Page:VCH Rutland 1.djvu/267

 POLITICAL HISTORY 1832 in the continuity of the representation of the county in Parliament by the members of Rutland families. With these exceptions the representation of Rutland was shared between the families of Heathcote and Noel from 1832 to 1867, and between those of Noel and Finch from 1868 to 1907."" There is no regiment of the regular army associated with Rutland, but the county appears to have been incidentally connected both with the 58th Regiment, now the 2nd battalion of the Northamptonshire Regiment, and with two others which have ceased to exist. The 55th Regiment, which was raised in 1755, appears in the Army Lists from 1783 — when the practice of assigning territorial designations to all the regiments of the line appears to have begun "'^ — to 188 i, when the modern territorial system was established, as the ' 55th (Rutlandshire) Regt.,' and it seems not improbable that it acquired this title from the fact that Lord Charles Manners appears to have been its first colonel,"^' and that it was there- fore at one time largely recruited in Rutland. A similar reason may be, perhaps, accepted as accounting for the title of ' Rutlandshire ' — or, as it is given in the History of the British Army ' The Duke of Rutland's ' — bestowed in the Army Lists from 178 i to 1784, when it was disbanded, on the old 86th Regiment, which was raised, with twelve others in 1779 ; ^^* and Rutland must undoubtedly have been also the chief recruiting ground of a regiment of infantry raised, at a cost of ;^20,ooo by George Finch, 9th Earl of Win- chilsea, during the American War of Independence to fight for George III."' No documents, unfortunately, are to be found amongst the papers at Burley with respect to the strength, services, or designation of this regiment, though it is apparently known that men after it was disbanded were employed as marines in various ships;"' but the fact that the old 87th Regiment, which was one of the thirteen regiments above mentioned as raised in 1779, and was, like the 86th Regiment, apparently disbanded in 1784, bore the title of The Earl of Winchilsea, who accompanied George III on his tour through Scotland in 1822, and on the king's death attended as Groom of the Stole on the Windsor Establishment,"' also raised in 1803, during the alarm caused by Napoleon's threatened invasion of England, a volunteer corps called the Rutland Legion of Rifle Corps,"' which, like numerous others amongst the auxiliary forces during this period, had a special medal struck in commemoration of its embodiment. ^^° The corps, which had a strength of four officers besides its colonel, and 100 non-commissioned officers and men, continued in existence till the end of 1804, when it appears to have merged '" Pari. PollBk. '" The Army Lists show that (as in the case of the 86th, given above) this practice was coming into force in 178 1. '" Letter Bk. of the Sec. at War. 1755, p. 258. '" Fortescue, Hist. Brit. Army, iii, 290. In 1781 the 86th was serving in the West Indies under Col. Antony St. Leger. Army List, 1781. Cf. Annl. Reg. 1781, Chron. App. p. 65. '" Hist. Burley on the Hill, 335. "° Ibid. '" Fortescue, Hist. Brit. Army, iii, 290. "' Hist. Burley on the Hill, 335. The Prince Regent and the Duke of York visited Burley from Belvoir in 1 8 14. "' Ibid. 336. Some knapsacks, stamped R.V. with an earl's coronet, with bayonets and other accoutre- ments of the corps, are still preserved at Burley. '" D. Hastings Irwin, Vfar Medals from 1588 to 1899, p. 331 ; cf. 'Napoleon and the Invasion of Engl, ii, 321, 322. 207
 * Lord Winchilsea's ' "^ seems to identify it with the latter corps.