St John Brodrick, 1st Earl of Midleton

William St John Brodrick, 1st Earl of Midleton

William St John Freemantle Brodrick, 1st Earl of Midleton KP PC JP DL ( December 14, 1856 - February 13, 1942 ) was a British Conservative Party politician who was a member of the House of Commons and Minister for India and for 26 years Was Minister of War . In 1907 he inherited the title of 9th Viscount Midleton from his father and was a member of the House of Lords until his death . In 1920 he was given the hereditary title (Hereditary Peerage) as 1st Earl of Midleton.

Life

Member of the House of Commons and Undersecretary of State

He was the eldest son of William Brodrick, 8th Viscount Midleton , who was between 1868 and 1870 Member of the House of Commons for the constituency of Surrey , in 1870 the title of 8th Viscount Midleton and the associated membership in the House of Lords from his father inherited and last from 1896 to 1905 Lord Lieutenant of Surrey was.

After attending Eton College , he graduated from Balliol College at the University of Oxford . On March 31, 1880, he was elected to the House of Commons for the first time for the Conservative Tories , where he initially represented the constituency of West Surrey and then from November 24, 1885 to January 12, 1906, the constituency of Guildford . At times he acted as administrator (governor) of the traditional elite Charterhouse School .

After Prime Minister Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, formed a Conservative Party government on August 3, 1886, he assumed his first government office and served as Treasury Secretary of the War Department until the end of Salisbury's tenure on August 15, 1892 (Finance Secretary to the War Office ) .

After the Marquess of Salisbury was Prime Minister again on 25 June 1895 Brodrick took over first the office of Undersecretary of State in the Ministry of War ( War Office ) and then 1898 to 1900 as Undersecretary of State in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs ( Foreign Office ) . In 1897 he was appointed Privy Counselor .

Minister and Member of the House of Lords

William St John Brodrick (caricature in Vanity Fair magazine , July 18, 1901)

On November 12, 1900, Brodrick succeeded Henry Petty-FitzMaurice, 5th Marquess of Lansdowne in the Cabinet of Prime Minister Salisbury for the first time, and served as Salisbury's successor until he was replaced by Hugh Oakeley Arnold-Forster on October 6, 1903 Arthur Balfour as Secretary of State for War . As part of a cabinet reshuffle by Prime Minister Balfour he took over on October 9, 1903 by Lord George Hamilton , the post of Minister of India (Secretary of State for India) and maintained this until the end of Balfour's term of office on 5 December 1905th

After the death of his father William Brodrick, 8th Viscount Midleton, on April 18, 1907, he inherited the title of 9th Viscount Midleton of Midleton in the County of Cork and the associated membership in the House of Lords. He also inherited the subordinate titles of nobility as 9th Baron Brodrick of Midleton, in the County of Cork and as 6th Baron Brodrick of Peper Harow, in the County of Surrey . In the following years he was from 1907 to 1913 Councilor (Alderman) of the London County Council .

Viscount Midleton which temporarily also functions as a magistrate (justice of the peace) and Deputy Lieutenant held from Surrey, was founded in 1916 Knight Companion of the Order of St Patrick .

By a letters patent dated February 2, 1920 he was raised to 1st Earl of Midleton and received the subordinate title of 1st Viscount Dunsford of Dunsford, in the County of Surrey . Most recently he held the post of High Steward of Kingston upon Thames from 1930 until his death in 1942 .

Family and offspring

Brodrick was married twice. His first marriage was on December 4, 1880, Hilda Charteris, daughter of Francis Richard Charteris, 10th Earl of Wemyss . This marriage resulted in four daughters and a son, George St John Brodrick , who inherited the title of 2nd Earl of Midleton and the associated membership in the House of Lords and the subordinate titles of nobility after the death of his father in 1942 .

The eldest daughter Muriel Brodrick was married to Dudley Churchill Marjoribanks, 3rd Baron Tweedmouth of Edlington . The second daughter Sybil Brodrick, the 1911 and 1912 maid (Maid of Honor) by Queen Mary was, was the wife of Ronald William Graham , the 1921-1933 Ambassador in Italy was. The second youngest daughter from this marriage, Aileen Hilda Brodrick, married the officer and climber Charles Francis Meade , who among other things wrote the book Approach to the Hills and High Mountains about his mountaineering experiences. The youngest daughter of this marriage, Moyra Brodrick, was the wife of Lieutenant General Henry Loyd , who during the Second World War from 1939 to 1942 General Officer Commanding (GOC) of the 2nd Infantry Division, then commander in chief of the Southern Command, and most recently from 1944 to 1947 commander of the Brigade of Guards and General Officer Commanding of the London Borough.

After the death of his first wife on August 1, 1901, Brodrick married Madeline Cecilia Carlyle Stanley on January 5, 1903, whose father served as a colonel in the Grenadier Guards . From this marriage the two sons Francis Alan Brodrick and Michael Victor Brodrick emerged, both of whom had fallen major in September 1943.

Web links

• William Brodrick at Hansard (English)
• Entry in Cracroft's Peerage
• Entry in Leigh Rayment Peerage
• William St. John Freemantle Brodrick, 1st Earl of Midleton on thepeerage.com , accessed August 17, 2015.

predecessor	Office	successor
Henry Petty-FitzMaurice, 5th Marquess of Lansdowne	Secretary of State for War 1900-1903	Hugh Oakeley Arnold-Forster
George Francis Hamilton	Secretary of State for India 1903-1905	John Morley, 1st Viscount Morley
William Brodrick	Viscount Midleton 1907-1942	George Brodrick
New title created	Earl of Midleton 1920-1942	George Brodrick