George Herbert, 4th Earl of Powis

George Charles Herbert, 4th Earl of Powis (24 June 1862 – 9 November 1952), known as George Herbert until 1891, was a British peer.

The 4th Earl inspects the troops at Royal Welch Fusiliers parade, Newtown, Montgomeryshire (1939)

Herbert was born at Number 26, Bruton Street, Mayfair, London, and baptised at St George's, Hanover Square.^[1] He was son of the Honourable Sir Percy Egerton Herbert and Lady Mary Caroline Louisa Thomas Petty-FitzMaurice, daughter of William Petty-FitzMaurice, Earl of Kerry.^[2] He succeeded his uncle the 3rd Earl in the peerage in 1891.

He was educated at Eton College and at St John's College, Cambridge, where he graduated BA in 1885 and MA in 1905.^[3]

After gaining of his first degree, he was employed as a civil servant in the administrative branch of the General Post Office in London but resigned after succeeding to his peerage.^[4]

He was appointed Lord Lieutenant of Shropshire in 1896,^[5] a post he held until 1951.^[6] He was also a Deputy Lieutenant for the county of Montgomeryshire and JP for the counties of Montgomeryshire and Shropshire, and Alderman of Shropshire County Council. He was Bailiff Grand Cross of the Order of St John of Jerusalem.^[7]

In 1898 he was made Honorary Colonel of the 4th (Militia) Battalion of the South Wales Borderers.^[8]

Lord Powis married the Honourable Violet Ida Evelyn Lane-Fox, daughter of Sackville Lane-Fox, 15th Baron Darcy de Knayth, in 1890. They had two sons and one daughter. In 1903 Violet succeeded her father in the barony of Darcy de Knayth. Lord and Lady Powis's elder son Percy Robert, Viscount Clive, died of wounds received in 1916 at the Battle of the Somme in World War I. Lady Powis died in April 1929, aged 63, and was succeeded in the barony by her younger and only surviving son, Mervyn Herbert, Viscount Clive, who was killed while on active service in World War II in 1943 (his daughter and only child Davina inherited the barony).

Lord Powis died in November 1952, aged 90, and was buried in the churchyard at Christ Church, Welshpool. He bequeathed his family seat, Powis Castle near Welshpool,to the National Trust. He was succeeded in the earldom by his cousin, Edward Robert Henry Herbert.^[2]

References

1. The Complete Peerage, Volume X. St Catherine's Press. 1947. p. 655.
2. thepeerage.com George Charles Herbert, 4th Earl of Powis
3. Venn, J. A. (1947). Alumni Cantabrigienses, Part II, Volume III. Cambridge University Press. p. 337.
4. "Salopians of Note, No.XI. The Earl of Powis". The Shrewsbury Chronicle. 11 June 1926. p. 6.Newspaper profile. The employment was not mentioned in biographical reference books e.g. Burke's Peerage, Who's Who.
5. The London Gazette: no. 26761. p. 4207. 24 July 1896.
6. The London Gazette: no. 39302. p. 4167. 3 August 1951.
7. Kelly's Handbook to the Titled, Landed and Official Classes, 1951. Kelly's. p. 1682.
8. Mate, Charles H. (editor) (1907). Shropshire, Historical, Descriptive, Biographical. Part II - Biographical. Mate, Bournemouth. p. 7.