Henry Vassall-Fox, 3rd Baron Holland
Encyclopedia
Henry Richard Vassall-Fox, 3rd Baron Holland PC
(21 November 1773 – 22 October 1840) was an English
politician and a major figure in Whig politics in the early 19th century. A grandson of Henry Fox, 1st Baron Holland
, and nephew of Charles James Fox
, he served as Lord Privy Seal
between 1806 and 1807 in the Ministry of All the Talents
headed by Lord Grenville and as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
between 1830 and 1834 and again between 1835 and his death in 1840 in the Whig administrations of Lord Grey
and Lord Melbourne
.
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Holland was born at Winterslow House, Wiltshire
, the son of Stephen Fox, 2nd Baron Holland
and Lady Mary, daughter of John FitzGerald, 1st Earl of Upper Ossory and Lady Evelyn, daughter of John Leveson-Gower, 1st Earl Gower
. His paternal grandparents were Henry Fox, 1st Baron Holland
, and Lady Caroline Lennox, the eldest of the famous Lennox Sisters
and a great-granddaughter (through an illegitimate line) of King Charles II
.
He succeeded in the barony in December 1774, aged one, on the early death of his father, while his mother died shortly before his fifth birthday. He was educated at Eton
and Christ Church, Oxford
, where he became the friend of George Canning
and John Hookham Frere
. Lord Holland's uncle was the great Whig orator Charles James Fox
, and he remained steadily loyal to the Whig party.
on 5 October 1796. According to the 1911 edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica
he for a while "almost ... constituted the Whig party in the upper house." He was appointed to negotiate a treaty
with American
envoys James Monroe
and William Pinkney
, was admitted to the Privy Council on 27 August 1806, and on the 15th of October entered the Ministry of All the Talents
led by Lord Grenville as Lord Privy Seal
, retiring with the rest of his colleagues in March 1807.
Holland led the opposition to the Regency bill in 1811, and he attacked the orders in council and other strong measures of the government taken to counteract Napoleon's
Berlin decrees. He denounced the treaty of 1813 with Sweden which bound Britain to consent to the forcible union of Norway, and he resisted the bill of 1816 for confining Napoleon in Saint Helena
. He was Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
between 1830 and 1834 and 1835 and 1840 in the cabinets of Lord Grey
and Lord Melbourne
, and he was still in office when he died in October 1840.
. Lord Holland's Foreign Reminiscences (1850) contain much amusing gossip from the Revolutionary and Napoleonic era. His Memoirs of the Whig Party (1852) is an important contemporary authority. He also published a small work on Lope de Vega
(1806).
, wife of Sir Godfrey Webster, 4th Baronet (1719 – 1800), who left her husband for him. She was born Elizabeth Vassal (1771 – 1845), daughter of Richard Vassal, a planter in Jamaica
, and wife Mary Clarke, who later remarried Sir Gilbert Affleck, 2nd Baronet (d. 1808). An illegitimate son, Charles Richard Fox
, was born to them. He later rose to become a General in the British Army
. Sir Godfrey Webster having obtained a divorce, the couple were able to marry on 6 July 1797.
They had three more children: the Hon. Stephen Fox (d. 1800), Henry Edward Fox, 4th Baron Holland
, and Hon. Mary Elizabeth Fox, married to Thomas Powys, 3rd Baron Lilford
. In 1800 he was authorized to take the name of Vassall, and after 1807 he signed himself Vassall Holland, though the name was no part of his title. Lord Holland died in October 1840, aged 66, and was succeeded in his titles by his eldest and only surviving legitimate son, Henry. Lady Holland died in November 1845.
in the London Borough of Lambeth
is named after Henry Richard Vassall-Fox who was responsible for the first building development in the area in the 1820s. Roads in the area such as Lord Holland Lane or Foxley Square commemorate this connection.
Privy Council of the United Kingdom
Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, usually known simply as the Privy Council, is a formal body of advisers to the Sovereign in the United Kingdom...
