Harry Powlett, 4th Duke of Cleveland

Harry George Powlett, 4th Duke of Cleveland KG (19 April 1803 – 21 August 1891), born Harry George Vane and known as Lord Harry George Vane from 1827 to 1864, was an English Whig statesman. He was the third son of William Vane, 3rd Earl of Darlington, who would later be created Duke of Cleveland. After graduating from Oxford University Lord Harry entered the foreign service and held posts in Paris and Stockholm before entering the House of Commons in 1841 as a member for South Durham. He would represent Durham until 1859, when he switched to Hastings, which he represented until his accession to the dukedom on the death of his brother on 6 September 1864. Later the same year, on 18 November, he adopted by Royal Licence the surname of Powlett in lieu of that of Vane, in accordance with the will of his maternal grandmother, the Duchess of Bolton.

He was made a Knight of the Garter in 1865. During the crisis which led to the collapse of the Earl of Russell's government in 1866 over the question of parliamentary reform, he was considered a possible compromise Prime Minister in a Whig-Conservative anti-reform coalition government, but such plans came to nothing.

He married in 1854 Lady Dalmeny, the widow of Lord Dalmeny and the mother of the future Prime Minister Archibald Primrose, 5th Earl of Rosebery. On the Duke of Cleveland's death in 1891 the dukedom became extinct, although the subsidiary title Baron Barnard passed to a relative and remains extant.

References

*DisraeliRef
*Rayment
* [http://www.thepeerage.com/p2610.htm#i26095 thePeerage.com]