Elizabeth Manners, Duchess of Rutland

Elizabeth Howard

Elizabeth Manners, Duchess of Rutland (13 November 1780 – 29 November 1825) was the wife of John Manners, 5th Duke of Rutland. She was the daughter of Frederick Howard, 5th Earl of Carlisle, and his wife Lady Margaret Caroline Leveson-Gower.^[1]

Lady Elizabeth married the duke on 22 April 1799, and they had ten children:

• Lady Caroline Isabella Manners (25 May 1800–December 1804)
• Lady Elizabeth Frederica Manners (10 December 1801 – 20 March 1886), who married Andrew Robert Drummond and had seven children.
• Lady Emmeline Charlotte Elizabeth Manners (2 May 1806 – 29 October 1855), who married Charles Stuart-Wortley-Mackenzie and had three children.
• George John Henry Manners, Marquess of Granby (26 June 1807 – 4 August 1807)
• Lady Katherine Isabella Manners (4 February 1809 – 20 April 1848), who married Frederick Hervey, 2nd Marquess of Bristol, and had seven children.
• Lady Adeliza Elizabeth Gertrude Manners (29 December 1810 – 26 October 1877), who married and had one daughter.
• George John Frederick Manners, Marquess of Granby (20 August 1813 – 15 June 1814)
• Charles Cecil John Manners, 6th Duke of Rutland (16 May 1815 – 3 March 1888)
• John James Robert Manners, 7th Duke of Rutland (3 December 1818 – 4 August 1906), who first married Catherine Marley and had one son; his second wife was Janetta Hughan, and they had four children.
• Lord George John Manners (22 June 1820 – 8 September 1874), who married Adeliza Fitzalan-Howard (daughter of Henry Fitzalan-Howard, 13th Duke of Norfolk) and had five children.

The Duchess's interests included gardening and estate management. She took forward improvements begun by her father-in-law, Charles Manners, 4th Duke of Rutland, but interrupted when he went bankrupt.^[2] She supervised landscaping works at Belvoir Castle and included a model farm. A fire in 1816 almost destroyed the castle.^[3] The rebuilding was largely entrusted to the Duchess and cost around £82,000. The Gentleman's Magazine commented that "What many individuals would have required a century to execute, her perseverance in a few years achieved."^[4]

Elizabeth also made improvements to Cheveley Park, where her husband's famous stud operated,^[5] and influenced the building of York House on the Mall on behalf of Prince Frederick, Duke of York and Albany, the brother of King George IV, with whom she had an intimate relationship.^[6]

She died, aged 45, of "an inflammation of the chest", and was buried in the family vault at Bottesford. A statue of her was later erected at the castle.^[7] A pencil portrait of her, by Henry Bone, after John Hoppner, is held by the National Portrait Gallery.^[4]

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