Frederick Brundrett

Sir Frederick Brundrett, (25 November 1894 – 1 August 1974) was a British civil servant and mathematician who served as the Chief Scientific Adviser to the Ministry of Defence from 1954 to 1959.

Education and early life Frederick Brundrett was born in Sunny Bank, Ebbw Vale, Monmouthshire on 25 November 1894. He was the oldest child of the seven sons and three daughters of Walter Brundrett, an accountant who worked for the Ebbw Vale Steel, Iron and Coal Company, and his wife Ada Richardson. He was educated at Rossall School, a public school in Fleetwood, Lancashire, where he excelled at sports. Later in life he was said to be one of the country's oldest first-class field hockey players. Although the school was not renowned for mathematics, Brundrett won a mathematics scholarship to Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, which he entered in 1913. He earned first class honours in the first part of the Mathematical Tripos in 1914 and became a Wrangler in 1916.

Career Brundrett joined the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve to participate in World War I. He was slated for duty on patrol boats but contracted mumps and was held in isolation. It was discovered that he was a Wrangler and he was reassigned to the Wireless Experimental Department at , where he spent the rest of the war. Demobilised in 1919, Brundrett, joined the scientific staff of the Royal Naval Signal School. In 1920 he married Enid James; they had one child, a son they named James Edward. For his wartime work, Brundrett was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Bath in the 1946 New Year Honours.

When Sir Charles Wright retired in 1947, Brundrett succeeded him as the Chief of the Royal Naval Scientific Service. He chose William Cook as his Director of Physical Research. The year 1947 also saw the formation of the Defence Research Policy Committee (DRPC) to advise the Minister of Defence and the Chiefs of Staff on matters of scientific policy, of which Brundrett became an ex officio member. The DRPC was initially chaired by the Chief Scientific Adviser to the Ministry of Defence, Sir Henry Tizard. Brundrett became deputy chairman in 1950 and chairman in 1954 succeeding, Sir John Cockcroft as Chief Scientific Adviser. He was also Honorary Scientific Adviser to the Ministry of Civil Aviation from 1953 to 1959. He became an honorary fellow of Sidney Sussex College in 1954 and received an honorary DSc from the University of Manchester in 1956.