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Sunday, 26 May 2019

(377) Baring of Stratton Park, Barons Northbrook and Earls of Northbrook - part 2

Baring family, Earls of Northbrook
This post on the Baring family of Stratton Park has been divided into two parts because of its length. The first part provides the introduction and gives an account of the houses associated with the senior line of the Baring family. This second part discusses the houses associated with the cadet branch descended from the Rt. Rev. Charles Baring (1807-79) and sets out my account of the genealogy of both these branches of the family.

Beaudesert Park, Box, Gloucestershire


An estate near Nailsworth called The Highlands, which did not include a mansion house, belonged to Edwin Hunt in 1855. It was sold shortly afterwards to the Rt. Rev. Charles Baring, who had been appointed Bishop of Gloucester in 1856. He would have found the bishop’s palace in Gloucester to be a medieval house, much altered in the mid 18th century, and probably not an attractive or comfortable residence to Victorian eyes. He decided to build on the splendid site afforded by a steep hillside on the Highlands estate, and constructed ‘a large stone house in the Tudor style’, no illustrations of which have come to light. The architect is not recorded, but may well have been Ewan Christian, whom Baring commissioned in 1860 to design a new, muscular, episcopal palace at Gloucester, which has since become the King’s School.

In 1861 Baring sold The Highlands, on being translated to the bishopric of Durham. The purchaser was John Griffith Frith, a London banker and former East India Co. agent, who had scarcely moved into the house when a landslip caused part of it to collapse. Investigations showed that soft clay beds outcropped on the hillside, making it almost impossible to establish secure foundations for a rigid structure. Nevertheless, Frith decided to rebuild, merely taking the precaution of a site rather higher up the hill, on an artificial terrace retained by a massive stone revetment. Frith died in 1868, but the project was carried on for his widow, tenders being invited in 1871 and work completed in 1874. The new house cost about £5,600 to construct. This time, Ewan Christian is known to have been the architect, although the evocative contemporary watercolours from which the house is best known were painted by Axel Haig. 


Beaudesert Park (Glos): watercolour by Axel Haig of the entrance front, c.1874. Image: RIBA Collections.

To assist the stability of the house Christian decided on using a structural timber frame, which could both be decorative and twist to accommodate any further subsidence. The panels between the timber members are made of Dennetts concrete infill. The style adopted – a rather overblown version of the semi-timbered vernacular of the Welsh borders – was thus influenced by the materials chosen, but it also shows the influence Norman Shaw’s ‘old English’ manner was having on his peers. Curiously, having opted for this eminently picturesque style, Christian made The Highlands regular, if not actually symmetrical. On the main front, to the terraced gardens, this characteristic, together with the rather flat modelling and the first-floor verandahs, communicate the date of the house unambiguously. The service wing, running away behind the house to the east, was built of stone in a more orthodox Tudor revival style, and was originally shorter, being extended before 1911 to its present length.


Beaudesert Park (Glos): watercolour by Axel Haig of the garden front, c.1874. Image: RIBA Collections.
Mrs. Caroline Frith died in 1897, and her daughter bequeathed the house to Robert Eaton White in 1909. He put it up for sale in 1911, but it does not seem to have changed hands until 1918, when a boys’ preparatory school moved here from Henley-in-Arden (Warks). The school, which was already called Beaudesert Park School, gave this name to its new home, and the original name has since been all but forgotten. The school is still the owner today, and has erected extensive additional buildings in the grounds, to the north of the main house.
Beaudesert Park (Glos): the house in about 1985. Image: Nick Kingsley. Some rights reserved.
Despite eighty years of use as a school, the principal rooms retain many of their Victorian fittings, with carving by Harry Hems of Exeter, such as the staircase with splat balusters, stone fireplaces, panelling and beamed ceilings; the library ceiling is said to have been painted by Thomas Gambier-Parry. An elaborate terraced garden also survives on the hill below the house, with an avenue of Wellingtonias, a Gothic arbour, and an attractive octagonal gazebo containing a staircase which gives access from the top terrace by the house to the levels below.

Descent: built c.1856 for Rt Rev. Charles Baring (1807-79); sold 1861 to John Griffith Frith (d. 1868); to widow, Caroline Frith (d. 1897); to daughter (d. 1909); to Robert Eaton White, who sold 1918 to Beaudesert Park School.


Wallsgrove House, High Beach, Essex

Wallsgrove House, High Beach

A four bay two storey early 19th century stuccoed house, reputedly built in 1806, which has been dressed up at some point with a central tetrastyle portico of attenuated Doric columns, and a group of three similar columns clustered around the angles at either end of the facade supporting a section of entablature in a completely illiterate way. The house has a forecourt facing the road enclosed by curving arcaded screen walls.

Descent: Thomas Charles Baring (1831-91); to son, Harold Herman John Baring (1869-1927); sold after his death to Lt-Col. Edward North Buxton (fl. 1946)... Francis Wallis (d. 1972)... Dorothy Maud Woods (1911-98)... sold 2017 to B. Nicholaisen.



Ardington House, Berkshire




Ardington House: entrance front and side elevation.

An assured and rather urban three-storey house of vitrified grey and red brick, built in 1719-21 for Edward Clarke, whose family had occupied the original manor house (which stood on a different site) for over 150 years. His marriage to an heiress, Mary Wiseman, no doubt encouraged him to undertake the project, but it proved to be one that he could not really afford, and much of the property Mary brought him and half the Ardington estate had to be sold to meet the costs of building and his rather extravagant lifestyle. The fortunate survival of a couple of drawings relating to the building of the house (now in the Berkshire Record Office) tells us that the house was built by by Thomas Strong junior (1685-1736), whose family owned the stone quarries at Taynton (Oxon) and Barrington (Glos) and had worked extensively as masons on projects including St Paul's Cathedral, the rebuilding of the City churches after the Great Fire, and the construction of Greenwich Palace. Thomas's better-known brother Edward Strong junior (1676-1741) was certainly a competent architect, and there is every reason to suppose that Thomas was too, although they often worked on the construction of buildings designed by gentlemen architects like Christopher Wren and Thomas Archer. The late Andor Gomme pointed out similarities between Ardington and two houses firmly attributed to Thomas Archer, Chettle House (Dorset) and Marlow Place (Bucks), but concluded that Ardington was probably designed by one of the Strong brothers, using their experience of building to Archer's design at St Paul, Deptford and perhaps at Marlow Place. The house is built of brick of excellent quality and workmanship, and the symmetrical main fronts have seven bays, with a projecting three bay centre carrying a decorated pediment. The windows of the centre are segmental-headed, and plain elsewhere. The entrance and garden fronts are identical except for the doorways and the addition of a later four-column wooden veranda on the garden side. The side elevations are of three bays only, with the windows gathered in the centre, and hence appear very high; this feeling and the details are decidedly Vanbrughian. The windows are close-set and all round-arched, except for those on the top floor, which are circular. A pediment runs the whole width of the side elevation.

Ardington House: entrance hall and staircase.

Inside, the entrance hall has paired fluted pilasters flanking niches in the side walls, and runs through to the spectacular Imperial staircase at the back. This rises in two arms to return in one, and has thin, twisted balusters of a pattern identical to those on a more conventional staircase at Britwell House (Oxon). The original small reception rooms of Ardington were altered c.1790 for William Wiseman Clarke, who enlarged the dining and drawing rooms. He also did away with the original formal layout of the gardens and replaced their three canals with a larger piece of water. Further alterations were made for Robert Vernon in the 1830s, when the carved achievement of arms was added to the pediment on the garden front, and for Lord Wantage later in the century, including the addition of extra plasterwork and carved woodwork to the interior. More recent changes have been few: a tactful kitchen wing added on the east in 1961 to the designs of Hugh Vaux, and a restoration in 1980, when some of the 19th century exterior alterations were reversed.

