HOLFORD, Robert Stayner (1808-1892), of Dorchester House, Park Lane, London of Westonbirt, Tetbury, Glos.

In the 1870s Holford was reputedly the richest commoner in England. He was also one of the most distinguished art connoisseurs of his time, who assembled ‘one of the choicest collections’ of old masters in London.1J. Wake, ‘Holford, Sir George Lindsay’, Oxf. DNB, xxvii. 636-7, at 636; F. Boase, Modern English Biography, v. 685. Although a county MP for more than 17 years, he is said to have taken ‘little interest in politics’, devoting his attention instead to developing his gardens and arboretum at Westonbirt into a remarkable ‘showcase of Victorian gardening’.2C. Sebag-Montefiore, rev. ‘Holford, Robert Stayner’, Oxf. DNB, xxvii. 638; M. Symes, ‘Westonbirt Gardens: A Victorian Elysium’, Garden History, xviii (1990), 155-73, at 171. He did, however, vote with the Conservatives in many of the most important divisions of the period, while also demonstrating a willingness to take his own line on certain questions.

Holford was born in London and brought up on his father’s estate at Westonbirt, Gloucestershire, which had been acquired by his family in 1665. He was the only child of George Peter Holford, a barrister and the fourth generation of the family to work as a master in chancery.3Handbook of the Peerage and Commons (1862), 208; Burke’s Landed Gentry (6th edn., 1879), 797. A supporter of Pitt and Lord Liverpool, his father, whose main interest lay in the management of prisons, had sat for the pocket boroughs of Bossiney, Lostwithiel, Dungannon, Hastings and Queensborough between 1803 and 1826, and served as secretary to the board of commissioners for India, 1804-6.4Gent. Mag. (1839), ii. 318; HP Commons, 1790-1820, iv. 214-6; HP Commons, 1820-1832, v. 676-8.

After graduating from Oxford in 1829, Holford briefly studied law, but showed a greater talent for landscape gardening. That year he began to plant an arboretum at the family estate which was gradually expanded to cover an area of 600 acres.5Sebag-Montefiore, ‘Holford, Robert Stayner’, 638; Symes, ‘Westonbirt Gardens’, 158. In August 1838 he inherited ‘a vast property’ and an ‘immense and princely fortune’ amounting to upwards of £1 million from his father’s elder brother, Robert Holford. A respected philanthropist, Holford’s uncle had been a collector of prints and paintings and a liberal patron of the arts, having inherited the fortune amassed by his father, Peter Holford (d. July 1804), in supplying London with a fresh water canal.6Gent. Mag. (1838), ii. 444; Lancaster Gazette, 21 July 1804; The Times, 23 Feb. 1894. Holford was to retain lucrative shares in the New River Company, and on his father’s death in 1839 inherited the remainder of the valuable family estates, which in 1883 amounted to more than 9,000 acres in Gloucestershire, along with 7,000 acres in Wiltshire, Kent and Hampshire, (including a ‘magnificent mansion’ on the Isle of Wight), with a total annual rental of £21,277.7J. Bateman, The Great Landowners of Great Britain (4th edn., 1883), 223; Gent. Mag. (1838), ii. 672; Gent. Mag. (1839), ii. 318.

From his home at Russell Square in London Holford began his own art collection with, it was remarked, ‘an eye for quality and the means to indulge it without stint’, and was admitted a member of the Society of Dilettanti, 6 June 1841. He specialised in the Italian Renaissance but, with the assistance of the dealer William Buchanan, between 1840 and 1860 he also accumulated paintings by Rubens, Velasquez, Van Dyck and Poussin, as well as ‘one of the most perfect extant collections of Rembrandt’s etchings’, sculptures, tapestries, porcelain, furniture, and a very fine library of illuminated manuscripts and early printed books.8Sebag-Montefiore, ‘Holford, Robert Stayner’, 638; Boase, Modern English Biography, v. 685; The Times, 23 Feb. 1894. He furnished valuable pictures to the Manchester Art Treasures Exhibition in 1857, and to the Royal Academy in 1887: Athenaeum, 3357 (27 Feb. 1892), 283.

