CAVENDISH, William, Lord Cavendish (1808-1891), of 10 Belgrave Square, Middlesex

As heir to two titles, including the earldom held by his septuagenarian grandfather, Cavendish was destined for a short Commons career, and had already sat for three constituencies in three years in the unreformed Parliament, before topping the poll for the new constituency of North Derbyshire at the 1832 general election.1HP Commons, 1820-1832. A solid Whig, who apparently had ‘no political talent or ambition’, he curtly told local supporters in early 1833 that much work was needed to ‘wipe out the errors of a long system of maladministration’, arguing that the East India and Bank charters and the Church were all in need of reform.2F.M.L. Thompson, ‘Cavendish, William, seventh duke of Devonshire (1808-1891)’, www.oxforddnb.com; Derby Mercury, 16 Jan. 1833. His support for the ministry was expressed through the division lobby, and he divided in favour of the Irish coercion bill, but against the ballot and currency reform.3The Times, 13 Mar. 1833, 26, 29 Apr. 1833. In the following session he served on the inquiry into church patronage in Scotland, before the death of his grandfather, 9 May 1834, removed him to the Lords as 2nd earl of Burlington. He was succeeded as member for North Derbyshire by his younger brother, George Henry Cavendish, who sat until 1880.4PP 1834 (512), v. 2.

Although he seconded the address in 1836, he rarely spoke in the Lords, a tendency reinforced by the death of his beloved wife Blanche in 1840.5Hansard, 4 Feb. 1836, vol. 31, cc. 8-11. However, Cavendish’s parliamentary contribution is perhaps slightly greater than has been allowed.6HP Commons, 1820-1832; Thompson, ‘Cavendish’; DNB supplement (1901), i. 401. He successfully piloted an 1855 bill through the Lords, whose ‘object was to enable the boards of guardians to provide for the education of the children of the poor who were supported by the parish rates out of the workhouses’.7The bill had been introduced by Evelyn Denison in the lower House, was passed by the Lords with no amendments, 18 June 1855, and received the royal assent, 26 June 1855. Hansard, 8 June 1855, vol. 138, c.1645; PP 1854-55 (81), iii. 311-14; CJ cx. 299, 324; 18 & 19 Vict. c.34. After he succeeded his cousin as 7th duke of Devonshire in 1858 and became chancellor of Cambridge in 1861, he spoke in favour of the abolition of university tests.8Hansard, 25 July 1867, vol. 189, cc. 52-58; ibid., 29 May 1867, vol. 192, cc. 1020-21. He continued his family’s policy of endorsing Cavendish and a second Liberal for North Derbyshire, supported the disestablishment of the Irish church in 1869, but broke with the Liberal party over Home Rule in 1886.9C. Hogarth, ‘Derby and Derbyshire elections, 1852-1865’, Derbyshire Archaeological Journal (1981), ci. 151-72 (at 163); Hansard, 17 June 1869, vol. 197, cc. 76-81; Thompson, ‘Cavendish’. His real interests lay in the patronage of science and education, and the development of Eastbourne and Barrow-in-Furness. Lauded in his day as the model of public-spirited and enterprising aristocracy, Cavendish’s huge investment in the latter town, particularly after the collapse of the iron, steel and railway companies which sustained its boom, passed on large debts to his successors.10D. Cannadine, ‘The landowner as millionaire: the finances of the dukes of Devonshire, c.1800-c.1926’, Agricultural History Review (1977), xxv. 77-97 (at 82-87); idem, Lords and landlords: the aristocracy and the towns, 1774-1967 (1980). 229-388; Derby Mercury, 23 Dec. 1891; S. Pollard, ‘Barrow-in-Furness and the duke of Devonshire’, Economic History Review (1955-6), 2nd ser., vii. 213-21; Thompson, ‘Cavendish’; The Times, 24, 26 Dec. 1891. His first-born son died in infancy, but his three surviving sons all served in Parliament. The assassination of Lord Frederick Cavendish (1836-82) in Dublin on being appointed as Irish secretary, combined with his financial worries, added to his natural melancholy in his final decade. He died in 1891, just surviving his youngest son, Lord Edward (1818-91), and was succeeded by his only remaining and second-born son Spencer Compton Cavendish (1833-1908), marquess of Hartington, and 8th duke, a leading politician of the late Victorian era.