Major General Alexander Cambridge, 1st Earl of Athlone, was a British Army commander and major-general who served as Governor-General of the Union of South Africa and as Governor General of Canada.
Prince Alexander was born in London to the Duke and Duchess of Teck and was educated at Eton College and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst. In 1904, he married Princess Alice of Albany and rose in the military ranks through his service on the western front of the First World War, receiving numerous honours and decorations.
A cousin and also brother-in-law of King George V, he relinquished his German titles in 1917, including that of Prince of Teck in the Kingdom of Württemberg, and was elevated to the peerage as the Earl of Athlone. He was in 1923 appointed as South Africa's governor-general by the King, on the recommendation of Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Stanley Baldwin, to replace Prince Arthur of Connaught, and he occupied the viceregal post until succeeded by the Earl of Clarendon in 1930.