In 1849 Holroyd purchased the freehold of the old Dorchester House in London and commissioned a ‘beautiful Italian palace’ from the architect Lewis Vulliamy in which to display his art collection. The building became the most conspicuous feature of Park Lane and took seven years to complete.9Sebag-Montefiore, ‘Holford, Robert Stayner’, 638; The Times, 23 Feb. 1894. Dorchester House was sold and razed around 1930 for the construction of the Dorchester Hotel. In August 1854 Holford married the younger daughter of James Lindsay, Conservative MP for Wigan, 1825-31, and Fife, 1831-2.10He thus married into a family of important art collectors, which included Alexander Lindsay, 25th earl of Crawford, and Sir Coutts Lindsay: HP Commons, 1820-1832, vi. 123-8. That December he was solicited to come forward for the seat of East Gloucestershire, following the sudden death of the sitting Conservative member. Then absent on his matrimonial tour of the continent, he was at first unwilling to stand, but consented ‘at the urgent appeal of his friends’ and issued a ‘decidedly Conservative’ address from Genoa.11Morning Chronicle, 1 Dec. 1854; Berrow’s Worcester Journal, 16 Dec. 1854; Standard, 18 Dec. 1854. As a large and influential landowner who was very popular ‘in the Hill district’ of the constituency, he was looked upon by the Derbyites as ‘a sure and safe man’.12Berrow’s Worcester Journal, 2 Dec. 1854; Morning Chronicle, 4 Dec. 1854. He was returned in absentia without opposition, with his close friend and neighbour, Joseph Sotherton MP, explaining that it was not ‘the calls of ambition, but of duty’ that had led Holford to offer.13Morning Post, 20 Dec. 1854.

Having promised ‘uncompromising opposition to hasty innovations, or organic changes’, Holford also agreed to promote improvements ‘which the lapse of time may render imperative’, and took his place in the Commons alongside his brother-in-law, Robert Blagden Hale of Alderley Park, who had sat for West Gloucestershire since 1836. At his nomination it was stated that Holford regarded the campaign in the Crimea as a ‘just and necessary’ war of ‘civilisation against barbarism’, and would therefore support measures brought forward by ‘whatever political party’ that appeared necessary for ‘the vigorous prosecution of hostilities’.14Ibid. He was, however, absent from most of the critical divisions on the conduct of the war, excepting Roebuck’s motion of censure on the cabinet, 19 July 1855, when he broke ranks with other Conservatives in order to back Palmerston.15Having voted in the small minority for a postponement of the confidence motion on the fall of Kars, 1 May 1856, he abstained from the main division.

A lax attender, who is not known to have spoken in debate, Holford did not introduce any bills, and voted in just 31 of the 196 divisions taken in 1856.16J.P. Gassiot, Third letter to J.A. Roebuck: with a full analysis of the divisions in the House of Commons during the last session of parliament (1857), 7. An opponent of the income tax, which he regarded as ‘unequal in its pressure, and inquisitorial in its operation’, he backed Disraeli’s motion for its abolition, 23 Feb. 1857, and advocated instead greater economy in the national expenditure.17Dod’s parliamentary companion (1856), 208; Morning Post, 31 Mar. 1857. He voted against the government on the Canton question, 3 Mar. 1857, but at his unopposed return at the ensuing general election explained to his constituents that he ‘was not one of those who had great sympathy with the Chinese’, and claimed that had Palmerston replaced Sir John Bowring, the political agent in Canton, more speedily, the Commons would have been in his favour. He endorsed a general improvement in national education, provided that it was ‘based on the Word of God’ and, reflecting his father’s preoccupation with prison reform, advocated improvements to ‘the reformation of juvenile offenders, and the treatment of older criminals’.18Dod’s parliamentary companion (1857, 2nd edn.), 216; Morning Post, 31 Mar. 1857.

Holford consistently opposed the admission of Jews to parliament, dividing in favour of two amendments to the oaths bill which aimed to exclude them, 15 June 1857, 22 Mar. 1858. However, between 1856 and 1861 he regularly voted against motions to withdraw the existing grant to Maynooth College. In July 1857 he sat on the Falkirk election committee. He voted against the Liberal ministry on the government of India bill, 18 Feb. 1858, and the second reading of the conspiracy to murder bill, 19 Feb. 1858.19PP 1857 session 2 (195) vi. 447. While campaigning in Gloucestershire he spoke in favour of admitting to the franchise ‘the intelligent portion of the working classes’ and, although he believed that Lord Derby’s reform bill required amendment, presented it to the electors as an ‘honest and sincere’ basis for reform which had been defeated ‘by means of a parliamentary trick’. After voting for the bill’s second reading, 31 Mar. 1859, he was returned again at the ensuing general election and, having pledged to continue to give Derby his ‘independent support’, backed the ministry in the confidence motion which led to its demise, 10 June 1859.20Dod’s parliamentary companion (1859, 2nd edn.), 217; Daily News, 11 Apr., 7 May 1859.

Holford backed Conservative criticism of the commercial treaty with France, voting for amendments by Disraeli, 20 Feb. 1860, and Ducane, 24 Feb., and that month sat on the Great Yarmouth election committee.21PP 1860 (127) xi. 443. He was one of 100 Conservative MPs who supported the Liberal government’s motion for a grant to purchase land for the exhibition scheme at Kensington, 15 June 1863, but voted against Gladstone’s subsequent motion for the purchase of the exhibition buildings, 2 July. He was also on hand to back Disraeli’s motion of censure against Palmerston’s ministry for its handling of the Schleswig Holstein question, 8 July 1864.

