THE eldest son of the fifth Earl, by Emily, only daughter of the first Viscount Melbourne. He went from a preparatory school at Mitcham to Eton, and thence to Trinity College, Cambridge. On leaving the University, he entered the Royal Horse Guards, Blue, and became M.P. for Canterbury. In Lord Palmerston’s first Administration Lord Fordwich was appointed Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs,—an office the arduous duties and grave responsibility of which proved too much for his health, which was never very strong, and he accordingly sent in his resignation at the end of a few months. In 1833 he married Lady Anne Florence, Baroness Lucas, eldest daughter of Earl de Grey, and two years after he retired from public life altogether. He succeeded his father in 1837. Lord Cowper was a staunch Whig, and always supported his party in the House, otherwise he took no leading part in politics; he was extremely popular, in spite of a certain diffidence which never wore off in his contact with public and official life, or general society. Perhaps it might be said (in the case of a man of his great wealth and exalted position) to have enhanced the charm of his refined and engaging manners and proverbially musical voice. He enjoyed society, of which he was a cheerful and agreeable member, and few houses were more celebrated for their delightful reunions than Panshanger, near Hertford.
The circumstances attending Lord Cowper’s death were most unexpected and painful. He was Lord-Lieutenant of the county of Kent, a post that was in some measure irksome to him, as it entailed frequent residence in a neighbourhood where he had few acquaintances,—with the exception of Lord Sydney, one of his most valued and intimate friends. These two noblemen had arranged to go down together to Maidstone at the time of the Sessions, on the occasion of the reorganisation of the militia. But at the eleventh hour Lord Sydney was prevented accompanying his friend, as his presence was required in London in his capacity of Lord Chamberlain.
The Lord-Lieutenant therefore went down alone, and while transacting business in court he was taken suddenly ill, removed to the governor’s residence in the gaol, and died the same evening, apparently unaware of his danger.
Lady Cowper had some friends dining with her in St. James’s Square, when she was summoned in all haste to Maidstone. She started immediately, accompanied by her brother-in-law, William Cowper (the present Lord Mount Temple), and the family physician, Dr. Ferguson. But, alas! they arrived too late, for all was over.
The death of a man so much esteemed in public, so tenderly beloved in private life, caused a profound sensation; and, says the friend to whom we are indebted for these particulars, ‘few men have ever been more widely and deeply lamented.’ Lord Cowper left two sons and three daughters:—
The present Earl; the Honourable Henry Cowper, M.P. for Hertford; Lady Florence, married to the Honourable Auberon Herbert, brother of the Earl of Carnarvon; Adine, married to the Honourable Julian Fane, fifth son of the eleventh Earl of Westmoreland, both deceased; and Amabel, married to Lord Walter Kerr, second son of the seventh Marquis of Lothian.
No. 3.
THE HONOURABLE GEORGE LAMB, FOURTH SON OF THE FIRST VISCOUNT MELBOURNE.
As the infant Bacchus. A nude child.