Descent: Henry Stanley (1531-93), 4th Earl of Derby, to son, Ferdinando Stanley (c.1559-94), 5th Earl of Derby; to brother, William Stanley (c.1561-1642), 6th Earl of Derby, all of whom leased it to John Clarke (d. 1570) and his successors, of whom his grandson, Edward Clarke (d. 1630) purchased the freehold in 1606; to son, John Clarke; to son, John Clarke (d. 1702); to brother, Richard Clarke; to son, Edward Clarke (1692-1733); to son, William Wiseman Clarke (1727-90); to son, William Wiseman Clarke (1759-1826); to son, William Nelson Clarke (1799-1855); sold 1831 to Robert Vernon; to nephew, Capt. Leicester Viney-Vernon (d. 1860); sold after his death to Col. Sir Robert James Loyd-Lindsay VC (1832-1901), later 1st Baron Wantage; to widow, Lady Wantage (d. 1920); to distant cousin, Arthur Thomas Loyd (d. 1944); to son, C.L. Loyd; leased from 1939 and sold 1960 to Desmond Charles Nigel Baring (1914-91); to son, Nigel Baring (b. 1940); gifted 2012 to Lorne Baring (b. 1970).


Baring family of Stratton Park, Earls of Northbrook


Johann Baring (1697-1748)
Baring, Johann (later John) (1697-1748). Posthumous son of Rev. Franz Baring (1657-97), Lutheran pastor and professor of theology at Bremen (Germany) and his wife Rebecca Vogds, born 31 January 1697. He emigrated to England in 1717  as the apprentice of a wool merchant at Exeter, but on the completion of his articles decided to remain in England rather than returning to Bremen; he was naturalised in 1723 and Anglicised his forename to John. He established himself as a merchant and cloth manufacturer in Exeter and quickly built a profitable business, which his widow continued after his death, growing a capital of £40,000 at the time of John's death to £70,000 in 1766. He was 'a man of exceeding good parts, of a most pleasant, excellent disposition' with 'an admirable head and an excellent heart' but he suffered from increasingly poor health and passed the last part of his life 'very uncomfortably'. He invested his profits in property, and became a significant landowner, and it was said that in Exeter, only he, the bishop, and the recorder kept their own carriages. He married, 15 February 1728/9, Elizabeth (1702-66), daughter and heiress of John Vowler of Exeter, grocer, and had issue:
(1) John Baring (1730-1816) (q.v.);
(2) Thomas Vowler Baring (1733-58), born 19 January 1733; married, 24 August 1758, Elizabeth (1733-1818), daughter of Francis Parker of Blagdon, but had no issue (she m2, 9 January 1763, William Spicer MP (c.1735-88) of Exeter, and had issue five sons and five daughters, including a son who bought Courtlands in 1829); he died 25 August 1758;
(3) Sir Francis Baring (1740-1810), 1st bt. (q.v.);
(4) Charles Baring (1742-1829), born 28 October 1742; apprenticed to a London merchant but was recalled to Exeter in 1758 on the death of his brother Thomas before he had had much opportunity to gain experience; in 1762 he became the managing partner in the family's Exeter house; he was a poor businessman, displaying a tendency to snatch 'at every new project that offered' and forming 'partnerships, connections and speculations, of a wild, strange, incoherent description' none of which proved successful; he had repeatedly to be bailed out by his brothers and when the affairs of the Exeter partnership were finally wound up in 1801 he had to accept a loan from Francis which the latter made contemptuously clear that he did not expect to see repaid; lived at Courtlands, Exmouth (Devon), which he rebuilt c.1800; he married, 6 September 1767, Margaret (1743?-1812), daughter and heiress of William Drake Gould of Lew Trenchard (Devon) and had issue [from whom descend the Baring-Gould family of Lew Trenchard who will be the subject of a future post]; died 13 January 1829; will proved in the PCC, 29 April 1829;
(5) Elizabeth Baring (1744-1809), born 21 July 1744; married, 31 March 1780, John Dunning MP (1731-83), later 1st Baron Ashburton, lawyer and politician, and had issue two sons (one of whom died in infancy and the other without issue); as a widow she built Sandridge Park, Stoke Gabriel (Devon) to the designs of John Nash in 1805; died 23 March 1809; will proved 2 March 1809.
He lived in Exeter until 1737, when he bought Larkbeare House, a villa with 37 acres on the edge of the city. In 1747 he purchased Lindridge House at Bishopsteignton (Devon).
He is thought to have died of tuberculosis, and was buried 3 November 1748; his will was proved in the PCC, 25 November 1748. His widow was buried 16 April 1766; her will was proved in the PCC, 5 May 1766.


John Baring (1730-1816)
Baring, John (1730-1816). Eldest son of Johann (later John) Baring (1697-1748) and his wife Elizabeth, daughter of John Vowler of Bellair, born in Exeter, 5 October 1730. Educated at Exeter and Geneva (Switzerland). He travelled on the continent for a period before 1755, and on his return entered into partnership with his younger brothers Francis (in London) and Charles (in Exeter) as merchants, but was always a sleeping partner, engaging his capital in the businesses in return for a share of the profits but not taking an active part in their management; his mother also remained an active force in the business until her death in 1766. He was 'a gregarious, easy-going character' who was not cut out for a life in business and found the life of a gentleman more satisfying. He stood unsuccessfully for Parliament in Honiton in 1774, but was elected two years later, after an election costing £6,000, as MP for Exeter and held the seat from 1776-1800. In 1790 he successfully fought an even more expensive election against Sir Charles Warwick Bampfylde, 5th bt., of Poltimore, which cost him £10,000 and brought Bampfylde 'face to face with ruin'. He remained in partnership with his brothers until 1800 and retired in prosperity, but in old age with the loss of three of his children he declined into melancholic solitude. He was a tall, thin man, known behind his back as 'Old Turkey Legs'. He married, 24 November 1757 at St Leonard, Exeter, Anne (1729-65), daughter of Francis Parker of Blagdon (Devon) and had issue:
(1) Anne Baring (1758-1804), born 28 September and baptised at St Leonard, Exeter, 1 October 1758; died unmarried, 20 May and was buried at St Leonard, Exeter, 23 May 1804;
(2) Elizabeth Baring (1759-1801), born 22 November and baptised at St Leonard, Exeter, 25 November 1759; died unmarried in London, 2 April, and was buried at St Leonard, Exeter, 16 April 1801;
(3) John Baring (1760-1837), baptised at St Leonard, Exeter, 29 October 1761; inherited Larkbeare and Mount Radford from his father but sold them to his cousin, Sir Thomas Baring, in 1817; he was unmarried but co-habited in London with Miss Elizabeth Webber, to whom he left much of his property; died 21 January 1837 and was buried at Kensal Green (Middx), 28 January 1837; will proved in the PCC, 24 March 1837;
(4) Francis Baring (1762-1810), baptised at St Leonard, Exeter, 6 July 1762; unmarried and without issue; committed suicide and was buried at St George, Hanover Sq., London, 28 August 1810;
(5) Charlotte Baring (1763-1833), born 16 September and baptised at St Leonard, Exeter, 19 September 1763; married, 22 November 1786 at St Leonard, Exeter, John Jeffrey Short (1753-1801), son of John Short of Exeter, and had issue two sons and four daughters; died 14 May 1833;
(6) Margaret Baring (1765-1851), born 20 January and baptised at St Leonard, Exeter, 23 January 1765; lived at Exeter; died unmarried, Jan-Feb 1851; will proved in the PCC, 26 March 1851. 
He inherited Larkbeare House and Lindridge House from his father in 1748. He purchased the Mount Radford estate adjoining Larkbeare in 1755 and rebuilt it. He sold Lindridge House in 1765.
He was buried at St Leonard, Exeter, 1 February 1816; his will was proved in the PCC, 1 March 1816. His wife was buried at St Leonard, Exeter, 25 January 1765.


