Henry Byng, 4th Earl of Strafford
The Earl of Strafford KCVO CB | |
---|---|
Equerry | |
In office 1874–1899 | |
Preceded by | The Lord de Ros |
Succeeded by | John Brocklehurst |
Groom-in-Waiting | |
In office 1872–1874 | |
Preceded by | |
Succeeded by | John Campbell |
Personal details | |
Born | Henry William John Byng 21 August 1831 London, England |
Died | 16 May 1899 Potters Bar, Hertfordshire, England | (aged 67)
Military service | |
Branch/service | British Army |
Rank | Supernumerary Major |
Unit | Coldstream Guards |
Henry William John Byng, 4th Earl of Strafford KCVO CB (21 August 1831 – 16 May 1899) was a British peer and courtier.
Biography[]
Byng was the second son of George Byng, 2nd Earl of Strafford and his first wife, Agnes. From 1840 he was a Page of Honour to Queen Victoria and joined the Coldstream Guards in 1847 as a Lieutenant. In 1854, he was promoted to Captain, by purchase, appointed an Adjutant later that year and a Supernumerary Major in 1865.
In 1872, Byng was made a Groom-in-Waiting and then an Equerry two years later. In 1895, he was appointed a CB and knighted KCVO in 1897. In 1898, he inherited his elder brother's titles.
Byng was killed by an express train at Potters Bar railway station. Witnesses said he appeared to step in front of the approaching engine from the bottom of the slope at the end of the platform. His body was carried 50 yards down the track.[1] A coroner's court was later told he had the nervous condition of catalepsy. The inquest jury – after considering several verdicts including suicide – returned a finding of death by misadventure.[1]
As his sons predeceased him[a] the titles passed to his brother, Francis.
Family[]
On 15 October 1863, Byng married Countess Henrietta Louisa Elizabeth Danneskiold-Samsøe (a maternal granddaughter of the 1st Marquess of Ailesbury) and they had four children:
- (1867–1893)
- Hon. John George Thomas Wentworth (1870–1894)
- Lady Mary Elizabeth Agnes (d. 1946), married Count Maurice de Mauny Talvande.
- (1865–1961), married .
After his wife's death in 1880, Byng married on 6 December 1898 Cora Colgate née Smith (a wealthy American widow), but they did not have any children, Byng dying only five months later.
Byng had been buried in a family vault in the churchyard of St John's Potter's Bar with his first wife. When the church had become disused and prone to vandalism, the bodies were exhumed in 1935 and moved to a mausoleum at the nearby family estate of Wrotham Park.[2]
Notes[]
References[]
- Companions of the Order of the Bath
- Deaths by decapitation
- Coldstream Guards officers
- Earls in the Peerage of the United Kingdom
- Knights Commander of the Royal Victorian Order
- 1831 births
- 1899 deaths
- Railway accident deaths in England
- Accidental deaths in England
- Byng family