Lieutenant-Colonel Sir William Alexander Gordon Gordon-Cumming, 4th Baronet (20 July 1848 – 20 May 1930), was a Scottish landowner, soldier, socialite and a notorious womaniser.

After inheriting a baronetcy he joined the British Army and saw service in South Africa, Egypt and the Sudan; he served with distinction and rose to the rank of lieutenant-colonel.

The case was a public spectacle, widely reported in the UK and abroad, but the verdict went against Gordon-Cumming and he was ostracised from polite society.

[9][b] He volunteered for service in South Africa in the Anglo-Zulu War, where he served gallantly and was mentioned in despatches; he was the first man to enter Cetshwayo's kraal after the Battle of Ulundi (1879).

[15] He concluded his work with the following: The record of my doings might no doubt have been more acceptable to the general reader had it been more varied with matter other than mere slaughter, and had the tale of bloodshed been more frequently relieved by accounts of the geography, scenery, and natural history, human and bestial, of the country; but all these have been well described elsewhere, and by abler pens.

Also accompanying the party was Lieutenant Berkeley Levett, a brother officer to Gordon-Cumming in the Scots Guards and a friend of the Wilson family.

[21] During the evenings of the weekend, Edward insisted on playing baccarat, a game that was at the time illegal if gambling was involved;[22] many of the house joined in, including Gordon-Cumming, Levett and Stanley Wilson.

[24][25] After the second evening of play Lycett Green, Stanley Wilson and Arthur and Edward Somerset confronted Gordon-Cumming and accused him of cheating.

[29] In order to avoid a scandal involving the prince, Gordon-Cumming gave way to pressure from the attendant royal courtiers to sign a statement undertaking never to play cards again in return for a pledge that no-one present would speak of the incident to anyone else.

[30][31] In consideration of the promise made by the gentlemen whose names are subscribed to preserve my silence with reference to an accusation which has been made in regard to my conduct at baccarat on the nights of Monday and Tuesday the 8th and 9th at Tranby Croft, I will on my part solemnly undertake never to play cards again as long as I live.Despite the pledge of silence, rumours of the incident began to circulate and were brought to Gordon-Cumming's attention.

[38] As a result of the scandal, Gordon-Cumming was dismissed from the army the day after the trial concluded,[1][39] and he resigned his membership of his four London clubs, the Carlton, Guards, Marlborough and Turf.

[1] The same day he married his American fiancée, the heiress Florence Garner, who had supported him throughout the trial although Gordon-Cumming twice offered to break off their engagement because of the scandal.

Major Vesey John Dawson of the Coldstream Guards was Gordon-Cumming's best man and Lord Thurlow gave the bride away.

According to the former Lord Chancellor, Michael Havers, the lawyer Edward Grayson and the historian Peter Shankland, the local people did not care that society considered Gordon-Cumming a social outcast.

[1] Gordon-Cumming managed to disguise his contempt for the middle-class society to which he was now limited so that he could continue to indulge in golf, croquet, billiards, cricket, bridge and collecting postmarks.

[1] After Gordon-Cumming visited South Africa in 1913–1914, the couple rented houses in Chelsea and Pitmilly, Fife, but increasingly they began to live apart.

[2] In 1916 Gordon-Cumming ensured that the former leader of the Labour Party, Ramsay MacDonald, had his membership rescinded from the Moray Golf Club because of the latter's opposition to the First World War.

[3] William Cavendish-Bentinck, 6th Duke of Portland, a friend of Gordon-Cumming, wrote of him: I knew Bill Cumming very well, and for a long time liked and admired him greatly, both as a gallant soldier and as a fine sportsman. ...

[1] The writer Elma Napier, one of Gordon-Cumming's daughters, described him thus in late age: He never, not even when he was eighty, lost the touch of the swagger in his walk, the hint of scorn for lesser mortals, the suggestion that he was irresistible.

[2][54] In 1890, three days before the events at Tranby Croft, the Prince of Wales returned early from travelling in Europe; he visited Harriet Street where he found his mistress, Daisy, Lady Brooke, "in Gordon-Cumming's arms", which soured the relationship between the two men.