LAMBTON, Hedworth (1797-1876), of Lambton Castle, co. Durham.

Lambton was born into a politically distinguished family whose wealth was derived from the coalmines surrounding Lambton castle in county Durham. His father, William Henry Lambton, was MP for Durham City, 1787-97, and his eldest brother, John George Lambton, who became the first earl of Durham in 1833, was a son-in-law of the prime minister Lord Grey and an instrumental figure in the drafting of the reform bill.1HP Commons 1820-1832, vi. 29-37; G. Martin, ‘Lambton, John George, first earl of Durham (1792-1840)’, Oxf. DNB, www.oxforddnb.com; J. Reid, Life and letters of the first earl of Durham, 1792-1840 (1906), ii. 20. Lambton, ‘of whom one hears little in the politics of the period’, lived largely in Durham’s shadow, but the two brothers were close and corresponded regularly, particularly during Lambton’s youth, when he travelled extensively across Europe.2C.W. New, Lord Durham: a biography of John George Lambton, first earl of Durham (1929), 284; The Times, 21 Sept. 1876. In 1823, while abroad, he was put up without his knowledge by his brother to challenge the re-election of Sir Henry Hardinge at Durham City.3HP Commons 1820-32, ii. 364. With Lambton trailing in the poll, however, his sponsors announced his retirement, whereupon Durham publicly distanced his brother from the disastrous campaign.4Ibid.

At the 1832 general election Lambton offered for the newly-created division of North Durham. Following a keenly fought contest in which he called for ‘the correction of all those abuses which inflict so much misery on the state’, he decisively headed the poll.5Newcastle Courant, 22 Dec. 1832. He later recalled that ‘I was unknown; but in every part of the county where I went to canvass, only this simple observation was made to me – “you are Lord Durham’s brother, and that is enough”’.6Durham Chronicle, 8 Nov. 1833. Although he remained silent in his first parliament, he attended frequently and supported Grey’s administration on most major issues, but was against the ministerial motion to replace church rates with a land tax, 21 Apr. 1834. He voted for shorter parliaments, 15 May 1834.

At the 1835 general election, Lambton unambiguously nailed his reformist colours to the mast. He advocated the ballot, triennial parliaments and household suffrage, and declared that ‘I would rather trust a child to a ferocious tiger than I would trust the working-out of the Reform bill ... to a Tory administration’.7Parliamentary test book (1835), 93-4. Returned unopposed, he divided with the opposition majority on the speakership, 19 Feb. 1835, and for the amendment to the address, 24 Feb. 1835. He voted for Irish church appropriation, 2 Apr. 1835, and thereafter consistently supported the attempts of the Melbourne ministry to reform the Irish church. In his first known speech, he insisted that appropriation was ‘a most necessary and praiseworthy plan for rescuing millions of Catholics from contributing to the support of a Church to which they did not belong’, 17 June 1835.

Lambton opposed Melbourne’s ministry, however, over the established church bill, believing that the legislation would lead to a misuse of the revenues of the Durham see. Declaring that Lord John Russell was ‘unacquainted’ with the ‘nature of church property in Durham’, he unsuccessfully pressed for a delay in reading the bill, 8 July 1836, and his motion to insert a clause to stop the appropriation of the revenues of the Durham diocese was defeated 88-8, 12 July 1836. He did, though, back the revised ministerial plan for the abolition of church rates. While maintaining his belief that the bill was ‘harsh and unjust on church leaseholders’, he stressed that ‘the Dissenters came before Parliament with very strong claims to its generous and cordial support’, 22 May 1837, and ‘any objections ... were matters for future consideration’, 23 May 1837.8Newcastle Courant, 4 Aug. 1837.

Comfortably re-elected at the top of the poll at the 1837 general election and returned without opposition in 1841, Lambton finally found his feet as a debater in the early 1840s, and he frequently spoke on ecclesiastical matters, particularly to defend the revenues of the Durham see and the rights of leaseholders of church property. He intervened to back the ministry’s ecclesiastical duties and revenues bill, 6 Apr. and 29 June 1840, although his proposed amendment to ensure that church revenues were only appropriated to the diocese to which they belonged (which was essentially a repeat of his previous defence of the extremely wealthy Durham bishopric) was defeated 50-15, 9 July 1840. Following his service on the 1837-38 and 1839 select committees on church leases, when he was an assiduous questioner of witnesses, he intervened in the debates on the Southwark improvement bill, urging the government ‘not to sanction any compulsory sale of church leasehold property without a clause to ensure compensation to the church lessees for the right of renewal’, 26 Apr. 1842. 9PP 1837-38 (692), ix. 2; PP 1839 (247), viii. 238. His motion to insert a clause into the bill to secure compensation for church lessees was passed 187-31, 3 May 1842.

Lambton also spoke on matters affecting his family’s commercial interests. An active member of numerous select committees on the coal trade, he criticised Peel’s ministry for its proposed new tariff on coal, arguing that ‘it would only aggravate foreign competitors into retaliating’, 14 June 1842, but intervened to support the government’s mines and collieries bill, 22 and 24 June 1842.10PP 1835 (603), v. 2; PP 1836 (522), xi. 169; PP 1837-38 (475), xv. 2. His attendance during Peel’s ministry, however, was generally poor, and he rarely contributed to debate in his final four sessions. His presence on key divisions, therefore, was patchy, though he recorded a vote in favour of the Maynooth grant, 3 Apr. 1845, and supported corn law repeal, 15 May 1846. Following the dissolution in 1847, Lambton’s nephew, George, who had succeeded to the earldom in 1840 but did not share the first earl’s radical instincts, declared that he was no longer willing to spend money on an advanced Liberal, prompting Lambton to retire.11T.J. Nossiter, Influence, opinion and political idioms in reformed England: case studies from the North-east, 1832-74 (1975), 76.

Following his departure from the Commons, Lambton faded into relative obscurity. He died without issue at his residence at 8 Lansdowne Place, Brighton, in 1876. His estate was valued at £25,000.12England and Wales, National Probate Calendar, Index of wills and administration, 1861-1941, 25 Oct. 1876. Prior to entering Parliament, Lambton had admitted that ‘I am perfectly aware that I can never come within an immeasurable distance of my brother in point of ability’, but as one sympathetic obituarist noted, he was, like Durham, ‘a reformer, and something more’.13Newcastle Courant, 22 Dec. 1832; The Times, 21 Sept. 1876. His correspondence with Durham is located at the Lambton estate office, Lambton Park, Chester-le-Street, county Durham.