Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 44.djvu/403

Percy after restoring the estates to order, his object was to administer his princely revenues in a manner worthy of his cultivated tastes and the dignity of his rank. Under his rule Alnwick Castle, which he restored at vast expense, and enriched with rare collections of pictures and antiquities, became the scene of an open hospitality, almost feudal in its stately profusion. At the duke's cost five churches were built on his estates, five more endowed, and six parsonages erected. Nearly half a million was spent on building cottages, and half as much on drainage, new roads, and bridges. His love of his old profession was manifested in a long series of wise foundations and endowments in aid of sailors. In 1851, on the occasion of the Great exhibition, he offered a prize for the best model of a lifeboat, and his influence led to a new activity in the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, brought into practical use the self-righting lifeboat, and promoted the establishment of lifeboat stations all round the coasts of the British Isles. He established lifeboats himself at Hauxley, Tynemouth, Cullercoats, and Newbiggin, endowed schools for the children of sailors and fishermen at Whitby, Tynemouth, Percy Main, and North Shields, and founded the Tyne Sailors' Home. In March 1852 he was appointed first lord of the admiralty in Lord Derby's first administration, and his ten months' tenure of office was marked by a firm maintenance of the best interests of the profession, and a great extension of the application of steam power to the navy. The ministry went out in January 1853, when the duke was made a knight of the Garter. For a short period in 1852 he was a special deputy warden of the Stannaries, and he was constable of Launceston Castle. His scientific interests were shown in his support of learned societies. He was a fellow of the Royal Society, of the Astronomical and Geological Societies, and of the Society of Antiquaries; and was also president of the Royal Institution and the Royal United Service Institute, and a trustee of the British Museum. He died at Alnwick on 12 Feb. 1865, and was buried by Dean Stanley in the Percy chapel in Westminster Abbey on 27 Feb. He left no issue, and the dukedom passed to his cousin George, father of the present duke.

[Personal knowledge; private information; Memoir appended to Funeral Sermon by Rev. M. M. Ben-Oliel, chaplain to the Duchess of Northumberland, in Brompton Episcopal Chapel, 26 Feb. 1865; statement of services from the admiralty; De Fonblanque's Annals of the House of Percy, privately printed, 1887; Lane-Poole's Life of E. W. Lane, pp. 108–10; Annual Register, vol. cvii. 1865.] 

PERCY, ELIZABETH. [See under, sixth , d. 1748]

PERCY, GEORGE (1580–1632), author and colonist, was eighth son of Henry Percy, eighth earl of Northumberland [q. v.], by his wife Catherine, eldest daughter and coheiress of John Neville, lord Latimer. Henry Percy, ninth earl of Northumberland [q. v.], was his brother. Born 4 Sept. 1580, he served for a time in the Low Country wars, and subsequently took part in the first permanent English colonisation of America. He sailed for Virginia in the first expedition of James I's reign (December 1606). On 23 May 1609 his name appeared among the incorporators of the Second Company of Virginia. On 31 Aug. of the same year Gabriel Archer mentions him as one among the ‘respected gentlemen of Virginia’ who can testify how false are the stories of mutiny in Jamestown at this time. Percy was made deputy-governor on the recall of John Smith in September 1609 to answer some misdemeanours, as Percy and others of Smith's enemies declared. He held office during a critical period until the arrival of Sir Thomas Gates [q. v.] in May 1610. Lord De la Warr became governor a month later, and appointed Percy a member of his new council (12 June 1610) (cf., Metrical News from Virginia, London, 1610). On the departure of Lord De la Warr in March 1611, Percy, in recognition of his former services, was reappointed deputy-governor until the arrival of Dale in the following May. According to Spelman's ‘Relation of Events,’ 1609–11—probably written in the autumn of 1611—Indians at this time came from the ‘great Powhatan’ with venison for Captain Percy, ‘who now was president,’ and Sir Thomas Dale wrote to the Virginia Company from Jamestown, 25 May 1611, that he was received by Percy, who, after hearing his commission read, surrendered up his own, ‘it being accordingly so to expire.’

On 17 Aug. 1611 Percy excused himself for his large expenditure to his brother Henry, who had paid on his account 432l. 1s. 6d. during the past year. He argued that, as governor of Jamestown, he was ‘bound to keep a continual and daily table for gentlemen of fashion.’ A Spanish writer (in the Simancas archives) drew the distinction between Percy and his successor Dale, that the former had been ‘appointed for himself,’ the latter by order of the king. 