LAWLEY, Hon. Beilby Richard (1818-1880), of 29 Berkeley Square, London and Escrick Park, Yorks.

Described by his proposer on the hustings at Pontefract in February 1851 as ‘an amiable, generous, highly-connected, and independent gentleman of liberal principles’, Lawley had a perfunctory Commons career, cut short by his succession to the peerage only 15 months later.1The Times, 13 Feb. 1851.

Born at the family residence in Berkeley Square, Lawley was the eldest son of Paul Beilby Lawley, who had taken the surname of his uncle, Richard Thompson, on succeeding in 1820 to his extensive Yorkshire estates, centred on Escrick Park, near York. His children, who were related through their mother to Catherine Gladstone, retained the surname Lawley. A ‘lifelong Liberal’,2HP Commons, 1820-32, vii. 423. Lawley’s father was MP for Wenlock, 1826-32, and the East Riding, 1832-7, and in 1839 was created Baron Wenlock, a family title which had been in abeyance since 1834. In January 1851 he inherited the Lawley baronetcy and estates in Shropshire from his older brother, Francis.3Ibid.; Gent. Mag. (1852), i. 617-18; Dod’s parliamentary companion (1852), 207. Lawley’s mother Caroline was the sister of Catherine Gladstone’s mother Mary.

Educated at Eton and Cambridge, Lawley’s coming of age was celebrated with festivities at York and Escrick in 1839.4York Herald, 27 Apr. 1839; York Herald, 21 Sept. 1839. The following year he was among the speakers at a dinner given by the York Liberal Association, where he asserted that ‘his principles were Liberal’, quashing rumours to the contrary. Some of those present evidently regarded his appearance as heralding his imminent entry into public life, with Alderman Meek observing that he ‘entertained the highest expectations of Mr. Lawley’, given his father’s political proclivities.5York Herald, 1 Aug. 1840. The presentation of an address to Lord Wenlock from eighty of Filey’s inhabitants in September 1840 was said to be ‘merely an electioneering clap-trap proceeding’, undertaken for the purpose of introducing Lawley for the representation of the East Riding.6Hull Packet, 25 Sept. 1840. Nothing came of this, however, and it was more than a decade before he stood for election. In the meantime he went on a Continental tour with one of his younger brothers in 1844.7York Herald, 15 June 1844. His marriage in 1846 to Lady Elizabeth Grosvenor, daughter of the marquess of Westminster, was expedited because his wife’s grandmother was terminally ill.8Leeds Mercury, 5 Dec. 1846. The wedding had been due to take place at Bishopthorpe, the residence of the archbishop of York, but was instead held at St. George’s, Hanover Square.

In November 1850 Lawley came forward for a vacancy at Pontefract, created by the appointment of the Liberal incumbent as a judge. On his first appearance he was introduced as ‘a Yorkshireman, a member of a noble family, the son of one who was a Reformer in times when reform was not fashionable’. Lawley likewise cited his family’s long-standing commitment to the cause of reform. He declared himself to be – in the words of Prince Albert at a recent banquet at York – ‘liberal from feeling’, and ‘was sure he had none of the germs of old Toryism in his composition’. Questioned about extending the franchise, he stated that ‘his feeling was decidedly with progress, but that it must be in accordance with the advancing intelligence of the people’.9The Times, 6 Nov. 1850. Later that month he signed a requisition for and attended a Yorkshire county meeting protesting at the ‘aggression’ of the Pope in establishing a Catholic hierarchy in England.10Leeds Mercury, 16 Nov. 1850; Morning Chronicle, 23 Nov. 1850.

At the nomination in February 1851, Lawley asserted that he was ‘bound by no party, but independent of all parties’ and came forward as ‘the advocate of Liberal principles, which his family had always held’.11Leeds Mercury, 15 Feb. 1851. He attacked the ‘insolence and insidiousness’ of the Pope’s recent actions, which were ‘an infringement of the Queen’s supremacy’, and noted that ‘he had spent some winters in Rome, and had witnessed the despotism and intolerance of the Pope’. He endorsed an unconditional repeal of the window tax, and emphasised his long-held opposition to protection, despite the fact that ‘every shilling he possessed arose from land’.12The Times, 13 Feb. 1851. He suggested that ‘by a strict and rigid economy’ more taxes might be repealed. Although ‘zealously attached to Church and State’, he would allow others religious freedom. He recognised that ‘if returned to Parliament, his votes would be scanned, – and he wished them to be so’, but insisted that he would vote ‘to the best of his judgement’.13Leeds Mercury, 15 Feb. 1851. The last-minute nomination – in his absence and without his consent – of the borough’s former Conservative MP, Viscount Pollington, scuppered Lawley’s expectations of a walkover, but did not present a serious challenge to his election.14The Times, 15 Feb. 1851. He narrowly escaped injury at the chairing, where the chair was torn to pieces just as he was about to climb into it.15Leeds Mercury, 15 Feb. 1851.

