Page:Debrett's Peerage, Baronetage, Knightage and Companionage.djvu/43

 DEBRETT. "A depository of information which I never open without amazement or admiration." Extract from Speech of the late Lord High Chancellor Cairns, in House of Lords. PREFACE. [HE heavy mortality among the Nobility and Aristocracy during the closing weeks of 1891 and the early part of the present year, has left its mark upon the pages of "Debrett," and placed many well-known names in the lengthy "Obituary" recorded on pages x xiii, while a County Council Election, a Dissolution of Parliament, followed by a General Election, and a subsequent change of Ministry with its accompanying shower of Honours, have all added to the labour of compiling the 1893 edition, and in making phenomenal the number of alterations and additions recorded in the present issue. Of the principal events of the past twelve months, special mention should be made (i) of the lamented death in January of H.R.H. the Duke of Clarence and Avondale, involving a change in the line of succession to the Throne, (2) of the announcement in the " Birthday Gazette " that Her Majesty had conferred the dignity of a Peerage of the United Kingdom upon H.R.H. Prince George Frederick Ernest Albert of Wales, K.G., by the name, style, and title of Duke of York,* Earl of Inverness, and Baron Killarney, (3) of the decisions of the Committee for Privileges of the House of Lords in three claims to Peerages, in which they adjudged William Grey to be gth Earl of Stamford and loth Baron Grey of Groby, and Henry de Vere Vane to be gth Baron Barnard, but refused the claim to a Barony of De Wahull, and (4) of the bestowal of more than last holder of the title having been Frederick, who died in 1827, second son of King George III.
 * The Royal Dukedom of York has been five times previously conferred, the