Staunchly opposed to the abolition of university tests, Holford divided against government bills in 1864-6, and was in the minority that supported Cairns’s amendment to the Catholic oath bill, 12 June 1865, which proposed that Catholic members abjure any intention to subvert the established church or weaken Protestant government. He regularly voted against the abolition of church rates, having explained to his constituents in 1857 that he would not consent to abolish unconditionally the means ‘by which £300,000 or £400,000 a-year were raised, and the fabrics of our ancient churches repaired’.22Morning Post, 31 Mar. 1857. At his re-election in 1865, Holford again confronted the issue of parliamentary reform, criticising the practice whereby lodgers paying £20 a year might be refused a vote while neighbours ‘of inferior education’ but who rented at £10 a year were afforded that privilege.23Birmingham Daily Post, 19 July 1865.

Holford wished to see a speedy repeal of the malt tax and backed a motion for its reduction, 17 Apr. 1866. However, alert to the argument that this would ‘be a death-blow to indirect taxation’, he suggested to his constituents that the tax be substituted by a small duty on beer.24Dod’s parliamentary companion (1869), 233; Birmingham Daily Post, 19 July 1865; Nottingham Guardian, 8 Feb. 1867. Having voted against the second reading of the Liberal reform bill, 27 Apr. 1866, he largely supported the Conservatives’ measure, with the exception of his votes to limit boroughs with populations of less than 10,000 to one seat, 31 May 1867, and to allow the distribution of votes in seats with more than two members, 5 July 1867.

Convinced that the connection of church and state was ‘one of the greatest blessings which we possess’, Holford voted against Gladstone’s resolutions on the Irish establishment in April and May 1868, and was re-elected for Gloucestershire East as the staunch opponent of ‘the spoliation of the Irish Church’.25Dod’s parliamentary companion (1869), 233; Bristol Mercury, 21 Nov. 1868. However, subsequent rumours that he was to be raised to the peerage were treated with scepticism, particularly as he had never ‘ventured to open his mouth in Parliament’.26Bradford Observer, 8 Oct. 1868. He took the Chiltern Hundreds in February 1872 ‘in consequence of ill-health preventing his attendance to parliamentary duties’.27Standard, 29 Feb. 1872.

Holford’s chief interest remained the arts and horticulture. With Vulliamy, he rebuilt Westonbirt House to an Elizabethan design and at huge expense between 1863 and 1870. He was an original member of the Burlington Fine Arts Club, to which he loaned a portion of his art collection in 1888. His three daughters each married well, Margaret to Albert Parker, 3^rd Earl Morley in 1876, Alice to Albert Grey, 4^th Earl Grey in 1877, and Evelyn to the merchant banker and art collector Sir Robert Henry Benson in 1887.28Benson later compiled a valuable catalogue of Holford’s art collection, see R.H. Benson, The Holford Collection (1924).

Holford died ‘after a long and painful illness’ at Dorchester House in February 1892.29Morning Post, 23 Feb. 1894; The Times, 23 Feb. 1894; Athenaeum, 3357 (27 Feb. 1892), 283. He was buried in Westonbirt churchyard and succeeded by his son, Sir George Lindsay Holford (1860-1926), a career army officer who served successively as equerry to the duke of Clarence, Edward VII (when prince of Wales), George V and Queen Alexandra.30Wake, ‘Holford, Sir George Lindsay’, 636. The value of Holford’s personal estate was £422,432, and his collection of engravings and etchings was sold by his son in July 1893 for £28,119, a price then ‘unprecedented’ in the history of print auctions.31Nat. Probate Calendar, Index of Wills, 1858-1966 (7 May 1892); Boase, Modern English Biography, v. 685; Morning Post, 13 July 1893; Daily News, 14 July 1893. The bulk of his art collection, which included paintings by Botticelli, Tinoretto and Titian, was auctioned after Sir George’s death by Christie’s of London in 1927, when it realised more than £573,000.32Sebag-Montefiore, ‘Holford, Robert Stayner’, 638; Wake, ‘Holford, Sir George Lindsay’, 637; The Times, 13 Sept. 1926, 18 May 1927; Time Magazine, 28 May 1928. Holford’s most tangible legacy, however, remains his prestigious arboretum at Westonbirt.33The arboretum was handed over to the Forestry Commission in 1956: S. Piebenga & S. Toomer, ‘Westonbirt Arbortetum: From Private Nineteenth-Century Estate Collection to National Arboretum’, Garden History, xxxv (2007), 113-28.