Sir Francis Baring, 1st bt.
Baring, Sir Francis (1740-1810), 1st bt. Third son of Johann (later John) Baring (1697-1748) and his wife Elizabeth, daughter of John Vowler of Bellair, born at Larkbeare, 18 April 1740. Educated at Mr. Fargue's French school in Hoxton (Middx) and Mr Fuller's academy in Lothbury, London, where he showed an aptitude for algebra and mental arithmetic and an ability for sustained concentration which put him far ahead of his fellow pupils; he was then apprenticed to Samuel Touchet, a Manchester and West Indies merchant in London, 1755-62. Immediately after completing his indentures he joined his brothers John and Charles in establishing two firms (John & Francis Baring of London, and John & Charles Baring of Exeter), which remained inter-dependent until 1777; John was a sleeping partner while Francis managed the London business and Charles that in Exeter. The London business took over some accounts from a family friend, Nathaniel Paice, who was retiring, and also acted as London agent for a number of Exeter firms, but soon moved on to agency for overseas merchants, trading speculations, and marketing government stocks, helping the British government to fund the Napoleonic wars and the American government to purchase Louisiana from the French. He had much to learn and the firm lost money in eight of its first fourteen years, though his position was assisted by legacies totalling £20,000 which his wife received from her father and her uncle Thomas Herring, Archbishop of Canterbury. From 1777, when he severed the connection with his brother's Exeter business, the London firm was steadily profitable and the firm's capital and profits grew almost exponentially, the profits peaking at £200,000 in the exceptional year of 1802. By the 1790s he estimated that his concerns had been 'more extensive and upon a larger scale than any merchant in this or any other country'In 1781 he promoted J.F. Mesturas, one of his clerks, to be a partner in the firm (he retired in 1795) and also made his son-in-law, Charles Wall, husband of his daughter Harriet, a partner; his brother John withdrew in 1800 and the firm became 'Sir Francis Baring & Co.', and Sir Francis himself began withdrawing from 1803, leaving the business in the hands of Wall and his sons Thomas, Alexander and Henry, whereupon the name changed again to 'Baring Bros. & Co.'. He was a Director of Royal Exchange Assurance, 1771-80 and the East India Company, 1779-1810 (Chairman, 1792-93); and from 1782 provided mercantile advice to Lord Lansdowne as Prime Minister, a role that continued after Pitt took over as Prime Minister despite their political differences. He was Whig MP for Grampound, 1784-90, Wycombe, 1794-96 and 1802-06, and for Calne, 1796-1802. He was created a baronet, 29 May 1793. He was partially deaf from an early age. In semi-retirement from 1803, he interested himself in furnishing Stratton Park with fine furniture and Old Master paintings (especially 17th century Dutch artists). He married, 12 May 1767, Harriet (1750-1804), daughter and co-heir of William Herring of Croydon (Surrey), and had issue:
(1) Harriet Baring (1768-1838) [for whom see my post on the Baring family of Norman Court];
(2) Maria Baring (1769-1835), born 27 September and baptised at St Gabriel, Fenchurch St., London, 25 October 1769; married, 1 September 1790 at Beddington (Surrey), Richard Stainforth (1759-1824), and had issue nine sons and four daughters; lived latterly at Walthamstow (Essex); died 12 April and was buried at Holy Trinity, Clapham (Surrey), 18 April 1835; will proved in the PCC, 6 June 1835;
(3) Dorothy Elizabeth Baring (1771-1859), born 13 February and baptised at St Gabriel, Fenchurch St., London, 14 March 1771; married, 26 November 1796, Peter Cesar Labouchere (1772-1839), banker with Hope & Co., of Amsterdam (The Netherlands), and had issue two sons; died 15 May 1859; will proved 16 June 1859 (effects under £35,000);
(4) Sir Thomas Baring (1772-1848), 2nd bt. (q.v.);
(5) Alexander Baring (1773-1848), 1st Baron Ashburton of the 2nd creation [for whom see my next post];
(6) Catherine Baring (1775-76), born 25 February and baptised at St Gabriel, Fenchurch St., London, 27 March 1775; died in infancy and was buried at St Gabriel, Fenchurch St., London, 13 February 1776;
(7) Henry Baring (1776-1848) [for whom see my post on the Baring family of Membland and Lambay, Barons Revelstoke];
(8) William Baring (1779-1820) [for whom see my post on the Baring family of Norman Court];
(9) George Baring (1781-1854), born 23 September and baptised at St Gabriel, Fenchurch St., London, 24 October 1781; a writer with the East India Co. from 1801, where he lost a lot of money speculating in opium; on leaving India he entered Magdalene College, Cambridge (admitted 1813), became a clergyman (ordained deacon, 1813 and priest, 1814) and was appointed vicar of Winterbourne Stoke (Wilts), 1814-15, but he joined the group around his sister Harriet as one of the leaders of the 'Western schism' from the Church of England and resigned his living to settle at Walford House near Taunton (Somerset), where he preached at the Octagon Chapel until his extravagant lifestyle led to his bankruptcy in 1828; he was then packed off to Italy by his brothers and spent many years in Florence and Bologna before returning to England to live quietly near Southampton; he married, 6 March 1806 at Calcutta (India), against his father's wishes, Harriet Rochfort (1785-1838), second daughter of Sir John Hadley D'Oyly, 6th bt. and had issue four sons and ten daughters (described as 'tall, raw-boned, vulgar misses, very underbred and unladylike in their conversation and manners' by Henry Fox); died at Cumberland Villa, Shirley (Hants), 4 October 1854;
(10) Frances Baring (1783-1825), born 31 January and baptised at St Gabriel, Fenchurch St., London, 1 March 1783; married, 12 July 1806 at Beddington, Thomas Read Kemp (1782-1844) of Dale Park (Sussex), developer of the Kemp Town estate, Brighton (Sussex), and had issue two sons and four daughters; died 8 March and was buried at St Nicholas, Brighton, 10 March 1825;
(11) Lydia Baring (1786-1854), born at Putney, 4 December 1786 and baptised at St Gabriel, Fenchurch St., London, 4 January 1787; married, 20 December 1806 at Beddington, Rev. Philip Lacock Story (1782-1843), son of the Rev. Philip Lacock Story of Lockington Hall (Leics) and had issue one son and four daughters; lived at Brighton and later at Torquay (Devon); buried at Lockington, 25 January 1854; will proved in PCC, 9 February 1854.
He lived in London. From about 1790 he began building up an estate around Camden House, Beddington (Surrey), and he added Lee Manor House (Kent) to this in 1796 and also land in Buckinghamshire. In 1801 he acquired the Stratton Park estate in Hampshire and remodelled the house to the designs of George Dance. 
He died 11/12 September 1810 and was buried at Micheldever; his will was proved 4 December 1810 (wealth at death over £500,000). His wife died 3 December 1804.


