Sir George Grey, 2nd Baronet
Sir George Grey, 2nd Baronet, PC (11 May 1799 – 9 September 1882) was a British Whig politician. He held office under four Prime Ministers, Lord Melbourne, Lord John Russell, Lord Aberdeen, and Lord Palmerston, and notably served three times as Home Secretary.[1]
Sir George Grey | |
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| Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster | |
| In office 23 June 1841 – 30 August 1841 | |
| Monarch | Victoria |
| Prime Minister | Viscount Melbourne |
| Preceded by | The Earl of Clarendon |
| Succeeded by | Lord Granville Somerset |
| In office 22 June 1859 – 25 July 1861 | |
| Monarch | Victoria |
| Prime Minister | The Viscount Palmerston |
| Preceded by | The Duke of Montrose |
| Succeeded by | Edward Cardwell |
| Home Secretary | |
| In office 8 July 1846 – 23 February 1852 | |
| Monarch | Victoria |
| Prime Minister | Lord John Russell |
| Preceded by | Sir James Graham, Bt |
| Succeeded by | Spencer Horatio Walpole |
| In office 8 February 1855 – 26 February 1858 | |
| Monarch | Victoria |
| Prime Minister | The Viscount Palmerston |
| Preceded by | The Viscount Palmerston |
| Succeeded by | Spencer Horatio Walpole |
| In office 25 July 1861 – 28 June 1866 | |
| Monarch | Victoria |
| Prime Minister | The Viscount Palmerston The Earl Russell |
| Preceded by | Sir George Cornewall Lewis, Bt |
| Succeeded by | Spencer Horatio Walpole |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 11 May 1799 |
| Died | 9 September 1882 (aged 83) |
| Nationality | British |
| Political party | Whig Liberal |
| Spouse(s) | Anna Sophia Ryder |
| Alma mater | Oriel College, Oxford |
Background and education
Grey was the only son of Sir George Grey, 1st Baronet, third son of Charles Grey, 1st Earl Grey, and younger brother of Prime Minister Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey. His mother was Mary Whitbread, daughter of Samuel Whitbread. Grey was educated privately and at Oriel College, Oxford. Originally intending to become a priest, he instead chose law as his profession, and was called to the bar in 1826. He began a successful legal practice, but soon turned to politics.
Political career, 1832–1853
Grey was elected to parliament as a Whig for Devonport in 1832, and quickly made his mark in the House of Commons. He did not hold office in the Whig administration of his uncle Lord Grey, but when Lord Melbourne became Prime Minister in 1834, he was appointed Under-Secretary of State for War and the Colonies. The government fell in December of that year, but returned to power in May 1835, when Grey resumed the post of Under-Secretary of State for War and the Colonies (succeeding William Ewart Gladstone). He retained this office until 1839, when he was made Judge Advocate General. The same year Grey was also admitted to the Privy Council. He was then briefly Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster in 1841, with a seat in the cabinet for the first time. However, the Whigs were defeated in the general election of that year.
The Whigs returned to power in July 1846 under Lord John Russell, who appointed Grey Home Secretary, the first of his three spells in this position. In 1846, Grey, "himself a zealous advocate of hydropathy"[2] succeeded in getting passed The Baths and Washhouses Act, which promoted the voluntary establishment of public baths and washhouses in England and Wales. A series of statutes followed, which became known collectively as "The Baths and Wash-houses Acts 1846 to 1896".[3][a] This was an important milestone in the improvement of sanitary conditions and public health in those times.[2] He decided to leave his seat at Devonport, partly owing to the baths scandal, returning instead for his native Northumberland North in an 1847 by-election, from the family seat at Fallodon, which he had recently inherited from his uncle, Henry Grey.
