Julia_Peel

Julia Peel

Julia Peel

Wife of the British Prime Minister


Julia, Lady Peel (1795–1859) was the wife of the British politician and Prime Minister Robert Peel. She was the daughter of the army officer Sir John Floyd, 1st Baronet and his wife Rebecca Darke. She became engaged to Peel, recently the Chief Secretary of Ireland, in March 1820 and the couple married on 8 June that year.[1] He went on to serve twice as Prime Minister from 1834 to 1834 and again from 1841 to 1846 and she functioned as his hostess as Spouse of the prime minister of the United Kingdom. Her husband also spent a number years as Leader of the Opposition along with his ally the Duke of Wellington. She outlived her husband by nine years, dying in 1859.

Portrait of Julia, Lady Peel by Sir Thomas Lawrence, 1827.

They had seven children:[2]

  • Julia Peel (30 April 1821 – 14 August 1893). She married George Child Villiers, 6th Earl of Jersey, on 12 July 1841. They had five children. She married her second husband, Charles Brandling, on 12 September 1865.
  • Sir Robert Peel, 3rd Baronet (4 May 1822 – 9 May 1895). He married Lady Emily Hay on 17 June 1856. They had five children.
  • Sir Frederick Peel (26 October 1823 – 6 June 1906). He married Elizabeth Shelley (niece of the poet Percy Shelley through his brother John: died 30 July 1865) on 12 August 1857. He was remarried to Janet Pleydell-Bouverie on 3 September 1879.
  • Sir William Peel (2 November 1824 – 27 April 1858).
  • John Floyd Peel (24 May 1827 – 21 April 1910). He married Annie Jenny in 1851.
  • Arthur Wellesley Peel, 1st Viscount Peel (3 August 1829 – 24 October 1912). He married Adelaide Dugdale, daughter of William Stratford Dugdale and Harriet Ella Portman, on 14 August 1862. They had seven children. In 1895 he became Viscount Peel and was father of the first Earl Peel.
  • Eliza Peel (c.1832 – April 1883). She married Hon. Francis Stonor (son of Thomas Stonor, 3rd Baron Camoys) on 25 September 1855. They had four children.

Her 1827 portrait by Sir Thomas Lawrence, then President of the Royal Academy, is now in the Frick Collection in New York City.[3]


References

  1. Lever p.74
  2. Mosley, Charles, ed. (2003). Burke's Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage. Vol. 1 (107th ed.). Wilmington, Delaware, U.S.: Burke's Peerage (Genealogical Books) Ltd. p. 659.

Bibliography

  • Gash, Norman. Mr Secretary Peel: The Life of Sir Robert Peel to 1830. Faber & Faber, 2011.
  • Lever, Tresham. The Life and Time of Sir Robert Peel. G. Allen & Unwin Limited, 1942.

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