Lawley took his seat, 17 Feb. 1851, and cast his first vote three days later, in the minority for the second reading of the Great Northern railway bill. He generally divided with the Russell ministry, supporting it on the ecclesiastical titles bill, 25 Mar. 1851. He voted against Peter Locke King’s county franchise bill, 2 Apr.; repeal of the malt tax, 8 May; and William Johnson Fox’s proposals for secular education, 22 May 1851. He did not trouble the House with any speeches, and is not known to have served on any select committees. His most noteworthy contribution to parliamentary life was his appearance for the victorious Houses of Parliament side when they played cricket against I Zingari at the Oval in July 1851.16The Era, 20 July 1851. He was present for only a handful of divisions in the 1852 session, and it was reported in April that he would not seek re-election at the dissolution.17York Herald, 17 Apr. 1852. His last vote appears to have been in opposition to James Heywood’s motion for a select committee to consider preserving the Crystal Palace, 29 Apr. 1852. On his father’s death the following month he succeeded as 2nd Baron Wenlock, and to the Lawley baronetcy. He inherited estates of over 20,000 acres in the East Riding and 5,000 acres in Shropshire,18Morning Post, 11 May 1852; J. Bateman, The great landowners of Great Britain and Ireland (1883), 470. and became patron of several livings.19The Handbook of the court (1862), 90.

Wenlock ‘did not take a prominent part in debate’ in the Lords, but was more active in the committee-rooms.20York Herald, 8 Nov. 1880. He spent more of his time at Escrick, where he ‘devoted a great deal of thought and money to the improvement of the estate’, than at his Shropshire or London residences.21Ibid. In 1866 he was embroiled in a court case after refusing to pay rent owed for 49 Eaton Place, London, as the house had been infested with ‘noxious insects’. He lost and had to pay the £525 debt.22The Times, 13 Feb. 1866.

Having joined the yeomanry cavalry as a cornet in 1837, he continued this activity in later life, serving as lieutenant-colonel of his regiment from 1859 until 1876, when failing health led him to take the role of honorary colonel.23York Herald, 8 Nov. 1880. His appointment as the East Riding’s vice-lieutenant in 1859 and lord lieutenant in 1864 reinforced his involvement with the local volunteer movement, and he took a practical interest in its activities, advising on the colour chosen for the uniforms of the Hull and East Riding rifle volunteer corps in 1859, for example.24The Times, 18 Nov. 1859. He was a prominent member of the Yorkshire Agricultural Society, serving as president in 1864,25The Times, 5 Aug. 1864. and was noted for his prize-winning sheep.26The Times, 30 Nov. 1863. Remembered as ‘a kind hearted and high minded English gentleman’, he was a generous benefactor to local causes, particularly those associated with the Anglican church.27York Herald, 8 Nov. 1880. As well as donating £500 for church building in Yorkshire in 1868,28The Times, 24 Jan. 1868. he restored churches on his estate, increased the endowment of the living of Riccall and built schools at Kexby and Marston.29York Herald, 8 Nov. 1880. He ‘used his powerful influence’ to oppose suggestions that the assizes be relocated from York.30Ibid. He served as a local magistrate, and was chairman of the York rural sanitary authority from its establishment in 1875 and of the commissioners for the Ouse and Derwent drainage scheme.31Ibid.

Wenlock died of heart disease at Escrick Park in November 1880 after ‘a short illness’.32The Times, 8 Nov. 1880; Manchester Times, 13 Nov. 1880. A year earlier he had suffered ‘a paralytic attack of mild form’, after which he had never fully re-established his health.33Morning Post, 8 Nov. 1880. He was buried in the church yard at Escrick, in what was, by his request, an ‘unostentatious’ funeral.34Leeds Mercury, 11 Nov. 1880. He was succeeded as 3rd Baron Wenlock by his eldest son, Beilby (1849-1912), who had been elected as Liberal MP for Chester that April, but unseated on petition.35Morning Post, 8 Nov. 1880. He served as governor of Madras, 1891-6. Wenlock’s personal estate was sworn under £250,000. To his wife (d. 1899), he bequeathed a £2,000 lump sum, an annual income of £1,000 and the use of either Monk Hopton House, Shropshire, or Escrick Villa, Yorkshire as her residence. His estates in Yorkshire and Shropshire passed to his eldest son, except for Monk Hopton and Priors Ditton, Shropshire, which he left to his second surviving son, Richard Thompson Lawley. Richard and his three younger brothers received £30,000 each, while Wenlock’s four daughters got £15,000 apiece.36The Times, 5 Feb. 1881. Following the death of the 3rd Baron in 1912, the barony was held in turn by three more of Wenlock’s sons, Richard Thompson (1856-1918), an army officer; Rev. Algernon George (1857-1931); and Arthur (1860-1932), who like his oldest brother became a colonial governor, and on whose death in 1932 the title became extinct. The Hull History Centre, Hull University Archives, holds some family and estate papers.