Sir Thomas Baring, 2nd bt.
Baring, Sir Thomas (1772-1848), 2nd bt. Eldest son of Sir Francis Baring (1740-1810), 1st bt. and his wife Harriet, daughter and co-heir of William Herring of Croydon (Surrey), born 12 June 1772. Educated at Amsterdam (The Netherlands). A writer to the East India Company at Calcutta (India), 1790-98; a partner in Baring Bros & Co., merchant bankers, 1800-09, but 'showed neither aptitude for nor interest in banking and made it clear that when his father died he expected to tend his estates, collect pictures, sit in the House of Commons, and generally behave in a gentlemanly way', a plan which fulfilled itself with the help of his legacy from his father, who he succeeded as 2nd baronet, 12 September 1810. He was Whig MP for Wycombe, 1806-32 and Hampshire, 1832, and was in favour of the abolition of slavery, Catholic emancipation, and the Reform Act. He was Chairman of the London & South-Western Railway Co., 1832-33; and a Fellow of the Royal Society from 1841. He was an evangelical in religion, and in the 1810s he was associated with his sister Harriet and brother George in the so-called 'Western Schism' from the Church of England. He was a notable collector of pictures and was a friend of Sir Thomas Lawrence. He married, 13 September 1794 in Calcutta, Mary Ursula (1774-1846), daughter of Charles Sealy of Calcutta (India), barrister, and had issue:
(1) Sir Francis Thornhill Baring (1796-1866), 3rd bt. and 1st Baron Northbrook (q.v.);
(2) Thomas Baring (1799-1873) [for whom see my post on the Baring family of Norman Court];
(3) John Baring (1801-88), born at Lee, 14 September 1801; as a young man he moved to the United States, where in 1826 he set up in business with a Boston merchant called Joshua Bates, whom in 1828 he brought back to England, where they both became partners in Baring Bros & Co.; John was regarded as 'able but indolent' and he retired in 1837 with capital of £180,000; he subsequently lived modestly at Oakwood, near Funtington (Sussex) and gave his surplus income to the poor; he married, 2 August 1842 at St George, Hanover Square, London, Charlotte Amelia (1819-46), daughter of Rev. George Porcher of Maiden Erleigh (Berks), but had no issue; died 17 April 1888; will proved 18 May 1888 (effects £134,557);
(4) Mary Ursula Baring (1803-12), born 28 September and baptised at Lee, 2 November 1803; died young, 3 October 1812 and was buried at Micheldever;
(5) Charlotte Baring (1805-71), born 29 May 1805; married, March 1833, Rev. Henry George Wells (1806-52), rector of Kings Worthy (Hants) and rural dean of Alresford, second son of John Wells MP of Bickley Hall, and had issue six daughters; died 23 April 1871;
(6) Rt. Rev. Charles Baring (1807-79) [for whom see below, Baring family of Beaudesert Park, High Beach and Ardington House];
(7) Emily Baring (1809-93), baptised at St Marylebone, 3 February 1809; married, 6 July 1837, Rev. William Maxwell Du Pré (d. 1855), vicar of Wooburn (Bucks) and had issue three sons and six daughters; died 29 July 1893; will proved 4 September 1893;
(8) Lydia Dorothy Baring (1810-12), born 25 December 1810 and baptised at St Nicholas, Brighton, 10 January 1811; died in infancy, 1 December 1812 and was buried at Micheldever;
(9) Frances Baring (1813-50), born 23 August 1813; married, 10 April 1840, as his first wife, her first cousin, Henry Labouchere (1798-1869), later 1st and last Baron Taunton, of Quantock Lodge, Over Stowey (Somerset), and had issue three daughters; died 25 May 1850.
After his return from India, he leased Pentland House, Lee (next door to the Manor House) until his father's death in 1810, when he inherited Lee Manor House and Stratton Park, which was the centre of a 9,000 acre estate. In 1801 he bought the Abbotstone House estate in Hampshire. In 1817 he bought Mount Radford and Larkbeare House from his cousin John; he sold them again in 1826. Lee Manor House was rented out between c.1806 and c.1830. His London house was at 21 Devonshire Place.
He died 3 April 1848 and was buried at Micheldever; his will was proved in the PCC, 25 May 1848. His wife died 26 July 1846 and was also buried at Micheldever.


Sir Francis Thornhill Baring, 3rd bt. &
1st Baron Northbrook, by Sir George Hayter.
Baring, Sir Francis Thornhill (1796-1866), 3rd bt. and 1st Baron Northbrook. Eldest son of Sir Thomas Baring (1772-1848), 2nd bt., and his wife Mary Ursula, daughter of Charles Sealy of Calcutta (India), barrister, born in Calcutta (India), 20 April 1796. Educated at Winchester, privately at Cambridge, Christ Church, Oxford (matriculated 1814; BA 1817; double first; MA 1821) and Lincolns Inn (admitted 1817; called 1823). Barrister-at-law. He was the Whig MP for Portsmouth, 1826-65, and his marriage to a niece of the Great Reform Act Prime Minister, Lord Grey, brought him to the heart of Whig politics, and ensured his early rise to office. He was a Lord of the Treasury, 1830-34, 1835-39; Privy Councillor, 1839; and Chancellor of the Exchequer, 1839-41, in which role he exhibited a principled opposition to income tax and a desire for free trade, although the latter remained fiscally impossible. His tenure of the Treasury ended in a vote of no confidence which brought down the Government, and he declined to return to that office in 1846, although he did agree to serve Lord John Russell as First Lord of the Admiralty, 1849-52. He was less in sympathy with later Whig administrations, twice turned down the offer of office under Lord Palmerston, and did not trust Gladstone in particular. His political opponents found him 'very rigid and severe' in his views, and he came to feel unequal to the task of managing the Government finances, but he made a good first chairman of the Public Accounts Committee when this was instituted in 1861. He succeeded his father as 3rd baronet, 3 April 1848, and, after refusing a peerage in 1852 and again in 1857, was created 1st Baron Northbrook, 4 January 1866, soon after retiring from the Commons. He was a committed opponent of slavery and the slave trade, and opposed colonial expansion in Africa. He was a conscientious landlord, a man of wide culture and evangelical piety, who led his family and household in prayers with real conviction. He became a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1849. He married 1st, 7 April 1825, Jane (1804-38), youngest daughter of the Hon. Sir George Grey, 1st bt., of Fallodon (Northbld), and 2nd, 31 March 1841, Lady Arabella Howard (c.1809-84), second daughter of Kenneth Alexander Howard, 1st Earl of Effingham, and had issue:
(1.1) Thomas George Baring (1826-1904), 2nd Baron & 1st Earl of Northbrook (q.v.);
(1.2) The Hon. Mary Baring (1827-1906), born 1 June 1827; married, 21 April 1864, John Bonham Carter MP (1817-84), of Adhurst St. Mary (Hants) and had issue three sons and four daughters; died 7 June 1906; died in Chelsea (Middx), 7 June 1906; will proved 11 July 1906 (estate £21,286);
(1.3) The Hon. Harriet Baring (1831-1903), baptised at St Martin-in-the-Fields, Westminster (Middx), 25 June 1831; died unmarried, 25 March 1903 and was buried at Micheldever; will proved 15 April 1903 (estate £16,026);
(1.4) Francis Grey Baring (1832-33), baptised at St Martin-in-the-Fields, Westminster (Middx), 24 July 1832; died in infancy, 8 May 1833 and was buried at Micheldever;
(1.5) The Hon. Alice Baring (b. 1833), born 4 June and baptised at St Martin-in-the-Fields, Westminster (Middx), 14 December 1833; lived in Hove (Sussex); died unmarried, 20 July 1925; will proved 9 September 1925 (estate £27,800);
(2.1) The Hon. Francis Henry Baring (1850-1915) (q.v.).
He inherited Lee Manor House and Stratton Park from his father in 1848. Lee Manor House was rented out after about 1850.
He died at Stratton Park, 6 September, and was buried at Micheldever, 13 September 1866; his will was proved 9 October 1866 (effects under £16,000). His first wife died 23 April 1838. His widow lived latterly in Brighton (Sussex) and died 10 December 1884; administration of her goods (with will annexed) was granted to her son, 23 January 1885 (effects £4,025).