(21 November 1773 – 22 October 1840) was an English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
politician and a major figure in Whig politics in the early 19th century. A grandson of Henry Fox, 1st Baron Holland
Henry Fox, 1st Baron Holland
Henry Fox, 1st Baron Holland, of Foxley, MP, PC was a leading British politician of the 18th century. He identified primarily with the Whig faction...
, and nephew of Charles James Fox
Charles James Fox
Charles James Fox PC , styled The Honourable from 1762, was a prominent British Whig statesman whose parliamentary career spanned thirty-eight years of the late 18th and early 19th centuries and who was particularly noted for being the arch-rival of William Pitt the Younger...
, he served as Lord Privy Seal
Lord Privy Seal
The Lord Privy Seal is the fifth of the Great Officers of State in the United Kingdom, ranking beneath the Lord President of the Council and above the Lord Great Chamberlain. The office is one of the traditional sinecure offices of state...
between 1806 and 1807 in the Ministry of All the Talents
Ministry of All the Talents
The Ministry of All the Talents was a national unity government formed by William Wyndham Grenville, 1st Baron Grenville on his appointment as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom on 11 February 1806 after the death of William Pitt the Younger...
headed by Lord Grenville and as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster is, in modern times, a ministerial office in the government of the United Kingdom that includes as part of its duties, the administration of the estates and rents of the Duchy of Lancaster...
between 1830 and 1834 and again between 1835 and his death in 1840 in the Whig administrations of Lord Grey
Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey
Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey, KG, PC , known as Viscount Howick between 1806 and 1807, was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 22 November 1830 to 16 July 1834. A member of the Whig Party, he backed significant reform of the British government and was among the...
and Lord Melbourne
William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne
William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne, PC, FRS was a British Whig statesman who served as Home Secretary and Prime Minister . He is best known for his intense and successful mentoring of Queen Victoria, at ages 18-21, in the ways of politics...
.
Background and education
Wiltshire
Wiltshire is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is landlocked and borders the counties of Dorset, Somerset, Hampshire, Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire. It contains the unitary authority of Swindon and covers...
, the son of Stephen Fox, 2nd Baron Holland
Stephen Fox, 2nd Baron Holland
Stephen Fox, 2nd Baron Holland, of Holland, 2nd Baron Holland, of Foxley, MP was briefly a British peer....
and Lady Mary, daughter of John FitzGerald, 1st Earl of Upper Ossory and Lady Evelyn, daughter of John Leveson-Gower, 1st Earl Gower
John Leveson-Gower, 1st Earl Gower
John Leveson-Gower, 1st Earl Gower PC , known as The Baron Gower from 1709 to 1754, was a British Tory politician, one of the first Tories to enter government in the 18th century.- Background :...
. His paternal grandparents were Henry Fox, 1st Baron Holland
Henry Fox, 1st Baron Holland
Henry Fox, 1st Baron Holland, of Foxley, MP, PC was a leading British politician of the 18th century. He identified primarily with the Whig faction...
, and Lady Caroline Lennox, the eldest of the famous Lennox Sisters
Lennox Sisters
The Lennox sisters were the daughters of Charles Lennox, 2nd Duke of Richmond in the Peerage of England and 2nd Duke of Lennox in the Peerage of Scotland, and Lady Sarah Cadogan , daughter of William Cadogan, 1st Earl Cadogan.-Ancestry:...
and a great-granddaughter (through an illegitimate line) of King Charles II
Charles II of England
Charles II was monarch of the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland.Charles II's father, King Charles I, was executed at Whitehall on 30 January 1649, at the climax of the English Civil War...
.
He succeeded in the barony in December 1774, aged one, on the early death of his father, while his mother died shortly before his fifth birthday. He was educated at Eton
Eton College
Eton College, often referred to simply as Eton, is a British independent school for boys aged 13 to 18. It was founded in 1440 by King Henry VI as "The King's College of Our Lady of Eton besides Wyndsor"....
and Christ Church, Oxford
Christ Church, Oxford
Christ Church or house of Christ, and thus sometimes known as The House), is one of the largest constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England...
