Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 13.djvu/362

 place he represented until the suppression of that borough by the Reform Bill of 1832. During this period he took an active part in criticising the public architectural works of the time, and succeeded in securing a system for the competition of public buildings, under which he was named a commissioner for rebuilding the Houses of Parliament, and for selecting the design of the Wellington monument. In 1845 he was appointed assistant-master of the ceremonies to her majesty, and in 1847 master of the ceremonies. He enjoyed the personal friendship of her majesty for many years, and only resigned his post from ill-health in February 1876, when he was created a baronet in reward for his services. Cust dabbled in literature, and wrote military histories, which were at one time considered of standard value, viz. ‘Annals of the Wars of the Eighteenth Century,’ and ‘Lives of the Warriors of the Thirty Years' War.’ For these works he received in 1869 the gold medal of the Austrian empire from the emperor of Austria. He also wrote ‘Noctes Dominicæ, or Sunday Night Readings,’ published in 1848, and ‘Family Readings—the New Testament harmonised and explained,’ published in 1850. For these works the honorary degree of D.C.L. was conferred upon him in 1853 by the university of Oxford. He was senior magistrate for the hundred of Wirral, and rendered long service in that capacity. He died in Jermyn Street on 14 Jan. 1878, in his eighty-fourth year, being one of the last surviving officers who had served in the Peninsular war, and was buried at Belton, near Grantham. He married on 11 Jan. 1821, at Marylebone Church, Mary Anne, only child of Lewis William Boode, of Amsterdam and Peover Hall, Cheshire, and heiress of her mother, Margaret Dannett, of Leasowe Castle, Birkenhead, daughter of the Rev. Thomas Dannett, rector of Liverpool. This lady was bedchamber-woman to H.R.H. the Duchess of Kent, the mother of Queen Victoria. She wrote a book on ‘Cats,’ being a great fancier of these animals, and died on 10 July 1882, aged 82. By her Cust left one son, Leopold, who succeeded him, and to whom the king of the Belgians was godfather, and four daughters.



CUST, JOHN (1718–1770), baronet, speaker of the House of Commons, was the eldest son of Sir Richard Cust, bart., by his wife Anne, daughter of Sir William Brownlow, bart., and sole heiress of her brother, Sir John Brownlow, bart., who in 1718 was created Baron Charleville and Viscount Tyrconnel in the kingdom of Ireland. He was born on 29 Aug. 1718 and was baptised at the church of St. Martin's-in-the-Fields, Westminster, on the 25th of the following month. He was educated at Eton and Benets (afterwards Corpus) College, Cambridge, where he received the degree of M.A. in 1739. He succeeded to the title as third baronet upon the death of his father on 25 July 1734, and was called to the bar at the Middle Temple on 26 Nov. 1742.

In April 1743 he was elected member for Grantham without a contest, in the place of Sir Michael Newton, bart., and thenceforth continued to represent that borough during the remainder of his life. On 18 Dec. 1743 Cust married Etheldred, daughter and coheiress of Thomas Payne of Hough-on-the-Hill, Lincolnshire, by whom he had two sons and two daughters. In 1747 he was appointed one of the clerks of the household to Frederick, prince of Wales, and upon that prince's death in 1751, he received a similar appointment in the household of the Princess Dowager of Wales. Onslow having resigned the office of speaker, which he had held for more than thirty-three years, Cust was unanimously chosen in his place on 3 Nov. 1761. He was admitted to the privy council on 24 Jan. 1762, and was again elected speaker on the opening of George's second parliament on 10 May 1768. Worn out by the fatigue of his office the speaker became so ill that on 17 Jan. 1770, being unable to attend, he entreated the house, through the mouth of the clerk, ‘to excuse him at present from any further attendance on their service’ (Parl. Hist. xvi. 733). He resigned the speakership on 19 Jan., and Sir Fletcher Norton was elected in his place on 22 Jan. Cust died two days afterwards, on 24 Jan. 1770, in the fifty-second year of his age. This date is confirmed by letters still in the possession of the family as well as by the inscription on his monument. Upon the election of Sir Fletcher Norton to the chair, Lord North paid an eloquent tribute to the late speaker's unwearied diligence, his uniform impartiality, and his minute knowledge of the proceedings of the house (ib. pp. 734–5). He was buried on 8 Feb. at Belton, near Grantham, where there is a monument erected to his memory. His widow survived him, and died on 27 Jan. 1775. Cust is represented in Hogarth's print of ‘The Times’ (plate ii.) Horace Walpole, in a letter to George Montagu, dated 7 Nov. 1761, writes: ‘Sir John Cust is speaker, and, bating his nose, the chair seems well filled’ (, Letters, 1857, iii. 458). In Wrax-