Ughtred Kay-Shuttleworth, 1st Baron Shuttleworth

Ughtred James Kay-Shuttleworth, 1st Baron Shuttleworth 2nd Bt (1844 – 1939) was a British Liberal Party Member of Parliament who held office briefly in 1886 as Under-Secretary of State for India and then as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. From 1892–95 he was Parliamentary and Financial Secretary to the Admiralty.

His father, James Phillips Kay-Shuttleworth, born James Kay, was from a nonconformist Midlands family of somewhat limited means and he was variously a medical doctor and a reforming civil servant. He married an heiress and added her surname to his.

The father was the best known of the family, a significant reformer in early Victorian times.

The Shuttleworths were landowners in Lancashire from medieval times. Tradition states they made their fortune from wool weaving. They supported the parliamentary side in the English Civil War.

The elder Kay-Shuttleworth was often a deeply unhappy and disappointed man who suffered from epilepsy. He and his wife parted company after five children. Ughtred was raised largely apart from his father. For some years in his youth he lived in Germany with his mother.

Kay-Shuttleworth was heir to large estates, one of which was in Lancashire just north of Manchester centred around Gawthorpe Hall. He inherited all this in 1872 upon the death of his mother. His father then relocated to another of the estates, in Westmorland.

From 1869 to 1880, Kay-Shuttleworth represented Hastings in Parliament and from 1885 to 1902, the Clitheroe district of Lancashire.

In 1902 he was made 1st Baron Shuttleworth. From 1908 to 1928, he was Lord Lieutenant of Lancashire, in which capacity in 1910 he entertained King George V and Queen Mary at Gawthorpe Hall. But this golden era was soon to end, replaced by a succession of tragedies.

Ughtred died at the age of 95, in the early months of World War II, blind and bedridden, spared the second half of the family misfortunes.

Ughtred Kay-Shuttleworth had six children, four girls and two boys, both of whom were killed during World War I. The 2nd and 3rd Barons Shuttleworth were both killed in World War Two. The 2nd Baron, Richard, died on August 8, 1940 when his Hawker Hurricane went missing during a battle over a Channel convoy, south of the Isle of Wight. He had previously scored two victories. Ronald, the 3rd Baron, was killed on November 17, 1942 in North Africa. Another grandchild of Ughtred, Charles, became the 4th Baron Shuttleworth, and inherited the remaining estates, but he was badly injured in the war, losing one leg and the use of the other. He moved to another home, Leck Hall, on his estates, which was more convenient to his disability, leaving Gawthorpe Hall to his aunt, Rachel. The current Lord Shuttleworth still resides at Leck Hall.

Kay-Shuttleworth's daughter, Rachel Beatrice, lived on at Gawthorpe Hall until her death in 1967. The estate became a National Trust property in 1970. The famous collection of lace, embroideries, costumes and other textiles amassed by Rachel are now on view there.

The current Baron Shuttleworth, Charles Kay-Shutleworth, is, like his great-grandfather, Lord Lieutenant of Lancashire.