, where he became the friend of George Canning
George Canning
George Canning PC, FRS was a British statesman and politician who served as Foreign Secretary and briefly Prime Minister.-Early life: 1770–1793:...
and John Hookham Frere
John Hookham Frere
John Hookham Frere PC was an English diplomat and author.Frere was born in London. His father, John Frere, the member of a Suffolk family, had been educated at Caius College, Cambridge, and would have been senior wrangler in 1763 but for the competition of William Paley; his mother, Jane,...
. Lord Holland's uncle was the great Whig orator Charles James Fox
Charles James Fox
Charles James Fox PC , styled The Honourable from 1762, was a prominent British Whig statesman whose parliamentary career spanned thirty-eight years of the late 18th and early 19th centuries and who was particularly noted for being the arch-rival of William Pitt the Younger...
, and he remained steadily loyal to the Whig party.
Political career
On a visit to Paris in 1791 Holland became acquainted with Lafayette and Talleyrand. He took his seat in the House of LordsHouse of Lords
The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster....
on 5 October 1796. According to the 1911 edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica
Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition
The Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition is a 29-volume reference work, an edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica. It was developed during the encyclopaedia's transition from a British to an American publication. Some of its articles were written by the best-known scholars of the time...
he for a while "almost ... constituted the Whig party in the upper house." He was appointed to negotiate a treaty
Monroe-Pinkney Treaty
The Monroe–Pinkney Treaty of 1806 was a treaty drawn up by diplomats of the United States and Britain as a renewal of the Jay Treaty of 1795. It was rejected by President Thomas Jefferson and never took effect...
with American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
envoys James Monroe
James Monroe
James Monroe was the fifth President of the United States . Monroe was the last president who was a Founding Father of the United States, and the last president from the Virginia dynasty and the Republican Generation...
and William Pinkney
William Pinkney
William Pinkney was an American statesman and diplomat, and the seventh U.S. Attorney General.-Biography:Born in Annapolis, Maryland, Pinkney studied medicine and law, becoming a lawyer after his admission to the bar in 1786...
, was admitted to the Privy Council on 27 August 1806, and on the 15th of October entered the Ministry of All the Talents
Ministry of All the Talents
The Ministry of All the Talents was a national unity government formed by William Wyndham Grenville, 1st Baron Grenville on his appointment as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom on 11 February 1806 after the death of William Pitt the Younger...
led by Lord Grenville as Lord Privy Seal
Lord Privy Seal
The Lord Privy Seal is the fifth of the Great Officers of State in the United Kingdom, ranking beneath the Lord President of the Council and above the Lord Great Chamberlain. The office is one of the traditional sinecure offices of state...
, retiring with the rest of his colleagues in March 1807.
Holland led the opposition to the Regency bill in 1811, and he attacked the orders in council and other strong measures of the government taken to counteract Napoleon's
Napoleon I of France
Napoleon Bonaparte was a French military and political leader during the latter stages of the French Revolution.As Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 to 1815...
Berlin decrees. He denounced the treaty of 1813 with Sweden which bound Britain to consent to the forcible union of Norway, and he resisted the bill of 1816 for confining Napoleon in Saint Helena
Saint Helena
Saint Helena , named after St Helena of Constantinople, is an island of volcanic origin in the South Atlantic Ocean. It is part of the British overseas territory of Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha which also includes Ascension Island and the islands of Tristan da Cunha...
. He was Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster is, in modern times, a ministerial office in the government of the United Kingdom that includes as part of its duties, the administration of the estates and rents of the Duchy of Lancaster...
between 1830 and 1834 and 1835 and 1840 in the cabinets of Lord Grey
Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey
Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey, KG, PC , known as Viscount Howick between 1806 and 1807, was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 22 November 1830 to 16 July 1834. A member of the Whig Party, he backed significant reform of the British government and was among the...
and Lord Melbourne
William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne
William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne, PC, FRS was a British Whig statesman who served as Home Secretary and Prime Minister . He is best known for his intense and successful mentoring of Queen Victoria, at ages 18-21, in the ways of politics...
