Richard Lawley, 4th Baron Wenlock

Lieutenant-Colonel Richard Thompson Lawley, 4th Baron Wenlock CB (1856–1918) was a British Army officer and polo champion who became the 4th Baron Wenlock and the 11th Lawley Baronet of Spoonhill in 1912.

Early life

Lawley was born on 21 August 1856, the second son and sixth child of Beilby Lawley the 2nd Baron Wenlock and his wife Lady Elizabeth (née Grosvenor).^[1]

Military service

Lawley joined the British Army in 1876 and served in the Nile Expedition of 1884-1885 and the South African War between 1901 and 1902.^[2] He was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Bath in 1902 for operations in South Africa.^[3] He was colonel commanding the 7th Hussars.^[2]

Polo

He won the International Polo Cup in 1886 for Britain alongside John Henry Watson, Captain Thomas Hone, and Brigadier-General Malcolm Orme Little.^[4]

Family life

He succeeded to the title of Baron Wenlock on the death of his brother Beilby Lawley, who had no son to whom to pass on the title.^[1] In 1909 he married Rhoda Edith Knox-Little.^[2]

Wenlock died on 25 July 1918 at his home at Hestercombe near Taunton, Devon, aged 61. He had no children so his younger brother, Algernon George Lawley, became the 5th Baron Wenlock.^[2]

References