Thomas George Baring, 1st Earl of Northbrook
Baring, Thomas George (1826-1904), 2nd Baron & 1st Earl of Northbrook. Eldest son of Sir Francis Thornhill Baring (1796-1866), 3rd bt. and later 1st Baron Northbrook, and his first wife, Jane, youngest daughter of the Hon. Sir George Grey, 1st bt., of Fallodon (Northbld), born in London, 22 January 1826. Educated privately and at Christ Church, Oxford (matriculated 1843; BA 1846). In a deliberate apprenticeship for politics, he worked between 1848 and 1857 as private secretary to a succession of his relatives who were in Government: Henry Labouchere, Sir George Grey and Sir Charles Wood. He was Liberal MP for Penryn and Falmouth, 1857-66; a Lord of the Admiralty, 1857-58; Under-Secretary of State for India, 1859-61, 1861-64; Under-Secretary of State for War, 1861, Under-Secretary of State at Home Office, 1864-66; and Secretary to the Admiralty, 1866. After inheriting his father's peerage in 1866 he served as Under-Secretary of State for War again, 1868-72 and was made a privy councillor in 1869. He was persuaded with some difficulty to become Viceroy of India, 1872-76, where, with the support of his cousin Evelyn Baring (later 1st Earl of Cromer) as Financial Secretary, he conducted an unusually liberal and pro-Indian regime but found himself in increasing conflict with Lord Salisbury as Secretary of State for India, who pressed for a more authoritarian approach. Back in England, he founded and maintained a club for Indian students in London. He was later First Lord of the Admiralty, 1880-85, but in 1884 he was attacked (with some justice) in the press by W.T. Stead for the relative neglect of the Royal Navy fleet; later that year, he was sent (again with Evelyn Baring) as a special High Commissioner to Egypt to try and find a compromise between the financial interests of the British, the Egyptian people, and the continental bondholders to whom vast sums were owed; although Northbrook made workable proposals, they were unacceptable to Gladstone as Prime Minister, and his mission was ultimately a failure; it was left to Evelyn Baring, the long-term Consul-General for Egypt, to find a way forward. He declined an offer from Gladstone to become Lord Lieutenant of Ireland in 1886, to push through home rule, which he came to feel was a misguided compromise. In later life he became one of the Liberal elder statesmen, and chaired a royal commission on the controversial question of mining royalties in 1890. At home, he was Lord Lieutenant of Hampshire, 1892-1904; Chairman of Hampshire County Council, 1894-1904; High Steward of Winchester; and Hon. Col. of the Hampshire Imperial Yeomanry. He was described as 'rich in public and private virtues' and possessed a simple piety that was intensified by the deaths of his wife and younger son in quick succession; at the end of his life he wrote The Teaching of Jesus Christ in his own Words (1900) for use in India, where it had a huge circulation. He was widely read, and edited his father's journals and correspondence for publication, 1866; he also sketched and painted in watercolours. He was one of the principal legatees of his uncle, Thomas Baring (1799-1873) and inherited part of his art collection, to which he added, being a particular friend and patron of Edward Lear. His inherited investments and non-agricultural property allowed him to cushion his estate and its employees from the effects of the Agricultural Depression, and in the mid-1880s he was reinvesting the whole income from his Stratton estate. He succeeded his father as 2nd Baron Northbrook, 6 September 1866 and on his return from India was appointed GCSI and created 1st Earl of Northbrook and Viscount Baring, 10 June 1876. He was made a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1880 and was awarded honorary degrees by Oxford (DCL, 1876) and Cambridge (LLD). He married, 6 September 1848, Harriet (1824-67), daughter of Henry Charles Sturt of Crichel House (Dorset) and had issue:
(1) Francis George Baring (1850-1929), 2nd Earl of Northbrook (q.v.);
(2) Lady Jane Emma Baring (1853-1936), born 24 April and baptised at St Peter, Eaton Sq., London, 14 July 1853; appointed to Imperial Order of the Crown of India, 1878 and CBE, 1920; married, 29 January 1890, as his second wife, Col. the Hon. Sir Henry George Lewis Crichton KCB (1844-1922) of Netley Abbey (Hants), third son of the 3rd Earl of Erne, but had no issue; will proved 2 March 1936 (estate £42,895);
(3) The Hon. Arthur Napier Thomas Baring (1854-70), born 3 June 1854; a midshipman in the Royal Navy; lost at sea when HMS Captain was wrecked off Cape Finisterre, 7 September 1870.
He inherited Lee Manor House and Stratton Park from his father in 1866. Lee Manor House was sold to Lewisham Metropolitan Borough Council c.1900.
He died 15 November and was buried at Micheldever, 19 November 1904; his will was proved 24 December 1904 (estate £249,770). His wife died 3 June 1867 and was buried at Micheldever.


Francis George Baring, 2nd Earl of Northbrook
Baring, Francis George (1850-1929), 2nd Earl of Northbrook. Elder and only surviving son of Thomas George Baring (1826-1904), 2nd Baron and 1st Earl of Northbrook, and his wife Harriet, daughter of Henry Charles Sturt of Crichel House (Dorset), born in Florence (Italy), 6 December 1850. Educated at Eton. Landowner and farmer. An officer in the 1st Middlesex Engineer Volunteers (2nd Lt., 1870), the Rifle Brigade (Ensign, 1870; Lt., 1873), the Grenadier Guards (Lt., 1876; retired 1880) and the Hampshire Rifle Volunteers (Maj., 1881); aide-de-camp to his father as Viceroy of India, 1873-76. Liberal MP for Winchester, 1880-85 and Liberal Unionist MP for Bedfordshire North, 1886-92. DL for Hampshire; Chairman of Hampshire County Council, 1907-27; High Steward of Winchester, 1906; Chairman of Hampshire Local War Pensions Committee. He was awarded the orders of St. Sava (Serbia) and of the Crown of Belgium. He was known as Viscount Baring from 1876 until he succeeded his father as 2nd Earl of Northbrook, 15 November 1904. In 1894 he was cited as co-respondent in the divorce case brought by Ian Robert James Murray Grant of Glenmoriston (Inverness) against his wife, Ada Ethel Sophie (1862-94), youngest daughter of Col. Cuthbert Davidson CB, and after their divorce was granted, he married that lady as his first wife, 26 June 1894 at the British Consulate in Paris (France); he married 2nd, 10 June 1899 at St Saviour, Chelsea (Middx), Florence Anita Eyre CBE (1860-1946), daughter of Eyre Coote and widow of Sir Robert John Abercromby, 7th bt., but had no issue.
He inherited Stratton Park from his father in 1904, but soon afterwards sold art works to the value of £200,000 from the collection there to American buyers. He also sold about 5,000 acres of the estate (mainly to tenants) in 1920. After his death the house and park was sold to a girls' school and then sold, with the rest of the estate in 1939 to Barings Bank.
He died of influenza and bronchitis at Stratton Park, 12 April 1929, when the Earldom and Viscountcy became extinct, but the barony passed to his cousin, Francis Arthur Baring (1882-1947) (q.v.); he was buried at East Stratton. His will was proved 21 June and 23 August 1929 (estate £496,435). His first wife suffered sunstroke on her wedding day and developed complications from which she never recovered; she died at Carlsbad (Austria), 22 July 1894; administration of her goods was granted to her husband, 26 November 1894 (effects £1,132). His widow died at Abbots Worthy (Hants), 4 December 1946; her will was proved 3 February 1947 (estate £179,122).

Baring, The Hon. Francis Henry (1850-1915). Only son of Sir Francis Thornhill Baring, 3rd bt. and 1st Baron Northbrook, and his second wife, Lady Arabella Howard, second daughter of Kenneth Alexander Howard, 1st Earl of Effingham, born 22 July and baptised at St Martin-in-the-Fields, 23 July 1850. Educated at Trinity College, Cambridge (admitted 1869 but did not reside), Corpus Christi College, Oxford (matriculated 1869) and Lincolns Inn (admitted 1872). He was exceptionally able academically; a classical scholar and a mathematician of distinction, with a lucid mind and a rare capacity for seeing the essential facts in any situation and holding to them tenaciously. He joined Baring Bros & Co. in 1874 and became a partner from 1882, so he was one of those most deeply affected by the crisis of 1890. Afterwards, he became a Director of the new firm, Baring Bros & Co. Ltd., and he was titular head of that business from 1891 until his retirement in 1901, a period when he proved especially good at resolving the legal difficulties the new firm encountered in winding up the affairs of its predecessor. The scale of the recovery under his leadership and that of his cousin John Baring, 2nd Baron Revelstoke, is reflected in his wealth at death. High Sheriff of Surrey, 1888. In 1873, he was one of the principal legatees of Thomas Baring (1799-1873) of Norman Court. He married, 13 February 1878 at St George, Hanover Square, London, Lady Grace Elizabeth (d. 1935), daughter of Richard Edmund St. Lawrence Boyle, 9th Earl of Cork and Orrery, and had issue, with a stillborn daughter:
(1) Francis Arthur Baring (1882-1947), 4th Baron Northbrook (q.v.);
(2) John Henry Baring (1885-1956), born 3 December 1885 and baptised at St Thomas, Portman Square, London, 20 January 1886; educated at Hazlewood School, Rugby and Trinity College, Oxford (matriculated 1904; BA 1908; MA 1912); education administrator with Essex and Oxfordshire County Councils, 1911-15; served in First World War with Royal Irish Regiment (Lt., 1916; Capt., 1917; retired 1920); acted as aide-de-camp to Governors of Bahamas and Ceylon, 1921-24, and then travelled through Australia, New Zealand and Spain; was the residuary legatee of his kinsman, the 4th Earl of Effingham, in 1927; died unmarried, 3 December 1956; will proved 8 February 1957 (estate £118,746);
(3) Rupert Alexander Baring (1891-94), born 23 February 1891; died young, 3 August 1894.
He bought an estate called Banstead Park (Surrey) in about 1880, and Norman Shaw built a house for him there in 1884-86, but after the Barings crisis of 1890 he sold it in 1893 to realise assets. He lived subsequently at 34 Great Cumberland Place, London. 
He died in London, 7 March 1915, and was buried at East Stratton; his will was proved 30 April 1915 (estate £730,860). His widow died 23 May 1935; her will was proved 27 June 1935 (estate £12,278).

