DUKE OF RUTLAND’S DEATH

Southland Times, Issue 24109, 24 April 1940, Page 6

DUKE OF RUTLAND’S DEATH

RESTORATION OF FAMOUS MANSION The Duke of Rutland, whose death has occurred, was the ninth duke. He was born in September 1886 and educated at Eton and Trinity College, Cambridge. He was the eldest son of the eighth duke, his mother being a daughter of Colonel the Hon. C. H. Lindsay. The family of Manners is one of the oldest among the wealthy residents of Derbyshire. Haddon Hall, now the most perfect example of old English baronial mansions, became its seat in the fifteenth century through the romantic elopement and marriage of Dorothy Vernon, daughter of the owner, with Sir John Manners. Their grandson was made Earl of Rutland. The dukedom was created in 1703. A few years later Belvoir Castle was acquired and Haddon Hall closed.

The Duke of Rutland was appointed in 1909 an honorary attache at the British Embassy in Rome. During the world war he served as a captain of the Leicestershire Regiment. His mother had been an able artist and his own chief interests were in art and archaeology. He became a member of the Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts and was recognized as an authority on some aspects of medieval art. In 1925, on the death of his father, he inherited estates of 18,000 acres, including that of Belvoir with its castle and its famous collection of pictures, and mining royalties in Leicestershire and Derbyshire. One of his first acts was to restore Haddon Hall as the family residence. He supervised every feature of the work and did some of it himself. In recognition of the efficiency of the restoration, the Royal Institute of British Architects made him an honorary Fellow. He was a brother of Lady Diana Duff Cooper. In 1926 he married a daughter of Mr Francis John Tennant and niece of the Countess of Oxford and Asquith. At the Coronation ceremony in 1937 the Duchess was one of the four peeresses who held a cloth of gold canopy over the Queen during the anointing. The Duke of Rutland was one of the few persons allowed to be present at the search for the tomb of Spenser in Westminster Abbey. i