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 captain on 17 March 1752, captain and lieutenant-colonel on 3 May 1756, and colonel on 7 May 1758. He was elected M.P. for Derbyshire on 27 June 1751, in the room of his elder brother, the Marquis of Hartington, who was summoned to the House of Lords as Lord Cavendish of Hardwick, in his father's barony, and for Derby in 1754, a seat which he held without intermission till 1780. He was a most enthusiastic soldier, and with three other young officers, Wolfe, Monckton, and Keppel, made a compact on the outbreak of the seven years' war not to marry until France was conquered. Family influence secured his rapid promotion, and in April 1757 he proceeded to Germany as aide-de-camp to the Duke of Cumberland, and served the campaign of that year there. In September 1758 he accompanied the Duke of Marlborough in his ludicrous expedition against St. Malo as aide-de-camp, and was taken prisoner at the affair of St. Cas. He at first refused to go on parole, on the ground that his duty as a member of parliament would make it necessary for him to vote the supplies for further war against France; but the Duc d'Aiguillon overruled his objections, and said, ‘Let not that prevent you, for we should no more object to your voting in parliament than to your begetting children lest they should one day fight against France.’ In 1760, after his exchange had been arranged, he went to Germany again as brigadier-general, and held command of a brigade of infantry in the army of Prince Ferdinand of Brunswick till the conclusion of the war in 1763. In 1759–60 he was colonel 67th regiment. On 30 Oct. 1760 he was made colonel of the 34th regiment, a command which he held for thirty-seven years, and on 7 March 1761 he was promoted major-general. He succeeded to the beautiful estate of Twickenham Park under the will of the Countess of Mountrath in 1766, and was promoted lieutenant-general on 30 April 1770. His political principles prevented him from applying for a command in the American war of independence, but he was promoted general on 20 Nov. 1782, and made a field-marshal on 30 July 1796. He died at Twickenham, unmarried, on 21 Oct. 1803, at the age of seventy-four, leaving the bulk of his immense property to his favourite nephew, Lord George Cavendish, M.P., afterwards first earl of Burlington.

[Rose's Biog. Dict.; Historical Record of the 34th Regiment.]  CAVENDISH, FREDERICK CHARLES (1836–1882), chief secretary for Ireland, was second son of William Cavendish, seventh duke of Devonshire, by his marriage, 6 Aug. 1829, with Blanche Georgiana Howard, fourth daughter of George, sixth earl of Carlisle. He was born at Compton Place, Eastbourne, on 30 Nov. 1836, and after being educated at home, matriculated in 1855 from Trinity College, Cambridge, where he graduated B.A. in 1858, and then served as a cornet in the Duke of Lancaster's own yeomanry cavalry. From 1859 to 1864 he was private secretary to Lord Granville. He travelled in the United States in 1859–60, and in Spain in 1860. He entered parliament as a liberal for the northern division of the West Riding of Yorkshire, 15 July 1865, and retained that seat until his death. After serving as private secretary to the prime minister, Mr. Gladstone, from July 1872 to August 1873 he became a junior lord of the treasury, and held office until the resignation of the ministry. He performed the duties of financial secretary to the treasury from April 1880 to May 1882, when on the resignation of Mr. W. E. Forster, chief secretary to the lord-lieutenant of Ireland, he was appointed to succeed him. In company with Earl Spencer, lord-lieutenant, he proceeded to Dublin, and took the oath as chief secretary at the Castle, Dublin, on 6 May 1882; but on the afternoon of the same day, while walking in the Phœnix Park in company with Thomas Henry Burke [q. v.], the under-secretary, he was attacked from behind by several men, who with knives murdered Mr. Burke and himself. His body being brought to England, was buried in Edensor churchyard, near Chatsworth, on 11 May, when three hundred members of the House of Commons and thirty thousand other persons followed the remains to the grave. The trial of the murderers in 1883 [see ] made it evident that the death of Cavendish was not premeditated, and that he was not recognised by the assassins; the plot was laid against Mr. Burke, and the former was murdered because he happened to be in the company of a person who had been marked out for destruction. A window to Cavendish's memory was placed in St. Margaret's Church, Westminster, at the cost of the members of the House of Commons. He was known as an industrious administrator, who seldom spoke in the house except upon subjects of which he had official cognisance or special experience, but he took an interest in educational questions, and on every side was highly esteemed for his urbanity and devotion to business. He married, on 7 June 1864, Lucy Caroline, second daughter of George William Lyttelton, fourth baron Lyttelton, and maid of honour to the queen. 