His Grace
The Duke of Richmond
KG PC
The Duke of Richmond, 1883
President of the Board of Trade
In office
24 June 1885 – 19 August 1885
MonarchVictoria
Prime MinisterThe Marquess of Salisbury
Preceded byJoseph Chamberlain
Succeeded byHon. Edward Stanhope
In office
8 March 1867 – 1 December 1868
MonarchVictoria
Prime MinisterThe Earl of Derby
Benjamin Disraeli
Preceded bySir Stafford Northcote, Bt
Succeeded byJohn Bright
Leader of the House of Lords
In office
21 February 1874 – 21 August 1876
MonarchVictoria
Prime MinisterBenjamin Disraeli
Preceded byThe Earl Granville
Succeeded byThe Earl of Beaconsfield
Lord President of the Council
In office
21 February 1874 – 28 April 1880
MonarchVictoria
Prime MinisterBenjamin Disraeli
Preceded byThe Lord Aberdare
Succeeded byThe Earl Spencer
President of the Poor Law Board
In office
7 March 1859 – 11 June 1859
MonarchVictoria
Prime MinisterThe Earl of Derby
Preceded byThomas Sotheron-Estcourt
Succeeded byCharles Pelham Villiers
Member of the House of Lords
Lord Temporal
In office
22 October 1860 – 27 September 1903
Hereditary Peerage
Preceded byThe 5th Duke of Richmond
Succeeded byThe 7th Duke of Richmond
Member of Parliament
for West Sussex
In office
22 July 1841 – 21 October 1860
Preceded byLord John Lennox
Succeeded bySir Walter Barttelot
Personal details
Born
Charles Henry Lennox

27 February 1818 (1818-02-27)
Richmond House, London
Died27 September 1903(1903-09-27) (aged 85)
Gordon Castle, Morayshire
NationalityBritish
Political partyConservative
SpouseFrances Harriett Greville
Children6, including Charles and Walter
Parent(s)Charles Lennox, 5th Duke of Richmond
Lady Caroline Paget
Alma materChrist Church, Oxford

Charles Henry Gordon-Lennox, 6th Duke of Richmond, 6th Duke of Lennox, and 1st Duke of Gordon, KG, PC (27 February 1818 – 27 September 1903), styled the Earl of March until 1860, was a British Conservative politician.

Background and education

Born at Richmond House, London, he was the son of Charles Lennox, 5th Duke of Richmond and Lennox and Lady Caroline, daughter of Field Marshal Henry Paget, 1st Marquess of Anglesey. He was educated at Westminster and Christ Church, Oxford, where he had a short career as a cricketer. He served in the Royal Horse Guards and was aide-de-camp to the Duke of Wellington. Charles was born with the surname Lennox; when his father inherited the Gordon estates from his uncle, the father took the surname Gordon-Lennox for himself and his issue, by royal licence dated 9 August 1836.[1]

He owned 286,000 acres mostly in Banff, Aberdeen and Inverness. His Sussex holdings were 17,000 acres. By 1883, he had an income of £80,000 a year[2]

Political career

"Highly respectable". Caricature by ATn published in Vanity Fair in 1870.

March entered politics as member for Sussex West in 1841. He was sworn of the Privy Council in 1859. In 1860, he succeeded his father as Duke of Richmond and entered the House of Lords. He chaired the Royal Commission on Capital Punishment, which reported in 1866, and the Royal Commission on Water Supply in 1869, which concluded that there was a need for some sort of overall planning of water supplies for domestic use.[3]

He was made a Knight of the Garter in 1867, and filled various positions in government in the Conservative administrations of the Earl of Derby, Disraeli and the marquess of Salisbury.[4] In 1876 he was rewarded for his public service by being created Duke of Gordon and Earl of Kinrara in the peerage of the United Kingdom.[5] He was also Chancellor of the University of Aberdeen from 1861 until his death at Gordon Castle in 1903.

Family

49 Belgrave Square, his London house

Richmond married Frances Harriett Greville, daughter of Algernon Greville, on 28 November 1843. They had six children:

Ancestry

Bibliography

  • Porter, Elizabeth (1978). Water Management in England and Wales. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-21865-8.
  • Torrance, David (2006). The Scottish Secretaries. Birlinn. ISBN 978-1-84158-476-8.

References

  1. ↑ "No. 19409". The London Gazette. 12 August 1836. p. 1441.
  2. ↑ The great landowners of Great Britain and Ireland
  3. ↑ Porter 1978, p. 24.
  4. ↑ McNeill, Ronald John (1911). "Richmond, Earls and Dukes of" . In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 23 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 307.
  5. ↑ One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Lennox". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 16 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 420.
  6. ↑ "Lady Caroline Gordon Lennox". Gordon Chapel. Archived from the original on 23 April 2021. Retrieved 10 August 2019.
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