Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 63.djvu/365

 sular war, being present at Vimiero, Fuentes de Onoro, Ciudad Rodrigo, Badajoz, Salamanca, Vittoria, the battles of the Pyrenees, the Nivelle and Nìve, and at Orthes, where he was severely wounded. He was also wounded at Badajoz and the Nivelle. He afterwards received the Peninsular silver medal with ten clasps. He was promoted captain on 24 Dec. 1813.

At Waterloo he was extra aide-de-camp to Major General Adam, who commanded the brigade of which the 52nd formed part. He received the medal. He was placed on half-pay on 25 Feb. 1816, but was appointed to the 13th foot on 7 Aug. 1817, and exchanged back to the 52nd on 2 July 1818. On 9 June 1825 he was given an unattached majority, and again went on half-pay. On 30 Nov. 1826 he was made lieutenant-colonel and inspecting field officer of militia. He became colonel on 23 Nov. 1841, and was assistant quartermaster-general, first at Cork and afterwards at Manchester from 1842 to 1851.

On 11 Nov. 1851 he was promoted major-general. He was sent to the Cape, and served in the Kaffir war of 1852 as second in command under General (afterwards Sir George) Cathcart [q. v.] On 20 June 1852 a Hottentot camp near the source of the Buffalo was surprised by his ‘judicious arrangements and the indefatigable exertions of Lieutenant-colonel Eyre and his troops’ (, p. 195). When Cathcart crossed the Keï, Yorke was left in command in British Kaffraria, and hunted out the Kaffirs still lurking there. He was given a reward for distinguished service on 13 July 1853, and in May 1854 he succeeded Colonel (afterwards Lord) Airey as military secretary at headquarters.

He was made colonel of the 33rd foot on 27 Feb. 1855, and K.C.B. on 5 Feb. 1856. He became lieutenant-general on 13 Feb. 1859, and received the G.C.B. on 29 June 1860, when he ceased to be military secretary. In that office it is said that as Lord Fitzroy Somerset had ‘softened the asperity of the Iron Duke, Sir C. Yorke neutralised the exuberant kindness of the Duke of Cambridge’ (, Personal History of the Horse Guards, p. 250). He was made colonel-commandant of the 2nd battalion of the rifle brigade on 1 April 1863, and became general on 5 Sept. 1865. On 5 April 1875 he was appointed constable of the Tower of London, and on 2 June 1877 he was made field-marshal. He died in South Street, Grosvenor Square, on 20 Nov. 1880, and was buried on the 24th at Kensal Green.

[Times, 22 Nov. 1880; Ann. Reg. 1880; Illustrated London News, 16 June 1877 (portrait); Sir George Cathcart's Correspondence; Moorsom's History of the 52nd Regiment.] 

YORKE, CHARLES PHILIP (1764–1834), politician, born on 12 March 1764, was elder son of Charles Yorke (1722–1770) [q. v.] by his second wife, elder brother of Sir Joseph Sydney Yorke [q. v.], and half-brother of Philip Yorke, third earl of Hardwicke [q. v.] He was educated at Harrow, and was admitted a fellow-commoner of St. John's College, Cambridge, on 22 Jan. 1781; he graduated M.A. from St. John's per literas regias in 1783, and was called to the bar from the Middle Temple in 1787. During the winter of 1788 he spent a few months in Italy.

He represented the county of Cambridge in parliament from 1790 to 1810, being chosen at the general election of 1790, and re-elected in 1796, 1802, 1806, and 1807. In 1792 he moved the address in answer to the king's speech. He frequently spoke in parliament, generally in opposition to Pitt, and was a strenuous opponent of the catholic claims. In 1801 he was made a privy councillor, and accepted the post of secretary at war in the Addington administration; but he showed anything but special aptitude for this office, and was in August 1803 transferred to the home department, acting as secretary until May 1804, when Pitt returned to office. He gave his steady support in debate to Windham's military schemes. On 22 Jan. 1808 he spoke at some length in defence of the Copenhagen expedition. On 25 May 1808 he spoke after Wilberforce against the catholic petition. Early in 1810 he succeeded William Eden (son of Lord Auckland), who was drowned in the Thames, as one of the tellers of the exchequer, a sinecure worth 2,700l. a year, which gossip had decided that Spencer Perceval would retain for himself, or at least for one of his own family (, Life of Perceval, ii. 66–8). Yorke, who was not well off, accepted the provision in an effusive manner. Having lost his seat in Cambridgeshire, where his policy in regard to the war had given offence, though he received a present of gold plate from his late constituents, he re-entered parliament for St. Germains, a seat exchanged in 1812 for Liskeard.

On 26 Jan. 1810 Lord Porchester moved that the House of Commons should resolve itself into a committee to inquire into the conduct and policy of the Walcheren expedition, and the motion was carried against all the exertions of the ministry and their friends, among whom Yorke was prominent.