Baring, Francis Arthur (1882-1947), 4th Baron Northbrook. Eldest son of the Hon. Francis Henry Baring (1850-1915) and his wife Lady Grace Elizabeth Boyle, daughter of 9th Earl of Cork and Orrery, born 20 July 1882 and baptised at St. Thomas, St. Marylebone (Middx), 18 August 1882. Educated at Eton and Trinity College, Oxford. Landowner and farmer. JP for Hampshire. He succeeded his cousin as 4th Baron Northbrook, 12 April 1929. He married 1st, 30 April 1914, Evelyn Gladys Isabella (1889-1919), daughter of John George Charles, and 2nd, 1 December 1941 at Alton (Hants), Constance Maud (1882-1976), daughter of Frank Griffin of Kew, and had issue:
(1.1) Francis John Baring (1915-90), 5th Baron Northbrook (q.v.);
(1.2) The Hon. Anne Baring (1917-2006), born 13 February 1917; lived at Westwood, West Meon (Hants); died unmarried, 10 October 2006; will proved 6 July 2007.
He purchased Woodlands Farm, West Meon in about 1913.
He died 15 December 1947 and was buried at West Meon (Hants); his will was proved 17 January 1948 (estate £428,879). His first wife died 20 February 1919; administration of her goods was granted to her husband, 9 May 1919 (estate £3,349). His widow died 11 April 1976 and was buried at West Meon; her will was proved 17 May 1976 (estate £126,765).

Baring, Francis John (1915-90), 5th Baron Northbrook. Only son of Francis Arthur Baring (1882-1947), 4th Baron Northbrook and his first wife, Evelyn Gladys Isabella, daughter of John George Charles, born 31 May 1915. Educated at Winchester and Trinity College, Oxford (BA 1937). JP (from 1954) and DL (from 1972) for Hampshire. He succeeded his father as 5th Baron Northbrook, 15 December 1947. Chairman of Hampshire Area Health Authority and Winchester District Health Authority, 1978-88. He married, 27 January 1951 at the Chapel Royal, Hampton Court (Middx), Rowena Margaret (1926-2020), second daughter of Brig-Gen. Sir William Henry Manning GCMG, KBE, CB, and had issue:
(1) The Hon. Laura Anne Baring (b. 1952), born 12 June 1952; lives at Aston Sandford (Bucks); married, 15 May 1982, Ewen Cameron Stewart Macpherson (b. 1942), eldest son of Brig. George Philip Stewart Macpherson OBE, and had issue two sons; 
(2) Francis Thomas Baring (b. 1954), 6th Baron Northbrook (q.v.);
(3) The Hon. Alexandra Grace Baring (b. 1957), born 4 February 1957; lives at Armsworth Park House, Old Alresford (Hants); married, Oct-Dec 1981, Philip Strone Stewart Macpherson (b. 1948), youngest son of Brig. George Philip Stewart Macpherson OBE, and had issue one son and two daughters; 
(4) The Hon. Catherine Margaret Baring (b. 1965), born 12 May 1965; lives at East Stratton House (Hants); married, May 1992 (div. 2007), (Edward) Sherard Bourchier Wrey (1961-2007), younger son of Sir (Castel Richard) Bourchier Wrey, 14th bt., and had issue one son and one daughter.
He inherited Woodlands Farm from his father in 1947 and repurchased the surviving part of the estate at Stratton (but not the house) from Barings Bank in 1952. He lived at East Stratton House.
He died 4 December 1990; his will was proved 3 March 1992 (estate £30,874,078). His widow died aged 93 on 27 April 2020.

Baring, Francis Thomas (b. 1954), 6th Baron Northbrook. Only son of Francis John Baring (1915-90), 5th Baron Northbrook, and his wife Rowena Margaret, second daughter of Brig-Gen. Sir William Henry Manning GCMG KBE CB, born 21 February 1954. Educated at Winchester College and Bristol University (BA 1976). Trainee chartered accountant with Dixon Wilson & Co., 1976-80; then with Baring Bros. & Co. Ltd., where he moved into investment management, 1980-90; he continued his career with Taylor Young Investment, 1990-93, Smith & Williamson Securities, 1993-95, and was then one of the founders of Mars Asset Management, 1996-2006. He has been a trustee of the Khetri Trust since 1993 and of the Fortune Forum Charity since 2006. He succeeded his father as 6th Baron Northbrook, 4 December 1990, and was one of the hereditary peers elected to remain a member of the House of Lords, 1999, where he speaks on treasury, constitutional and agricultural matters; Conservative whip in Lords, 1999-2000. He is a member of the Advisory Board of the Iman Foundation. He inherited a significant art collection from his father, some of which was lost in a major fire at his home in 2005, while other works were sold at the time of his divorce. He married 1st, 27 June 1987 (div. 2006), Amelia Sarah Elizabeth (b. 1960), elder daughter of Dr. Reginald David Taylor of Hursley (Hants), and 2nd, 2013, Charlotte Lee (b. 1960), publisher of the Almanach de Gotha and daughter of Thomas W. Pike, and had issue:
(1.1) The Hon. Arabella Constance Elizabeth Baring [Countess Nesselrode] (b. 1989), born 15 June and baptised at East Stratton, 21 September 1989; married, 2015, Bertram (b. 1984), Graf Droste zu Vischering von Nesselrode-Reichenstein, founder of Embley Wood Partners Ltd, property investment managers;
(1.2) The Hon. Venetia Harriet Anne Baring (b. 1991), born 19 April 1991; educated at Heathfield School, Marlborough College and Bristol University (BA 2014); Head of Communications for LXM Finance LLP;
(1.3) The Hon. Cosima Evelyn Maud Baring (b. 1994), born 30 August 1994 and baptised at East Stratton, 22 January 1995; educated at Bristol University (BA 2017); marketing executive at Arbor Education Partners, London.
He inherited the Stratton Park estate from his father in 1990. He remodelled Woodlands House at West Meon as a new residence in 1995, and after it burned down on 4 December 2005 he rebuilt it to an entirely new design, 2009-10.
Now living. There is no heir to the peerage, although Peter Baring of Ardington (see below) is heir to the family baronetcy.



