Lord Richard Cecil, Date of Birth, Date of Death

Lord Richard Cecil

British noble

Date of Birth: 26-Jan-1948

Date of Death: 20-Apr-1978

Profession: journalist

Zodiac Sign: Aquarius

Lord Richard Valentine Gascoyne-Cecil (26 January 1948 – 20 April 1978) was a British soldier, Conservative politician and freelance journalist who was killed in Rhodesia whilst covering the country's Bush War.
The second son of the 6th Marquess of Salisbury, Lord Richard was in Rhodesia with a freelance film-maker, Nick Downie, recording material for a television documentary about the war.
Carrying a rifle and wearing a Rhodesian Army uniform, he was shot dead at close range by a member of the Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army.
The Rhodesian government reported that Lord Richard had been "killed in action"; his body was returned to the United Kingdom for burial. The Cecil family had long-standing connections with Rhodesia.
The death of Lord Richard was one of a number of events during 1978 that brought Rhodesia's Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI) to an abrupt end; it was the identity of the deceased, and the nature of his loss, that affected UDI's supporters.