ship’s Husband, Salvesen describes how, when he joined in 1959, he had to learn the business from the bottom up. He was dispatched as an engineer on six-month trading voyages. The first was on the giant whaling factory ship Southern Venturer en route from Norway to South Georgia. It was an arduous but exciting apprenticeship in icy, gale-tossed waters amid oil, whale blood and blubber. On one occasion, the engines were stilled while the ship’s surgeon successfully removed a speck of metal from his eye with an improvised instrument. Otherwise, the family name afforded him no special privileges. One often-told story has it that, introducing himself to the foreman: “I’m Robin Salvesen,” got the answer, “Aren’t we all. Now what’s your name?”. Over 60 years at Eaglescairnie, the Salvesens welcomed Territorial Army training camps, Training for Ministry weekends, overseas business colleagues, scout groups, church groups and teenage reel parties, where Sgt Ash of the TA policed the drinks table. In later life, he was an active elder at St Mary’s, Haddington, valuing his visits to the 15-30 homes of his ‘district’. Other good causes included King George’s Fund for Sailors (now Seafarers UK), the Association for the Protection of Rural Scotland and contributing to improved conditions at Scots Veteran Residences. An honour guard of the High Constables of Leith attended his funeral. Salvesen loved to be outside, whether in the market garden, at archery matches, shooting, walking the dog, fishing, family croquet, tennis, golf or playing with the children. In his final years, he enjoyed sitting in the sun watching the cows in the field, birds passing and trees swaying in the breeze. Robin Salvesen is survived by Sari, his four daughters and two sons. His youngest son Iver died in 2016, aged 47, of heart failure while carrying out voluntary work in Tanzania. His younger brother Alastair, also a prominent Scots businessman and generous philanthropist, predeceased him by three months. Obituaries If you would like to submit an obituary (800-1000 words preferred, with jpeg image), contact gazette@scotsman.com