Rowe was born Heinz Peter Röhr in Ischl, Austria,[1] on 18 August 1916; his father, Richard, was Czech and his mother, Olga, an Austrian.
[1][2] In 1935, he enrolled at the University of Vienna, but he arrived at England in 1938 to read law at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge.
As an Austrian, he was interned during the Second World War, but showed signs of academic excellence in the year he had already spent at Cambridge, enough that the university awarded him a first-class degree in absentia.
In 1941, he was allowed to join the Royal Pioneer Corps in a non-combatant role, and was later transferred to the 7th Armoured Division where he served as a dispatch rider and was promoted to the rank of Warrant Officer.
He retired in 1981, having been appointed a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath in 1978, the same year he was made a Queen's Counsel.