, and he was still in office when he died in October 1840.
Writings
Holland's protests against the measures of the Tory ministers were collected and published, as the Opinions of Lord Holland (1841), by Dr Moylan of Lincoln's InnLincoln's Inn
The Honourable Society of Lincoln's Inn is one of four Inns of Court in London to which barristers of England and Wales belong and where they are called to the Bar. The other three are Middle Temple, Inner Temple and Gray's Inn. Although Lincoln's Inn is able to trace its official records beyond...
. Lord Holland's Foreign Reminiscences (1850) contain much amusing gossip from the Revolutionary and Napoleonic era. His Memoirs of the Whig Party (1852) is an important contemporary authority. He also published a small work on Lope de Vega
Lope de Vega
Félix Arturo Lope de Vega y Carpio was a Spanish playwright and poet. He was one of the key figures in the Spanish Golden Century Baroque literature...
(1806).
Family
After visiting Paris in 1791 Holland again went abroad to travel in France and Italy in 1793. At Florence he met Lady WebsterElizabeth Fox, Baroness Holland
Elizabeth Vassall Fox, Baroness Holland was an English political hostess and the wife of Whig politician Henry Vassall-Fox, 3rd Baron Holland...
, wife of Sir Godfrey Webster, 4th Baronet (1719 – 1800), who left her husband for him. She was born Elizabeth Vassal (1771 – 1845), daughter of Richard Vassal, a planter in Jamaica
Jamaica
Jamaica is an island nation of the Greater Antilles, in length, up to in width and 10,990 square kilometres in area. It is situated in the Caribbean Sea, about south of Cuba, and west of Hispaniola, the island harbouring the nation-states Haiti and the Dominican Republic...
, and wife Mary Clarke, who later remarried Sir Gilbert Affleck, 2nd Baronet (d. 1808). An illegitimate son, Charles Richard Fox
Charles Richard Fox
General Charles Richard Fox was a British army general, and later a politician.Fox was born at Brompton, the illegitimate son of Henry Richard Vassall-Fox, 3rd Baron Holland, through a liaison with Lady Webster, whom Lord Holland would later marry.After some service in the Royal Navy, Fox entered...
, was born to them. He later rose to become a General in the British Army
British Army
The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...
. Sir Godfrey Webster having obtained a divorce, the couple were able to marry on 6 July 1797.
They had three more children: the Hon. Stephen Fox (d. 1800), Henry Edward Fox, 4th Baron Holland
Henry Fox, 4th Baron Holland
Henry Edward Fox, 4th Baron Holland, of Holland, 4th Baron Holland, of Foxley, MP was briefly a British Whig politician and later an ambassador....
, and Hon. Mary Elizabeth Fox, married to Thomas Powys, 3rd Baron Lilford
Thomas Powys, 3rd Baron Lilford
Thomas Atherton Powys, 3rd Baron Lilford , was a British peer and Whig politician.Lilford was the son of Thomas Powys, 2nd Baron Lilford, and Henrietta Maria Atherton of Atherton Hall. He succeeded his father as second Baron in 1825...
. In 1800 he was authorized to take the name of Vassall, and after 1807 he signed himself Vassall Holland, though the name was no part of his title. Lord Holland died in October 1840, aged 66, and was succeeded in his titles by his eldest and only surviving legitimate son, Henry. Lady Holland died in November 1845.
Vassall ward
Vassall wardVassall ward
Vassall ward is an administrative division of the London Borough of Lambeth, United Kingdom. It is located in the North of borough bordering Southwark, in the SW9 and SE5 postcode area...
in the London Borough of Lambeth
London Borough of Lambeth
The London Borough of Lambeth is a London borough in south London, England and forms part of Inner London. The local authority is Lambeth London Borough Council.-Origins:...
is named after Henry Richard Vassall-Fox who was responsible for the first building development in the area in the 1820s. Roads in the area such as Lord Holland Lane or Foxley Square commemorate this connection.