The new baronet sat throughout the parliament in active support of Lord John Russell, until the collapse of the ministry after the scandal of the Durham Letter, and controversial Ecclesiastical Titles bull. Traditional Whigs were Protestant, among them Grey, but the liberality of authorising a catholic hierarchy changed the nature of party politics. Grey's first tenure at the Home Office notably saw him deal with relief efforts to the victims of the Irish Potato Famine and trying to subdue the Irish rebellion of 1848. The latter year also saw the peak of the Chartist movement, which staged a massive rally in London in April. In 1847, Grey had left his old constituency in Devonport. He remained Home Secretary until the 1852 general election, when, despite enjoying widespread popularity, he lost his seat.
Political career, 1853–1874
Grey remained out of parliament until January 1853, when he was returned for Morpeth. He at first refused to join the coalition government of Lord Aberdeen, but in June 1854 he accepted the post of Colonial Secretary. The coalition fell in February 1855, and the Whigs returned to office under Lord Palmerston. Grey was appointed to his old office of Home Secretary, which he retained until the government resigned in February 1858. The Conservative administration under the Earl of Derby which took office only lasted until June the following year, when Palmerston again became Prime Minister. Grey was now appointed Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, but in 1861 he became Home Secretary for the third time. The government fell in 1866, and Grey was not to hold office again. Before the 1874 general election, he was overlooked as the Liberal candidate for Morpeth in favour of miners' leader Thomas Burt. This marked the end of Grey's public life and he spent the remainder of his life in retirement at his Fallodon estate in Northumberland. In 1873 Grey took his grandson, Edward on a tour of Scotland. The train they were travellers in, pulled in at the tiny village halt of Kingussie in the Highlands, where they were met on the platform by none other than William Gladstone.
Family
Grey married Anna Sophia Ryder, eldest daughter of Henry Ryder, Bishop of Lichfield, a son of the Earl of Harrowby. They had one son, George Henry Grey (1835–1874). As his only son had predeceased him, he was succeeded in the baronetcy by his grandson, Edward. He was also to become a prominent Liberal politician, and served as Foreign Secretary from 1905 to 1916, when he was raised to the peerage as Viscount Grey of Fallodon.
George Grey was an affectionate family man, a good sense of humour and quickness of mind. He was widely welcomed by a wide variety of friends. A devoted grandfather of seven, he often accompanied out riding, even until eighty years old. Ever an enthusiastic sportsman he encouraged his family to play tennis. He was a keen reader of the classics, with a great knowledge of Latin, Greek, and Hebrew; Shakespeare's plays, Walter Scott's poetry were part of their education. To the end he was conscientious of his children's welfare. He died with them around him, aged eighty-three.[4] His eldest grandson, Edward inherited the estate at Fallodon, near Alnwick. His son and heir was:
- George Henry Grey
Notes
References
- Archives, The National. "The Discovery Service". discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk. Retrieved 19 September 2018.
- Metcalfe, Richard (1877). "Chapter IV Re-Introduction of the Turkish Bath, with Observations on the Vapour Bath". in Sanitus Sanitum et omnia Sanitus. Vol.1. London: The Co-operative Printing Co. p. 101. S.a. pp. 11–12, 16. Retrieved 4 November 2009. Full text at Internet Archive (archive.org)
- Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). . Encyclopædia Britannica. 3 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 519–520.
- Creighton, Memoir, pp.58-9 and 126-7; Fallodon, Twenty-Five Years, vol.II, app. A, p.280-1
- "London Gazette listings for 'Baths and Wash-houses Act'". London Gazette. Retrieved 5 November 2009.
- "Parliamentary Archives search portal for listings of 'Baths and Wash-houses Act'". Portcullis – Gateway to Parliamentary Archives. Archived from the original on 14 January 2013. Retrieved 5 November 2009.. Typing (or copying-and-pasting) the phrase: Baths and Wash-houses reliably yields 10 lisings, including that for the original 1846 act and its amendment of the same year, along with other results.
- Bibliography
- Dr. Creighton, A Memoir of Sir George Grey, Longmans & Co., 1901
External links
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to Sir George Grey, 2nd Baronet. |
- Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Sir George Grey
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