Henry Berkeley Portman, 2nd Viscount Portman GCVO (12 July 1829 – 16 October 1919, was a British Liberal Member of Parliament.
Portman was the son of Edward Berkeley Portman, 1st Viscount Portman and Lady Emma Lascelles, daughter of Henry Lascelles, 2nd Earl of Harewood. He was elected to Parliament for Shaftesbury in 1852, a seat he held until 1857, and then represented Dorset from 1857 to 1885. In 1888 he succeeded his father and entered the House of Lords.
At the end of the nineteenth century the 99 year leases on the family properties in London came up for renewal, generating a colossal income for Lord Portman of some £100,000 a year. With this fortune he commissioned Norman Shaw to build a new mansion for him at the family seat in Bryanston, Dorset. Within 30 years, however, it had been sold to Bryanston School, which is still based there. This was because it rapidly became anachronistic and uneconomic even for an aristocratic family to occupy a house on such a scale, and the family was also crippled by death duties when the second Viscount's heir and his heir's heir died within ten years of him.
Lord Portman married Mary Selina Charlotte FitzWilliam, daughter of William Charles FitzWilliam, Viscount Milton, in 1855. They had six sons and two daughters. Two of his sons died before him and all four of the others succeeded to his title in the course of time, namely, Henry Berkeley Portman, 3rd Viscount Portman (died 1923), Claud Berkeley Portman, 4th Viscount Portman (died 1929), Seymour Berleley Portman, 6th Viscount Portman (died 1946) and Gerald Berkeley Portman, 7th Viscount Portman (died 1948).
Lord Portman's first wife died in 1899. In 1908 he married, secondly, shortly before his 79th birthday, Frances Maxwell Buchanan Cuninghame, by whom there were no further children. Lord Portman died in October 1919, aged 90, and was succeeded in his titles by his aforesaid eldest son Henry Berkeley Portman.
| Parliament of the United Kingdom | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Richard Brinsley Sheridan |
Member of Parliament for Shaftesbury 1852– 1857 |
Succeeded by George Grenfell Glyn |
| Preceded by Henry Ker Seymer and John Floyer and Henry Gerard Sturt |
Member of Parliament for Dorset 1857– 1885 With: Henry Ker Seymer to 1864 John Floyer 1864–1885 Henry Gerard Sturt, to 1876 Edward Digby 1876–1885 |
constituency divided |
| Peerage of the United Kingdom | ||
| Preceded by Edward Berkeley Portman |
Viscount Portman 1888–1919 |
Succeeded by Henry Berkeley Portman |