Edward Stanley, 2nd Baron Stanley of Alderley

The Right Honourable The Lord Stanley of Alderley PC
Lord Stanley of Alderley, 1856.
Postmaster General
In office 17 August 1860 – 26 June 1866
Monarch	Victoria
Prime Minister	The Viscount Palmerston The Earl Russell
Preceded by	The Earl of Elgin
Succeeded by	The Duke of Montrose
President of the Board of Trade
In office 31 March 1855 – 21 February 1858
Monarch	Victoria
Prime Minister	The Viscount Palmerston
Preceded by	Edward Cardwell
Succeeded by	Joseph Warner Henley
Paymaster-General Vice-President of the Board of Trade
In office 5 January 1853 – 30 January 1855
Monarch	Victoria
Prime Minister	The Earl of Aberdeen
Preceded by	Charles Abbot
Succeeded by	Edward Pleydell-Bouverie
In office 12 February 1852 – 21 February 1852
Monarch	Victoria
Prime Minister	The Earl Russell
Preceded by	Granville Leveson-Gower
Succeeded by	Charles Abbot
Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs
In office 6 July 1846 – 12 February 1852
Monarch	Victoria
Prime Minister	The Earl Russell
Preceded by	George Smythe
Succeeded by	Austen Henry Layard
Paymaster-General
In office 19 June 1841 – 30 August 1841
Monarch	Victoria
Prime Minister	The Viscount Melbourne
Preceded by	Sir Henry Parnell, Bt.
Succeeded by	Sir Edward Knatchbull, Bt.
Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury
In office 21 April 1835 – 19 June 1841
Monarch	Victoria
Prime Minister	The Viscount Melbourne
Preceded by	Sir George Clerk
Succeeded by	Sir Denis Le Marchant
Member of Parliament for North Cheshire
In office 26 August 1847 – 8 June 1848
Preceded by	George Legh
Succeeded by	George Legh
In office 8 January 1833 – 22 July 1841
Preceded by	constituency established
Succeeded by	George Legh
Member of Parliament for Hindon
In office 1 June 1831 – 8 January 1833
Preceded by	George Matthew Fortescue
Succeeded by	constituency abolished
Member of the House of Lords Lord Temporal
In office 23 October 1850 – 16 June 1869 Hereditary Peerage
Preceded by	1st Baron Stanley of Alderley
Succeeded by	3rd Baron Stanley of Alderley
Personal details
Born	(1802-11-13)13 November 1802
Died	16 June 1869(1869-06-16) (aged 66)
Nationality	British
Political party	Whig Liberal
Spouse(s)	Hon. Henrietta Dillon-Lee (m. 1826)

Edward John Stanley, 2nd Baron Stanley of Alderley, PC (13 November 1802 – 16 June 1869), known as The Lord Eddisbury between 1848 and 1850, was a British politician.

Background

Stanley was the son of John Stanley, 1st Baron Stanley of Alderley, and Lady Maria Josepha, daughter of John Holroyd, 1st Earl of Sheffield.^[1]

Political career

Stanley entered the House of Commons as Whig Member of Parliament (MP) for Hindon in 1831 and was later member for North Cheshire between 1832 and 1841, and between 1847 and 1848. He served under Lord Melbourne as Patronage Secretary to the Treasury from 1835 to 1841, as Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department in 1841 and as Paymaster-General in 1841 and under Lord John Russell as Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs between 1846 and 1852.^[1] He was sworn of the Privy Council in 1841^[2] and in 1848, two years before he succeeded to the barony of Stanley, he was created Baron Eddisbury, of Winnington^[1] in the County Palatine of Chester.^[3]

Stanley was President of the Board of Trade under Lord Palmerston from 1855 to 1858, and Postmaster-General under Palmerston and then Lord John Russell from 1860 to 1866. In 1861 he established the Post Office Savings Bank.

Family

Lord Stanley of Alderley married Henrietta Maria (21 December 1807 – 16 February 1895), a daughter of Viscount Dillon, in 1826. Lord and Lady Stanley of Alderley had ten children:

• Henry Edward John, 3rd Baron Stanley of Alderley (1827–1903)
• Hon. Alice Margaret (1828–1910), wife of Augustus Pitt Rivers
• Hon. (Henrietta) Blanche (1830–1921), later Countess of Airlie, wife of David Ogilvy; a grandmother of Clementine Churchill, and a great-grandmother of the Mitford sisters
• Hon. Maude Alethea (1832–1915)
• Hon. Cecilia (d. 1839)
• Hon. John Constantine (1837–78)
• Edward Lyulph Stanley, 4th Baron Stanley of Alderley (1839–1925)
• Hon. Algernon Charles (1843–1928), Roman Catholic Bishop of Emmaus (in partibus)
• Hon. Katherine Louisa (1844–74), later Viscountess Amberley, wife of John Russell, Viscount Amberley; mother of the philosopher Bertrand Russell
• Hon. Rosalind Frances (1845–1921), later Countess of Carlisle, became the chatelaine of Castle Howard and a radical temperance campaigner.

Lord Stanley of Alderley died in June 1869, aged 66, and was succeeded by his eldest son, Henry. Lady Stanley of Alderley died in February 1895, aged 87.

In the 1930s his family's letters were published by his descendant Nancy Mitford as:

• The Ladies of Alderley: Letters 1841–1850 (Hamish Hamilton, 1938)
• The Stanleys of Alderley: Their letters 1851–1865 (Chapman & Hall, 1939)

References

External links

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Edward Stanley