The son of
Major-General Alexander Hugh Gatehouse, he attended
Wellington College, before being commissioned into the
Royal Dragoons during the
Second World War. He saw service in Western Europe in 1944–1945 from the
invasion of Normandy, when he was wounded, to the German surrender. During the war, he is said to have made an enemy tank surrender at gunpoint with his pistol. Returning to civilian life, Gatehouse attended
Trinity Hall, Cambridge; among his contemporaries were
Lee Kuan Yew and
Kwa Geok Choo. Gatehouse was
called to the bar in 1950 by
Lincoln's Inn and joined the chambers of John Thompson, QC, which had a general common law practice and one in personal injury. In 1955, he moved chambers to 1 Brick Court (now
Brick Court Chambers), where he had a mixed practice, including appeals to the
Privy Council from Commonwealth countries. He became a
Queen's Counsel in 1969. Among his most important cases as counsel was
British Railways Board v Herrington [1972] AC 877, in which he acted for the
British Railways Board. Gatehouse was appointed to the High Court in 1985 and received the customary knighthood. He was assigned to the Queen's Bench Division and tried cases in the Commercial Court. == References ==