Edith Rawdon-Hastings, 10th Countess of Loudoun

The Right Honourable The Countess of Loudoun
10th Countess of Loudoun
The Countess in 1861
Predecessor	Henry Rawdon-Hastings, 9th Earl of Loudoun
Successor	Charles Clifton, 11th Earl of Loudoun
Born	Lady Edith Maud Rawdon-Hastings (1833-12-10)10 December 1833
Died	23 January 1874(1874-01-23) (aged 40)
Spouse(s)	Charles Clifton, 1st Baron Donington ​ ​ (m. 1853)​
Issue Flora Fitzalan-Howard, Duchess of Norfolk Charles Clifton, 11th Earl of Loudoun The Hon. Paulyn Rawdon-Hastings Gilbert Clifton-Hastings-Campbell, 3rd Baron Donington Henry Clifton Lady Egidia Clifton
Parents	George Rawdon-Hastings, 2nd Marquess of Hastings Barbara Yelverton, 20th Baroness Grey de Ruthyn

Edith Maud Rawdon-Hastings, 10th Countess of Loudoun (10 December 1833 – 23 January 1874) was a Scottish peer. She died aged 41 after caring for Rowallan Castle. Sir George Gilbert Scott designed an Eleanor Cross style monument to her which was erected in Ashby de la Zouch.

Life[]

She was born in 1833, the daughter of George Rawdon-Hastings, 2nd Marquess of Hastings and his wife Barbara (née Yelverton). She was greatly attached to the old Mure family mansion of Rowallan Castle near Kilmaurs in Ayrshire. She expended considerable sums in repairing the ancient edifice and without her concern this remarkable building would no longer be with us.^[1]

On 30 April 1853, she married Charles Clifton, 1st Baron Donington, who took the name Abney-Hastings, as a condition of inheriting from a second cousin Sir Charles Abney-Hastings, 2nd Bt, a natural grandson of the 10th Earl of Huntingdon (brother of Lady Edith's grandmother). They had six children:

Her bookplate

• Lady Flora Paulyna Hetty Barbara Abney Hastings (1854–1887), married Henry Fitzalan-Howard, 15th Duke of Norfolk and had issue.
• Charles Edward Hastings Clifton, 11th Earl of Loudoun (1855–1920)
• Major Paulyn Francis Cuthbert Rawdon-Hastings (1856–1907), married Lady Maud Grimston, daughter of James Grimston, 2nd Earl of Verulam and had issue, including Edith Abney-Hastings, later 12th Countess of Loudoun.
• (1859–1927), married Maud Kemble Hamilton, daughter of Sir Charles Hamilton, 1st Baronet. They had four daughters, one of which married .
• Henry Cecil Plantagenet Clifton (born 1860), married Majaraja Duleep Singh's companion and was subsequently ostracised when the party went in exile.
• Lady Egidia Sophia Frederica Christina Clifton (1870–1892), died young.

In 1866 Rawdon-Hastings drew a picture which she called "Skeleton Ball". This picture is now in the Tate.^[2]

After her death her widowed husband was created Baron Donington. After she died the Loudoun monument was erected in Ashby. The octagonal monument by Sir George Gilbert Scott is based on the Eleanor crosses and is now a Grade II* listed structure.^[3][4]

References[]