- Henry John Rous
Henry John Rous (
23 January 1795 –19 June 1877 ), Britishadmiral and sportsman, was born the second son ofJohn Rous, 1st Earl of Stradbroke .He was educated at
Westminster School , and entered the British navy in 1808, serving as amidshipman in the expedition to Flushing. He was afterwards appointed to the "Bacchante", and received a medal for bravery in various actions and expeditions.In 1823 he was made captain, and served in the
India n and New Holland stations from 1823 to 1829. In April 1827, he organisedSydney 's firstregatta . In August 1828, he explored the Tweed andRichmond River s in northeasternNew South Wales .cite web
first=Louise T.
last=Daley
title =Rous, Henry John (1795 - 1877)
publisher =Australian National University
work=Australian Dictionary of Biography
url =http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A020355b.htm
accessdate = 2007-03-30] The area between these rivers is known as Rous County, but counties in Australia are not widely-known and are mainly used for cadastral purposes.In 1834 he was appointed to the command of the "Pique", a 36-gun
frigate , which ran ashore on the coast ofLabrador and was greatly damaged. Rous, however, brought her across theAtlantic Ocean with a sprung foremast and without keel, forefoot or rudder, and though the ship was making 23 inches of water an hour.Thoroughbred horse racing
His father owned a stud farm in
Suffolk and won the 1815 2,000 Guineas with the colt Tigris. Rous, always fond of the sport became a steward of theJockey Club in 1838, a position he held almost uninterruptedly to his death. In 1855 he was appointed public handicapper. In that role he introduced the weight-for-age scale. [cite news | first=Greg | last=Wood | author= | url=http://sport.guardian.co.uk/horseracing/story/0,,1745459,00.html | title=End of an era as Jockey Club falls on own sword | work= | publisher=The Guardian | pages= | page= | date=Monday3 April 2006 | accessdate=2006-04-17] He managed the stables of theDuke of Bedford at Newmarket for many years, and wrote a work on "The Laws and Practice of Horse Racing" that procured for him the title of the "Blackstone of the Turf".The
Rous Memorial Stakes was named in his honor.Political life
At the 1841 general election, he was elected as Conservative
Member of Parliament (MP) for Westminster, and in 1846 Sir Robert Peel appointed himFirst Lord of the Admiralty . He died on19 June 1877 .For the naval career of Admiral Rous see O'Byrne, "Naval Biographical Dictionary" (
London , 1849). A vivid sketch of him as a turf authority will be found in Day's "Turf Celebrities" (London, 1891).References
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*1911
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