Baring family of Beaudesert Park, High Beach and Ardington House


Rt. Rev. Charles Baring,
Bishop of Durham
Baring, Rt. Rev. Charles (1807-79). Fourth son of Sir Thomas Baring (1772-1848), 2nd bt., and his wife Mary Ursula, daughter of Charles Sealy of Calcutta (India), barrister, born 11 January 1807. Educated privately and at Christ Church, Oxford (matriculated, 1825; BA 1829 (double first); MA 1832; DD by diploma, 1856); President of the Oxford Union. He was ordained deacon, 1830 and priest, 1831, and belonged to the evangelical wing of the Church of England. Vicar of Kingsworthy (Hants), All Souls, Langham Place, Marylebone (Middx), 1847-55 and of Limpsfield (Surrey), 1855-56; chaplain in ordinary to Queen Victoria, 1850; Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol, 1856-61 and of Durham, 1861-79, where he founded 102 new parishes and presided over the erection of 119 new churches; he initially fought the division of the ancient see of Durham, but in 1876 conceded that division was necessary and supported a Bill in Parliament for the creation of a diocese of Newcastle. He was a man of deep personal piety and great kindliness. His inherited wealth enabled him to make donations to the church which more than repaid his episcopal salary, and he was also a generous an anonymous supporter of other charitable objects. He sought openly to use his episcopal power and influence to support the evangelical wing of the church and to combat ritualism, in a way that sometimes aroused controversy. He married 1st, 10 June 1830 at St. Marylebone (Middx), Mary Ursula (d. 1840), only daughter of Col. Charles Sealy of HEICS, and 2nd, 14 April 1846 at St Marylebone, his first cousin, Caroline (c.1810-85), daughter of Thomas Read Kemp of Dale Park (Sussex), and had issue:
(1.1) Thomas Charles Baring (1831-91) (q.v.);
(1.2) Mary Ursula Baring (1832-46), baptised at East Stratton (Hants), 26 August 1832; died young and was buried at Micheldever, 1 August 1846;
(2.1) Frances Dorothy Baring (1847-80), born 23 November 1847 and baptised at St. Marylebone, 23 February 1848; died unmarried and was buried at Wolfgottesacker Cemetery, Basel (Switzerland), 16 July 1880; administration of her goods granted to her brother, 3 August 1880 (estate £849);
(2.2) Rev. Francis Henry Baring (1848-1914), born 21 November 1848 and baptised at St. Marylebone, 2 January 1849; educated at Trinity College, Cambridge (matriculated 1867; BA 1871; MA 1874); ordained deacon, 1872 and priest, 1875; had a restless eccleasiastical career, serving as a missionary in India, 1872-84, 1886-89, where he started a boarding school for Christian boys at Amritsar and later at Batala, which continues (as Baring College) today; vicar of Chilworth (Hants), 1884-85 and Kingsworthy, 1891-94; Secretary of British & Foreign Bible Society, Lahore, 1895-99; rector of Eggesford (Devon), 1899-1900; emigrated to Tasmania, c.1901 and also served as a curate there; married 1st, 21 July 1881, Margaret Anne Borthwick (d. 1882), daughter of Rev. William Wallace Duncan of Peebles and widow of William Elmslie FRCS of Kashmir (India) but had no issue; married 2nd, 27 July 1886, Amy (d. 1935), daughter of Rev. John Alexander Stamper, and had issue five sons and two daughters; died at Kamo (New Zealand), 22 September 1914 and was buried at Northland (New Zealand); will proved 8 May 1915 (estate £36,024);
(2.3) Caroline Emily Baring (1850-1924), born 22 June and baptised at St. Marylebone, 5 August 1850; died unmarried, 9 January 1924; will proved 14 March 1924 (estate £20,844).
He was given the Abbotsworthy House estate (Hants) by his father in about 1830 and built a new house there to the designs of J.C. Buckler in 1834-36, but he sold this in c.1850. He purchased an estate called the Highlands in Gloucestershire and built a house there in 1856, but sold it in 1861 on being translated to Durham. He lived subsequently at Auckland Castle (Co. Durham).
He died at Cecil House, Wimbledon (Surrey), 16 September 1879 and was buried at High Beech (Essex); his will was proved 5 January 1880 (effects under £120,000). His first wife died 16 June 1840. His widow died 9 May 1885; her will was proved 30 June 1885 (effects £19,855).


Thomas Charles Baring (1831-91)
Baring, Thomas Charles (1831-91). Only son of Rt. Rev. Charles Baring (1807-79) and his first wife, Mary Ursula, only daughter of Col. Charles Sealy, born 16 May and baptised at St. Marylebone (Middx), 1 July 1831. Educated at Harrow, 1846-49 and Wadham College, Oxford (matriculated 1849; BA 1852; MA 1855); Fellow of Brasenose College, Oxford, 1852-59. He worked for Baring Bros. in America 1859-67, before becoming a partner in London, 1867-88. He retired before the crash of 1890 and had taken most, but not all, of his money out of the firm; but returned as a Managing Director of Baring Bros & Co. Ltd., 1890-91. He was the last member of the firm to combine a business and political career, serving as Conservative MP for South Essex, 1874-85 and City of London, 1887-91; DL for Essex. He was the author of several works, including Pindar in English Rhyme and The System of Epicurus. He funded the refoundation of Magdalen Hall, Oxford as Hertford College in 1874 to the tune of £100,000, and in 1886 purchased and anonymously presented to Harrow School twenty acres of the Football Field. According to Philip Ziegler, 'he was one of those conscientiously grumpy characters who are always assumed to have a heart of gold but gives few grounds to support such an assumption'; his cantankerous nature may have been the result of gout, but he cultivated few acquaintances and avoided even ordinary social civilities. He married, 15 November 1859, Susan Carter (1837-97), daughter of Robert Bowne Minturn of New York, and had issue:
(1) Charles Cuthbert Baring (1860-66), born in New York, 4 September 1860; died young in New York, 8 May 1866;
(2) Constance Mary Baring (1861-1929), born in New York, 10 December 1861; married, 27 July 1891 at St George, Hanover Sq., London, Rev. William Ewart Beamish Barter (1856-1928), rector of Hanwell (Middx) and later curate of Ealing (Middx), and had issue one son and eight daughters; died at Shoreham-by-Sea (Sussex), 5 August 1929; will proved 11 October 1929 (estate £4,342);
(3) Robert Bowne Minturn Baring (b. 1863), born in New York, 24 August 1863; died young in New York, 11 April 1866; 
(4) Susannah Beatrix Baring (1867-1956), born 15 November 1867; married, 29 June 1893, Rev. Vincent Travers Macy (1868-1938), vicar of St. Cyprian, Nottingham, and had issue two daughters; died 9 May 1956; will proved 9 August 1956 (estate £1,066);
(5) Harold Herman John Baring (1869-1927) (q.v.);
(6) Godfrey Nigel Everard Baring (1870-1934) (q.v.);
(7) Muriel Ursula Baring (1872-1950), born 12 August 1872; married, 25 April 1901 at High Beech, Henry Stephen Brenton (d. 1926) of The Manor House, High Beech (Essex) and had issue two daughters; died 22 November 1950; will proved 28 March 1951 (estate £18,743).
He purchased Wallsgrove House at High Beech (Essex).
He died in Rome (Italy), 2 April 1891; his will was proved 30 May 1891 (effects £867,765). His widow died 11 January 1897; her will was proved 8 April 1897 (effects £31,908).


Harold Herman John Baring (1869-1927)
Baring, Harold Herman John (1869-1927). Elder surviving son of Thomas Charles Baring (1831-91) and his wife Susan Carter, daughter of Robert Bowne Minturn of New York (USA), born 4 March 1869. Educated at Harrow and Hertford College, Oxford (matriculated 1888). He was employed by Baring Bros & Co. Ltd., but never became a director, perhaps because he was a keen gambler; he ran through £23,000 before coming of age, and twice appeared in court as the defendant in legal actions relating to his debts. He and his wife were prominent in social circles in London, and his wife was a noted beauty and hostess. He was Commandant of the Metropolitan Police Special Constabulary in the First World War, and was awarded the MBE, 1920. He married, 24 October 1898 at St Peter, New York, Marie (or Mary) Heyl (1872-1940), daughter of John Augustus Churchill of New York, but had no issue.
He inherited Wallsgrove House from his father in 1891; it was sold after his death.
He died 10 December 1927 and was buried at High Beech, where he is commemorated by a monument; his will was proved in March 1928 (estate £97,188). His widow died at Nice (France), 3 April 1940; her will was proved 2 September 1940 (estate £24,543).

