Sir Gerard Noel, 2nd Baronet

Sir Gerard Noel Noel, 2nd Baronet (17 July 1759-25 February 1838), of Welham Grove in Leicestershire and Exton Park in Rutland, was an English Member of Parliament.

He was born as Gerard Noel Edwards, the son of Gerard Edwards of Welham Grove and Lady Jane Noel, daughter of the 4th Earl of Gainsborough. After education at Eton College and St John's College, Cambridge, he became partner in a Westminster banking house. He entered Parliament in 1784 as member for Maidstone. However, on the death of his cousin, Thomas Noel, MP for Rutland, he resigned so as to be elected for that county (where the Noels had regularly held one of the seats for centuries). He represented Rutland (in two spells) for well over forty years. Initially a supporter of Pitt the Younger, he was one of a group of MPs who in 1788 tried to form a third party independent of both Pitt and Charles James Fox; in later years, however, he was a consistent Tory.

In 1798 he inherited the estates of his uncle, Henry Noel, 6th Earl of Gainsborough (though not the peerage, which could not pass through the female line), and changed his surname to Noel.

Noel married three times. His first marriage, in 1780, was to Diana Middleton (d. 1823), daughter of Captain Charles Middleton, the Comptroller of the Navy. The following year Middleton was created a baronet, with a special remainder to his new son-in-law should he have no sons of his own. Middleton later became First Lord of the Admiralty and was raised to a peerage as Lord Barham; he died on 17 June 1813 without male issue, and Noel consequently inherited his baronetcy, while Noel's wife inherited the peerage. They had at least fifteen children:

* Charles Noel Noel (1781-1866), MP, who succeeded to his father's baronetcy and his mother's barony, later created Earl of Gainsborough
* Rev. Gerard Thomas Noel (1782-1851), a canon of Winchester
* Major Horace Noel (1783-1807)
* Henry Robert Noel(1784-1800)
* William Middleton Noel (1789-1859), MP for Rutland 1838-1840
* Captain Frederic Noel (1790-1833), a naval officer
* Rev. Francis James Noel (1793-1854), Rector of Teston and Nettlestead in Kent
* Berkeley Octavius Noel (1794-1841)
* Rev. Leland Noel (1797-1870), Vicar of Exton
* Baptist Wriothesley Noel (1799-1873)
* Louisa Elizabeth Noel (d. 1816), who married William Hoare (d. 1819)
* Emma Noel (d. 1873), who married Stafford O'Brien (d. 1864)
* Charlotte Margaret Noel (d. 1869), who married (first, in 1813) Thomas Welman and (second, in 1839) Thomas Thompson
* Augusta Julia Noel (d. 1833), who married Thomas Babington (d. 1871)
* Juliana Hicks Noel (d. 1855), who married Rev. Samuel Phillips

His second marriage, in 1823, was to Harriett Gill (d. 1826), and his third, in 1831, to Isabella Evans. Both these marriages were childless.

References

*
* [http://www.stirnet.com/HTML/genie/british/nn/noel03.htm Noel genealogy]
* Lewis Namier & John Brooke, "The History of Parliament: The House of Commons 1754-1790" (London: HMSO, 1964)