Sir George Bowyer, 6th Baronet

Sir George Bowyer, 6th and 2nd Baronet, KStJ, GCSG, KCPO (3 March 1783 – 1 July 1860),[1] was a British politician. He sat in the House of Commons in two periods between 1807 and 1818, first as a Tory[2] and then as a Whig.[3]

He was the son of Admiral Sir George Bowyer, 5th Baronet, and his second wife Henrietta Brett, daughter of Admiral Sir Piercy Brett,[4] and was born at Radley Hall in Berkshire.[5]

In 1800, he succeeded his father as baronet.[1] Bowyer was educated at Christ Church, Oxford, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in 1804 and a Master of Arts in 1807.[6]

At the 1807 general election, Bowyer was elected in the Tory interest as a Member of Parliament (MP) for Malmesbury,[2] a seat which he held until his resignation in 1810[7] by appointment as Steward of the Manor of East Hendred.[8]

He returned to Parliament the following year as a Whig, when he was elected at an unopposed by-election in June 1811 as the MP for Abingdon, following the resignation of Henry Bowyer.[3][9] He was re-elected in 1812, defeating his Tory opponent by a margin of 112 votes to 11,[3] and held the seat until the 1818 general election.[10] In 1815, financial difficulties forced him to sell the contents of Radley Hall.[11] As a consequence, he moved with his family to Italy, converting to Roman Catholicism in 1850.[11]

On 19 November 1808, he married Anne Hammond Douglas, oldest daughter of Captain Sir Andrew Snape Douglas.[12] They had three sons and a daughter.[13]

Death

Bowyer died at Dresden in Germany, but was buried at Radley. He was succeeded in both baronetcies successively by his sons George and William.[5]

Honours

Bowyer was a Knight of the Venerable Order of Saint John (KStJ), a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St. Gregory the Great (GCSG) and a Knight Commander of the Order of Pius IX (KCPO).[14]

References

1. "Leigh Rayment - Baronetage". Retrieved 29 March 2009.
2. Stooks Smith, Henry (1973) [1844-1850]. Craig, F. W. S. (ed.). The Parliaments of England (2nd ed.). Chichester, UK: Parliamentary Research Services. p. 372. ISBN 0-900178-13-2.
3. Stooks Smith, p. 7.
4. Burke, John (1832). A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Peerage and Baronetage of the British Empire. vol. I (4th ed.). London, UK: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley. pp. 134–35.
5. "ThePeerage - Sir George Bowyer, 2nd/6th Bt". Retrieved 27 January 2009.
6. s:Alumni Oxonienses: the Members of the University of Oxford, 1715-1886/Bowyer, Sir George, Bart. (1)
7. Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs – Constituencies beginning with "M"
8. "No. 16339". The London Gazette. 3 February 1810. p. 178.
9. "No. 16499". The London Gazette. 25 June 1811. p. 1174.
10. Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs – Constituencies beginning with "A" (part 3)
11. "Radley History Club, Official Website - History". Retrieved 29 March 2009.
12. Debrett, John (1824). Debrett's Baronetage of England. vol. I (Fifth ed.). London, UK: G. Woodfall. p. 221.
13. Dod, Charles Roger Phipps (1848). The Peerage, Baronetage and Knightage of Great Britain and Ireland. London, UK: Whitaker and Co. pp. 101–02.
14. Gordon Gorman, Converts to Rome (1885), archive.org; accessed 17 April 2017.