Later Dukes of Leeds.
The duke’s only surviving son, Peregrine (1659-1729), who became 2nd duke of Leeds on his father’s death, had been a member of the House of Lords as Baron Osborne since 1690, but he is better known as a naval officer; in this service he attained the rank of a vice-admiral. He died on the 25th of June 1729, when his son Peregrine Hyde (1691-1731) became 3rd duke. The 4th duke was the latter’s son Thomas (1713-1789), who was succeeded by his son Francis.
Francis Osborne, 5th duke of Leeds (1751-1799), was born on the 29th of January 1751 and was educated at Westminster school and at Christ Church, Oxford. He was a member of parliament in 1774 and 1775; in 1776 he became a peer as Baron Osborne, and in 1777 lord chamberlain of the queen’s household. In the House of Lords he was prominent as a determined foe of the prime minister, Lord North, who, after he had resigned his position as chamberlain, deprived him of the office of lord-lieutenant of the East Riding of Yorkshire in 1780. He regained this, however, two years later. Early in 1783 the marquess of Carmarthen, as he was called, was selected as ambassador to France, but he did not take up this appointment, becoming instead secretary for foreign affairs under William Pitt in December of the same year. As secretary he was little more than a cipher, and he left office in April 1791. Subsequently he took some slight part in politics, and he died in London on the 31st of January 1799. His Political Memoranda were edited by Oscar Browning for the Camden Society in 1884, and there are eight volumes of his official correspondence in the British Museum. His first wife was Amelia (1754-1784), daughter of Robert Darcy, 4th earl of Holdernesse, who became Baroness Conyers in her own right in 1778. Their elder son, George William Frederick (1775-1838), succeeded his father as duke of Leeds and his mother as Baron Conyers. These titles were, however, separated when his son, Francis Godolphin Darcy, the 7th Duke (1798-1859), died without sons in May 1859. The barony passed to his nephew, Sackville George Lane-Fox (1827-1888), falling into abeyance on his death in August 1888, and the dukedom passed to his cousin, George Godolphin Osborne (1802-1872), a son of Francis Godolphin Osborne (1777-1850), who was created Baron Godolphin in 1832. In 1895 George’s grandson George Godolphin Osborne (b. 1862) became 10th duke of Leeds. The name of Godolphin, which is borne by many of the Osbornes, was introduced into the family through the marriage of the 4th duke with Mary (d. 1764), daughter and co-heiress of Francis Godolphin, 2nd earl of Godolphin, and grand-daughter of the great duke of Marlborough.
[1] Chronicles of London Bridge, by R. Thomson (1827), 313, quoting Stow.
[2] Cal. of St Pap. Dom. (1673-1675), p. 449.
[3] Letter of Morley, Bishop of Winchester, to Danby (June 10, 1676). (Hist. MSS. Com. xi. Rep. pt. vii. 14.)
[4] Memoirs of Great Britain and Ireland, by Sir J. Dalrymple (1773), i. app. 104.
[5] Letters to Sir Joseph Williamson (Camden Soc., 1874), i. 64.
[6] Halifax note-book in Devonshire House collection, quoted in Foxcroft’s Life of Halifax, ii. 63, note.