Baring, Godfrey Nigel Everard (1870-1934). Younger surviving son of Thomas Charles Baring (1831-91) and his wife Susan Carter, daughter of Robert Bowne Minturn of New York (USA), born 1 October 1870 and baptised at High Beech, 25 March 1871. Educated at Harrow and Hertford College, Oxford (matriculated 1889). He was a keen huntsman and polo player and held the position of Master with three different hunts in England and Ireland for a total of 26 years. [He must be carefully distinguished from his namesake and near contemporary, Sir Godfrey Baring (1871-1957), who was MP for the Isle of Wight for many years]. He married, 14 October 1908 at St Peter, Eaton Sq., London, the Hon. Ada Sybil (1879-1944), only child of Edward Fitzgerald Burke Roche, 2nd Baron Fermoy, and had issue:
(1) Desmond Charles Nigel Baring (1914-91) (q.v.);
(2) Cynthia Cecil Baring (1909-85), born 9 October 1909; married 1st, 6 July 1932 (div. 1947), Brig. John Theodore de Horne Vaizey (1898-1982), only son of Robert Edward Vaizey OBE of Attwoods, Halstead (Essex) and had issue one son and three daughters; married 2nd, 24 October 1947, Forest Warren (d. 1954), son of Henry Nathaniel Warren of Bishops Caundle (Dorset), and had further issue; died 18 October 1985;
(3) Ursula Doreen Baring (1911-52), born 4 March 1911; died unmarried, 11 October 1952.
He lived at Rockbarton (Co. Limerick) and later at Park House, Market Harborough (Leics).
He died 22 June 1934; his will was proved 1 October and 31 December 1934 (estate £114,909). His widow died in Dublin, 15 May 1944; her will was proved 24 February 1945 (estate £28,032).

Baring, Desmond Charles Nigel (1914-91). Only son of Godfrey Nigel Everard Baring (1870-1934) and his wife the Hon. Ada Sybil Roche, only child of Edward Fitzgerald Burke Roche, 2nd Baron Fermoy, born 5 January 1914. Educated at Eton. Served in 3rd Dragoon Guards (2nd Lt., 1934-37). Landowner and market gardener. Member of Berkshire County Council. He married, 12 September 1938, Mary (Mollie) Eileen JP (1912-98), daughter of Benjamin Walter Warner, and had issue:
(1) Peter Baring (b. 1939), born 12 September 1939; educated at Eton; national service in the Grenadier Guards (2nd Lt., 1958); heir presumptive to the baronetcy held by 6th Baron Northbrook; director of Ardington House Ltd. until 2008; lives at The Dower House, Ardington; married, 1973, Rosemary Cecil (b. 1949), daughter of George Nigel Adams of Fernham Manor, Faringdon (Berks) and had issue two sons;
(2) Nigel Baring (b. 1940) (q.v.);
(3) (Margaret) Anne Baring (b. 1944), born 22 November 1944; racehorse owner at Trudoxhill (Somerset); married, Apr-Jun 1976, Hugh Barkly Gonnerman Dalgety (b. 1943), and had issue two sons and one daughter.
He leased Ardington House (Berks) from 1939 and purchased the freehold in 1960.
He died 3 February 1991 and was buried at Holy Innocents, High Beech (Essex); his will was proved 26 May 1992 (estate £615,744). His widow died 24 March 1998 and was also buried at High Beech; her will was proved 25 September 1998.

Baring, Nigel (b. 1940). Second son of Desmond Charles Nigel Baring (1914-91) and his wife Mary (Mollie) Eileen JP, daughter of Benjamin Walter Warner, born 9 August 1940. Educated at Eton. Wine merchant with Nigel Baring & Co. Ltd (dissolved 2006). He married, 18 July 1968, Jane Finola (b. 1944), elder daughter of Francis Byrne of Fulham (Middx), and had issue:
(1) Lorne Benjamin Nigel Baring (b. 1970), born 28 August and baptised 15 December 1970; educated at Eton and Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst; an officer in the Scots Guards (2nd Lt., 1990; Capt., 1992; retired 1996); subsequently a private banker with Barclays Ltd.; director of Ardington House Ltd.; married, 2002 (div. 2013), Victoria Essex Lea (b. 1976), daughter of Col. Brian Gustavus Hamilton-Russell and had issue one son and one daughter;
(2) Edward Francis Desmond Baring (b. 1972), born 1972; educated at Eton and Edinburgh University; admitted a solicitor, 2001; partner in Herbert Smith Freehills LLP, Johannesburg (South Africa); married, c.2003, Charlotte McCredie and had issue three sons (one died in infancy) and one daughter;
(3) Lucinda Anne Baring (b. 1980), born Jul-Sept 1980; educated at St Mary's Convent, Ascot and Edinburgh University (MA); journalist and travel writer; assistant editor with The Financial Times; married, 2009, Edward Andrew Ashenhurst Bartlam (b. 1979), events promoter, son of Thomas Bartlam of Blounce House, South Warnborough (Hants), and had issue one son and one daughter.
He inherited Ardington House from his father in 1991, but handed it on to his elder son in 2012 and now lives at The Lodge, Ardington.
Now living. 

Sources

Burke's Peerage and Baronetage, 2003, pp. 2931-34; J. Woolfe & J. Gandon, Vitruvius Britannicus, vol. 4, 1767, pls. 52-55; J. Britton, T. Allom, W.H. Bartlett and E.W. Brayley, Devonshire and Cornwall Illustrated, 1832, p. 67 and plate; D. Stroud, George Dance, architect, 1741-1825, 1971, pp. 200-04; B. Cherry & Sir N. Pevsner, The buildings of England: London - South, 1982, p. 426; J.M. Robinson, The latest country houses, 1984, pp. 142-43; J. Harris, 'A digression on John Sanderson and the Rococo', Furniture History, vol. 26, 1990, pp. 101-03; G. Worsley, 'The "Best Turned" house of the Duke of Bedford', Georgian Group Journal, vol. 6, 1996, pp. 63-73; M. Bullen, J. Crook, R. Hubbock & Sir N. Pevsner, The buildings of England: Hampshire - Winchester and the north, 2010, pp. 246-48; G. Tyack (ed.), John Nash: architect of the Picturesque, 2013, pp. 58-67; H. Meller, The country houses of Devon, 2015, pp. 317-18, 882-84; ODNB entries on Sir Francis Baring, 1st bt., Rt. Rev. Charles Baring, and 1st Baron and 1st Earl of Northbrook; 
http://www.lostheritage.org.uk/houses/lh_hampshire_strattonpark.htmlhttps://runner500.wordpress.com/2016/03/02/slavery-and-the-manor-house/;  https://runner500.wordpress.com/2016/03/10/lee-manor-house-the-years-before-the-library/http://exetercivicsociety.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/downloads/2014/04/Book-2-St-Leonards.pdf.


Location of archives


Baring Bros. & Co. Ltd, merchant bankers: correspondence, letter books, ledgers and journals, 1763-1899 [Barings Archive]
Baring family of Mount Radford, Exeter: deeds, partnership deeds and papers, 1706-1837 [Devon Archives & Local Studies, 1926B]
Baring family of Stratton Park, Barons Northbrook: correspondence, diaries and papers, 1762-1833 [Barings Archive, NP]; deeds, estate and family papers, chiefly relating to Lee Manor House, 1678-1846 [Lewisham Local History & Archives Centre, A62/6]; manor and hundred records, 1692-1838; estate, personal, official and family papers, 1770-20th cents. [Hampshire Archives & Local Studies, 77M95, 92M95]; building accounts for Stratton Park, 1731-39 [Hampshire Archives & Local Studies, 149M89/R5/6174]
Baring, Rt. Rev. Charles Thomas (1807-79): correspondence, 19th cent. [Durham University Library]


Coat of arms

Azure, a fesse or, in chief a bear's head proper, muzzled and ringed or.


Can you help?


  • I should be most grateful if anyone can provide photographs or portraits of people whose names appear in bold above, and who are not already illustrated.
  • As always, any additions or corrections to the account given above will be gratefully received and incorporated.

Revision and acknowledgements

This post was first published 26 May 2019 and was updated 27-28 May and 3 June 2019, 9 July 2020 and 22 March 2022. I am grateful to Patrick Dörrer for additional information.

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