Duke of Bronte

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Horatio Nelson, 1st Duke of Bronte

Duke of Bronte ( Italian : Duca di Bronte ) is a hereditary Sicilian title of nobility .

History of the title

When the French advanced against the Kingdom of Naples , which was allied with Great Britain, in December 1798 during the Second Coalition War , the British Admiral Horatio Nelson took over the task of evacuating the royal family from Naples to Palermo . In January 1799 the Kingdom of Naples was conquered by the French and the Parthenopean Republic was founded there. As early as June 1799, Naples was recaptured by the royalists, whom Lord Nelson supported with a British fleet. After the republican defenders of Naples surrendered against free withdrawal, Lord Nelson had them captured in the name of the Neapolitan king and had their leader, the Parthenopean Admiral Francesco Caracciolo , hanged.

In recognition of his services, King Ferdinand IV./III. of Naples and Sicily Horatio Nelson thereupon with a document dated October 10, 1799 a duchy from former church property around Bronte in Sicily . The fiefdom comprised 15,000 hectares and the residence was the former Benedictine abbey in Maniace . Since Lord Nelson had no legitimate children, the duchy and the rights associated with it were endowed with the special inheritance regulation that the respective duke can designate any relative as the next heir. With a document dated January 9, 1801, Lord Nelson confirmed the title of Duke of Bronte and the rights associated with it. In September 1801, King George III. Nelson a royal license that allows him and his heirs to use the title in Great Britain.

On the death of Lord Nelson, the Duchy in 1805 went to his brother William Nelson, 1st Earl Nelson over and then on his only daughter Lady Charlotte Nelson, what initially a conflict with the heir to the British title and goods, the 2nd Earl Nelson , led . Charlotte's marriage to Samuel Hood, 2nd Baron Bridport , gave title and duchy to the Bridport line of the Hood family in 1874. Today the 4th Viscount Bridport is also the 7th Duke of Bronte. He sold the associated lands to the Bronte Citizens' Council in the 1980s.

List of the Dukes of Bronte (1799)

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Charles Mosley: Burke's Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage. Burke's Peerage, Wilmington 2003, ISBN 0971196621 , Volume 2, p. 2873.

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