David Campion Acheson

David Campion Acheson (November 4, 1921 – August 16, 2018) was an American attorney. Son of United States Secretary of State Dean Acheson, he worked for the United States Atomic Energy Commission and served as an assistant to Treasury Secretary Henry H. Fowler.

Early life and education David Campion Acheson was born in Washington, D.C., on November 4, 1921, to Dean Acheson (1893–1971) and Alice Caroline Stanley (1895–1996). At the time of his birth, Acheson's father was a clerk for Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis. His parents had three children: (1) Jane Acheson (1919–2003), who married Dudley Brown (?-1975), (2) David Campion Acheson, and (3) Mary Eleanor Acheson (born 1924), who married William Bundy (1917–2000), an attorney, analyst with the CIA, and foreign affairs adviser to presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson

Acheson attended the Groton School, graduating in 1939. That fall, Acheson entered Yale University and joined the Naval ROTC. While he was at Yale, he was inducted in the honor society of Skull and Bones, ultimately graduating in 1942. In 1948, Acheson received a LL.B. from Harvard Law School.

Acheson's mother, Alice, was a painter, and his maternal grandparents were Louis Stanley, a railroad lawyer, and Jane C. Stanley, a watercolorist. His great-grandfather was John Mix Stanley (1814–1872), a renowned painter of American Indian life in the Wild West. Her subjects included scenes of Washington, portraits and landscapes of exotic lands she visited over the years.

Career Military service In 1942, Acheson was commissioned in the United States Naval Reserve and served until 1946 in the Pacific theater, seeing action in the Solomon Islands, New Guinea and the Philippines. He served on destroyer escorts from 1943 through 1945 and rose from ensign to lieutenant. For his service, he was awarded four battle stars. In 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson announced that Acheson was resigning from the U.S. Attorney's office to become a special assistant in the United States Secretary of the Treasury, under Henry H. Fowler. The job included overseeing the Secret Service and the Bureau of Narcotics as well as providing technical guidance for enforcement activities of the Bureau of Customs, Coast Guard and Internal Revenue Service.

Post-government service After he left the Treasury Department, he served as senior vice president of Communications Satellite Corporation, until he left for the law firm of Jones, Day, Reavis & Pogue in 1974. Together they had 3 children: who married Emily C. Hewitt (born 1944), former Judge and Chief Judge of the United States Court of Federal Claims David Campion Acheson Jr., an architect and principal of Acheson Doyle Partners Architects, who married Susan D. Sturges in 1986 Peter W. Acheson,

Patricia taught at the Cathedral School from 1959 until the mid-1960s and had earlier taught at the Potomac and Madeira Schools. She wrote books for students of American history including America's Colonial Heritage, Our Federal Government, and The Supreme Court.

Acheson died at home in Washington, D.C., on August 16, 2018, at the age of 96.

Published works This Vast External Realm (1973, W. W. Norton) Among Friends (1980, Dodd, Mead and Company) Effective Washington Representation (1983, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich) Acheson Country: A Memoir (1993, W. W. Norton) Affection and Trust: The Personal Correspondence of Harry S. Truman and Dean Acheson, 1953-1971 (2010, Alfred A. Knopf)