LOGAN, Robert Hart (1772-1838), of Kentwell Hall, Suffolk

Logan, who was also known as Hart Logan, made his fortune as a Montreal merchant and shipping magnate before embarking on a parliamentary career that was abruptly cut short by his death. He was the second son of James Logan, a Scottish baker who had moved his family to Canada in 1784.1C. Gordon Winder, William Edmond Logan (1798-1875): knighted Canadian geologist (2004), 18. After attending the College of Montreal, Logan established the merchant house of Logan and Watt in 1796, which had close links to the port of Greenock, Scotland, and dealt in the export of wheat and timber. The company flourished, whereupon Logan invested in shipbuilding. In 1812 he launched the Swiftsure, the second steamship of the prominent Canadian entrepreneur John Molson.2P. Deslauries, ‘Fleming, John (c. 1786-1832)’, Dict. Can. Biog., www.biographi.ca. Like a number of his fellow countrymen who had emigrated to the region, Logan joined the Montreal militia, though he appears to have fallen out with his battalion’s major, James Dunlop, originally from Glasgow, who, when drunk, informed Logan that he ‘esteemed him less than the driver of a milk cart’.3Dunlop was subsequently court martialled for his behaviour: D. S. Macmillan and A. J. H. Richardson, ‘Dunlop, James (1757-1815)’, Dict. Can. Biog., www.biographi.ca; The letters of Veritas, republished from the Montreal Herald (1815), 64.

Logan returned to Britain in 1815 and shifted his company’s export activities from Greenock to London, where he established a successful merchant house, Hart Logan and Co., trading in European wines and spirits, and Jamaican rum, sugar, molasses and coffee.4Deslauries, ‘Fleming, John’, Dict. Can. Biog. Despite his residence in London, Logan retained a strong interest in Canadian affairs and in 1826 joined the first board of directors of the Canada Company, which was formed to aid the colonisation of Upper Canada.5R. C. Lee, The Canada Company and the Huron Trace, 1826-1853: personalities, profits and politics (2004), 226. In 1827 the township of Logan in West Perth, Ontario, was named after him in recognition of his services.6http://www.westperth.com/community-life/history/. The same year Logan left the management of his business to his nephew, William Edmond Logan, and took up residence at his recently purchased Suffolk mansion, Kentwell Hall.7C. Gordon Winter, ‘Logan, Sir William Edmond (1798-1875)’, Dict. Can. Biog., www.biographi.ca. Thereafter he established himself as a prominent figure in county life, serving as high sheriff in 1828 and establishing the South Suffolk Agricultural Association in 1835, of which he was the first president.8Essex Standard, 20 Apr. 1838.

At the 1835 general election Logan was brought forward for Suffolk West by the leadership of the local Conservative party, who praised his expertise in commercial affairs.9Bury and Norwich Post, 7 Jan. 1835. His address called for the repeal of the malt tax and pledged to ‘strenuously oppose’ the introduction of free trade in corn.10Ibid. Despite his unequivocal support for the rural interest, Logan’s campaign was dogged by claims that his company had imported foreign grain to be sold in Sudbury market, a ‘foul aspersion’ which he strenuously denied.11Ibid., 21 Jan. 1835. At the nomination he presented himself as a churchman and claimed that the Conservatives, under Peel, were progressive, but he was defeated in third place, nearly 150 votes behind his fellow Conservative candidate Robert Rushbrooke.12Ibid.

Logan remained active in county Conservative politics, attending the 1836 annual dinner of the Bury St. Edmunds Constitutional Club, and offered again at the 1837 general election.13Morning Post, 4 Feb. 1836. Believing that his defeat in 1835 was a result of too many Conservative electors splitting their votes between Rushbrooke and the victorious Liberal candidate, he urged his supporters to vote only for Conservatives. His appeal appeared to be successful, as following a particularly rancorous contest, the Conservative vote was evenly spread between himself and Rushbrooke. He was elected at the top of the poll.14Ipswich Journal, 29 July, 4, 12 Aug. 1837.

Logan’s expertise on Canadian affairs was recognised in December 1837 when he led a deputation of the Canada Company to meet with Lord Glenelg, at the colonial office.15Morning Post, 13 Dec. 1837. A staunch advocate of the union of Upper and Lower Canada, Logan was a fierce critic of Louis-Joseph Papineau, the leader of the Canadian rebellions, who he believed was a ‘coward’ and a ‘great liar’, though he subsequently voted for an opposition motion blaming the Whig government for the Canadian rebellion, 7 Mar. 1838.16Gent. Mag. (1838), i. 213-4. A regular attender, who is not known to have spoken in debate, he generally followed Peel into the division lobby and remained firm in his attachment to the agricultural interest, opposing the repeal of the corn laws, 15 Mar. 1838, and the processing of foreign corn, in bond, for exportation, 20 Mar. 1838. He did, though, vote against the majority of his party in support of the repeal of soap duties, 3 Apr. 1838.

Logan had little time to make an impact in the Commons. He died unexpectedly and childless at Pall Mall in April 1838, following an unsuccessful tracheotomy to relieve the inflammation of his windpipe.17Bury and Norwich Post, 18 Apr. 1838. Kentwell Hall was subsequently purchased by the trustees of Edward Starkie Bence, the second son of Henry Bence, of Thorington Hall, Suffolk, who was then a minor.18W. A. Copinger, The Manors of Suffolk (1905), 144. Logan’s nephew, William Edmond Logan, returned to Canada where he established himself as an eminent geologist and was knighted in 1856, the first native-born Canadian to be so honoured.19C. Gordon Winter, ‘Logan, William Edmond (1798-1875), Oxf. DNB., www.oxforddnb.com. A selection of Logan’s correspondence with his nephew is held by McGill University, Montreal.20W. E. Logan papers, McGill University Archives, Montreal.